The IMI (Internal Market Information System), an electronic database and the related internet based information technology system, operated pursuant to Article 35 of Regulation (EU) 2017/2394 of 12 December 2017 on cooperation between national authorities responsible for the enforcement of consumer protection laws and repealing Regulation (EC) No 2006/2004, provides support for an effective and efficient relationship between the consumer protection authorities of Member States of the European Union.

Within the framework of the IMI, the authorities are entitled to diverse procedural actions set forth by the regulation above (for example to request information or enforcement measures, or to coordinate investigative and enforcement mechanisms) if they become aware of any intra-Union infringement, widespread infringement or widespread infringement with a Union dimension.

“Intra-Union infringement”: any act or omission contrary to Union laws that protect consumers’ interests that has done, does or is likely to do harm to the collective interests of consumers residing in a Member State other than the Member State in which:

  1. the act or omission originated or took place;
  2. the trader responsible for the act or omission is established; or
  3. evidence or assets of the trader pertaining to the act or omission are to be found;

“Widespread infringement”:

a) any act or omission contrary to Union laws that protect consumers’ interests that has done, does or is likely to do harm to the collective interests of consumers residing in at least two Member States other than the Member State in which:

  1. the act or omission originated or took place;
  2. the trader responsible for the act or omission is established; or
  3. evidence or assets of the trader pertaining to the act or omission are to be found; or

b) any acts or omissions contrary to Union laws that protect consumers’ interests that have done, do or are likely to do harm to the collective interests of consumers and that have common features, including the same unlawful practice, the same interest being infringed and that are occurring concurrently, committed by the same trader, in at least three Member States.

“Widespread infringement with a Union dimension”: a widespread infringement that has done, does or is likely to do harm to the collective interests of consumers in at least two-thirds of the Member States, accounting, together, for at least two-thirds of the population of the Union.

Each Member State has had to designate the competent authorities and the single liaison office responsible for the application of the regulation, since the system consists of communication among tese bodies.

The most important regulations regarding the procedure to be followed by the Hungarian Competition Authority during the application of this regulation are set forth in Chapter XI/B of the Hungarian Competition Act, according to which

a) if the Hungarian Competition Authority is requested to supply information pursuant to Article 11 of Regulation (EU) No 2017/2394, a competition supervision proceeding shall be initiated for this purpose, in such cases the proceeding shall be closed by the injunction of the case handler about the transmission of the information collected;

b) if the case handler or the competition council proceeding in the case requests enforcement measures to be taken pursuant to Article 12 of Regulation (EU) 2017/2394, it may, with reference to this fact, terminate the competition supervision proceeding.