Verdict: Medion is not allowed to advertise the Alditalk basic tariff with “no minimum sales”.
The Essen Regional Court has prohibited Medion from promoting Alditalk’s prepaid basic tariff as a product without a minimum turnover. Everything else is misleading.
The consumer goods manufacturer Medion has misled customers by advertising Alditalk’s basic prepaid tariff on the Internet with the statement “no minimum sales”. That was the decision of the Essen Regional Court in a judgment that has now been published on May 30 following a lawsuit by the Federal Association of Consumer Organizations (vzbv) (Az.: 1 O 314/21). Medion AG is therefore no longer allowed to market the Aldi brand with the reference. In fact, customers have to keep buying new credit to make calls and be reachable on their cell phones.
The tariff is characterized in that after activation of the SIM card, the starting capital can initially only be used within an activity window of twelve months. After that, consumers can only be reached on their mobile phones for two months. Then your SIM card will be deactivated.
Minimum amounts and maximum balances
In order to continue to be accessible via mobile phone and to be able to make calls, customers have to extend their time window and top up their account with credit. The minimum amount is five euros, with which you win four months. Then the game starts all over again. If the maximum credit of 200 euros is reached, users are forced to “call” at least five euros from it. Before that, charging is no longer possible. The maximum activity window is 24 months.
According to the first civil chamber of the court, the advertising statement suggests that consumers would not have to make any further payments after purchasing the starter set in order to be permanently available. However, this is not the case, so that the customer approach complained of is anti-competitive and unfair. With the necessary fees for the extension of the active time, a minimum turnover is due in principle. The advertising slogan, on the other hand, suggests to consumers that in principle no regular payments are required to receive at least the passive use of the mobile phone card.
What Medion replied
Medion, on the other hand, held that the advertising claim made no statement about the contract period and, above all, did not promise an unlimited contract period. Effects on the question of the minimum term would only arise if existing credit would expire upon termination of the contract, which is not the case here.
But the judges didn’t agree. They ordered the defendant company to pay the vzbv a lump sum of 260 euros and to bear the costs of the legal dispute. The decision is not yet final, so an appeal is possible.
