Global Class Actions

The landscape of consumer class actions in Germany has continued to flourish in 2025, particularly under the Consumer Rights Enforcement Act (VDuG). The number of class actions has increased, with four new actions published in the register of representative actions (Verbandsklagenregister) in the first half of this year alone. These actions include the new possibility of bringing motions for redress rulings as well as the continued use of motions for declaratory rulings on liability. The increasing use of redress motions confirms a growing willingness among consumer associations to utilize these legal mechanisms and address consumer redress topics.

Consumer associations remain committed to investigating new issues. Currently, the emphasis appears to be placed on enforcing compliance with data protection regulations among the providers of social media platforms. Nevertheless, they have not yet initiated actions for all prospective matters. This proactive approach suggests that consumer associations are actively seeking to expand the scope of consumer protection and are likely to bring forward even more new cases in the future.

These developments highlight a dynamic shift towards more representative consumer advocacy, with associations leveraging the VDuG to hold companies accountable for consumer rights infringements. The increase in class actions reflects a broader trend of empowering consumers and enhancing their ability to seek collective redress by declaring their opt-in to these actions.

Looking ahead to 2026 and beyond, several trends are poised to shape the consumer class action landscape in Germany. While the VDuG has facilitated several actions in the past two years, there is still limited experience with certain features of the new procedure for redress (Abhilfeklage) in court, due to the lengthy nature of civil proceedings. Key aspects to monitor remain the effect of the extended consumer opt-in period beyond the hearing date, the potential for court-approved settlements after the ruling on the merits, and the enforcement procedure (Sachwalterverfahren).

Consumer associations' willingness to sue has still not yet fully expanded their actions to encompass the entire scope of Annex I of Directive (EU) 2020/1828. As the scope of potential actions in Germany is broader than the Directive, we may witness the emergence of new topics and subject matters. Additionally, the absence of cross-border interventions in VDuG matters thus far leaves open potential future developments in this area.

To prepare, companies should closely monitor pending class actions and assess whether similar claims could be asserted against them. Historically, many class actions have revisited topics previously addressed against other defendants. Companies should also pay attention to announcements by qualified plaintiffs regarding topics they are investigating or seeking concerned consumers for. Requests for cease-and-desist letters from consumer associations could serve as early warning signs of potential collective redress actions.

Furthermore, companies should be ready to manage the cumulative impact of various legal actions, including injunctive actions, individual consumer redress (potentially as mass litigation), and opt-in class actions. By staying vigilant and proactive, companies can better navigate the evolving legal landscape and mitigate potential risks associated with consumer class actions.

Following a record year in 2024, Italy's consumer class action landscape has experienced a slight deceleration in 2025.

While comprehensive data remains pending as the year concludes, preliminary statistics indicate a reduction in new filings.

Proceedings encompass both domestic class actions (introduced in 2019) and European-inspired representative actions, with the latter predominating, and Consumer associations continue to serve as the primary catalysts for most cases.

Sectoral Focus Areas

Representative Actions Address:

• Regulatory Breaches: Three actions filed, including two against professional football clubs for failing to provide mandatory free tickets to minors, and one against a cigarette retailer for unlawful e-cigarette advertising
• Unfair Contractual Terms: Three actions targeting car rental companies and financial institutions over allegedly unconscionable standard agreement clauses
• Deceptive Commercial Practices: Consumer association litigation against an airline for allegedly unlawful check-in fees, seeking both injunctive and monetary relief

Traditional Class Actions Focus On:

• Breach of Contract: Users pursuing a travel agency for fraudulent vacation package sales
• Regulatory Non-Compliance: Municipal action for unlawful traffic fine imposition

Current Case Status: Two of the reported representative actions – against a car rental company and a football club – have been declared admissible and are pending on the merits, while all other cases, both class and representative actions, are still waiting for a decision on the admissibility of the claim.

Notable 2025 developments in prior-year cases include one representative action dismissal for inadmissibility, termination of the "greenwashing" case (likely through settlement), and appellate rejection of the malfunction claim against a fintech platform.

Current indicators suggest continued expansion of consumer class actions, representative actions in particular, despite year-to-year variations. Consumer association activism increasingly targets:

• Financial Services: Consumer credit companies are facing challenges over unfair terms and misleading practices
• Utilities Sector: Telecommunications, energy providers confronting regulatory compliance actions
• Automotive Industry: Manufacturers, distributors, and rental companies addressing product defect and contractual practice claims

Emerging Legal Frontiers

ESG Integration: Current indicators suggest continued expansion of consumer class actions, representative actions in particular, despite year-to-year variations. Consumer association activism increasingly targets the Financial Services, Utilities, and Automotive sectors.

Technology-Driven Litigation: Accelerating technological advancement will likely generate increased claims concerning:

• Data breach damages and platform outages
• "AI-washing" or "tech-washing" misrepresentation of artificial intelligence and technology capabilities

Strategic Corporate Preparation Framework:

1. Comprehensive Compliance Monitoring: Implement robust systems ensuring adherence to consumer protection, data privacy, product safety, and sector-specific regulations across all operational areas with collective litigation exposure.
2. Market Intelligence and Early Warning Systems: Recent experience demonstrates systematic targeting patterns among representative bodies, who methodically identify market vulnerabilities and pursue sequential company actions. Maintaining sophisticated monitoring capabilities – preferably through external legal counsel engagement – enables proactive litigation management.
3. Pre-Litigation Resolution Strategies: Pre-filing dialogue requirements (particularly for representative actions) present strategic settlement opportunities. Comprehensive cost-benefit analysis often facilitates dispute prevention or amicable resolution, avoiding substantial collective proceeding expenses, including claims exposure, legal fees, court costs, mandatory judgment publication in national media, and customer communication campaigns.
4. Enhanced Document Management and Disclosure Preparation: While Italian procedure excludes discovery mechanisms, collective redress frameworks permit expanded document disclosure requirements. Companies should establish comprehensive document retention and production protocols in advance of potential litigation.

In 2025, Mexico's judicial reform replaced career judicial appointments with judges elected by popular vote, significantly reshaping the structure and functioning of the judicial system. Additionally, Mexico’s class action system faced significant challenges: strict commonality requirements, the opt-in model, and protracted appeals processes often delay justice. For consumer companies, these dynamics mean that defending against class actions in Mexico requires both long-term litigation planning and close monitoring of evolving judicial priorities, as uncertainty in the courts can directly impact brand reputation and financial exposure.

In the wake of this judicial reform, consumer companies should prepare for increased unpredictability in how consumer rights are interpreted and enforced, as popular pressures may shape judicial decision-making in ways that directly affect product liability, advertising, and contractual disputes. Proactive compliance and robust defense strategies will be essential for companies navigating this environment.

The English consumer class action landscape has experienced continued growth during 2024. This can partly be attributed to the growing availability and sophistication of litigation funding, enabling more consumers and claimant firms to pursue collective redress. Activism by consumer advocacy groups in a range of areas, sometimes on a pan-European basis, has also contributed to the expansion of consumer class action claims. Many groups in England and Europe collaborate in relation to the enforcement of consumer protection law. The English landscape is also — and inevitably — influenced by developments in the US. 

The English courts have a range of innovative and flexible mechanisms for the management of such claims. The goal includes trying to manage the burden that consumer claims create for the judicial system and the overall legal costs involved in bringing and defending such claims. Throughout 2024, we have seen developments in a broad range of consumer claims managed under Group Litigation Orders (GLOs), 'same interest' representative actions, as well as Collective Proceedings Order (CPOs) before the Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT) (usually on an 'opt-out' basis).

The use of the CAT is increasingly popular for consumer claims that allege an abuse of market dominance by the defendants. 2024 was not without its setbacks for claimants. Defendants defeated the first opt-out consumer class action to reach judgment; a litigation funder tried unsuccessfully to block a £200m settlement of a consumer class action whose headline value was £10bn. The English courts also provided some welcome guidance on the operation of representative actions.  

The use of group proceedings — the relatively recently introduced procedural regime — took off in Scotland in 2024, with a series of consumer greenwashing claims against diesel manufacturers proceeding.

Collective actions will continue to rise, as will third-party funding of consumer claims. England's legal and procedural framework increasingly supports different mechanisms that enable collective redress and the number of such cases will continue to increase. 

We anticipate significant group litigation under the recent Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act, which significantly expands consumer protection law in this jurisdiction, which could be in the CAT under CPOs, or added to claims managed under GLOs. The English government is reviewing our domestic product safety regulation framework in the context of the Product Regulation and Metrology Bill. More rights may soon accrue to consumers, and with them, more angles to bring collective actions. 

Litigation funders' assets are increasing, with market participation from a wider pool of participants. The English courts are a center for environmental claims against businesses. 

As AI functions become increasingly integrated with consumer products and services, and the UK begins to establish and clarify the regulatory framework, we expect a new category of consumer collective action to emerge.

In 2024, we saw a continued rise in consumer class actions, with contamination cases remaining at the forefront. These lawsuits have hit various consumer industries, including food, household, and personal products. Particular attention continues to focus on PFAS chemicals, a class of synthetic chemicals used in a variety of industrial and consumer products. Although Plaintiffs’ lawyers have been suing over PFAS for years, the earlier litigations were environmental contamination cases. In recent years, as regulations and awareness of PFAS have expanded, so too have the companies and industries targeted and the types of PFAS-related claims asserted. Consumer activists and certain plaintiffs’ law firms have initiated aggressive campaigns to test entire categories of consumer products, apparel, cosmetics, beverages, and food packaging materials for the presence of PFAS and expose the results. Lawsuits have quickly followed. Today, if PFAS are found in a company’s finished product — even in trace amounts and/or as an unintentional consequence of environmental contamination — the company is at risk of litigation. 

Typically, plaintiffs allege that a product’s label was false or misleading because the product contains PFAS but was marketed as “all natural,” “safe,” “sustainable,” or “free of toxic chemicals,” among other representations. Many PFAS plaintiffs rely on testing co-opted from third-party sources (e.g., Consumer Reports, bloggers, non-profit organizations), while others conduct independent testing through third-party labs. These testing results may be influenced by contamination during the testing or sampling process or by interference from non-PFAS substances that can mimic a positive PFAS result. The results often suggest that products were subject to inadvertent PFAS contamination during the manufacturing process or afterwards. In fact, many companies faced with this litigation are unaware that their products contain PFAS.  

These claims survive motions to dismiss in many cases so far. For example, in a class action alleging that anti-fog spray was marketed as “safe for use” even though it purportedly contained PFAS, the court held that whether a reasonable consumer would interpret those representations as relating to PFAS was a question of fact that could not be resolved at the motion to dismiss stage. Recently, courts are more likely to grant a motion to dismiss for lack of standing if a plaintiffs fail to allege that they tested their own purchases for PFAS, directly.

Consumer class actions based on alleged product contamination, such as PFAS, lead, and other heavy metals, continue to be a focus of the Plaintiffs’ Bar. In addition, several ingredient class action lawsuits have been filed alleging that companies are misleading consumers by claiming their products are “natural” or “preservative-free” when they are alleged to contain unnatural ingredients such as ascorbic or citric acid. Given the risk of contamination/ingredient litigation, companies should conduct a review of all labelling, marketing, and commercial claims to ensure that they are truthful, not misleading, not deceptive, and have adequate substantiation/support. Be mindful of PFAS-related claims. Consumer companies should also require suppliers to provide certifications that PFAS is not used in the manufacture of their products and consider whether it is appropriate to require suppliers to conduct periodic testing. Finally, consumer companies should consider testing raw materials and/or finished products as part of the quality system, and take steps to remove or warn as appropriate.