Consumer protection defence before the SIC

The two routes by which the SIC arrives

The Superintendence of Industry and Commerce plays two distinct roles in consumer matters, and confusing them is expensive. As an administrative authority it supervises compliance with the Consumer Statute: it requests information, runs enquiries and can open an action that ends in a penalty. As a judge it decides the claims consumers bring under the consumer protection action, where what is at stake is, for example, enforcement of the warranty, a refund, or delivery of what was advertised.

The two scenarios have their own deadlines, different evidentiary demands and different consequences. We take on the defence in both and, where one set of facts opens both fronts, we coordinate a single position so the company does not say different things in each file.

First, rebuild the file

Before drafting anything, you have to know what happened, and that is almost never in one place. We reconstruct the whole consumer relationship with the teams involved.

• What was offered: the advertising, the product page, the quotation or the sales script.
• What was agreed: the terms accepted, the signed contract and the record of acceptance.
• What was delivered: invoice, dispatch note, proof of delivery and the condition of the product or service.
• What was answered: earlier claims, response times and commitments made by the service team.
• What the contracts with suppliers, manufacturers, platforms and carriers say about who answers.

That work defines the institutional position. Without it, the reply is built on the version of whoever answered an email first.

What we do at each stage

1. Information requests. We confirm the applicable deadline and the real scope of what is being asked, and prepare a complete answer that does not open new fronts.
2. Administrative action. We reply, submit and challenge evidence, and sustain the company's position through to the decision.
3. Consumer protection claim. We answer the claim, raise the appropriate defences, request and submit evidence and represent the company at hearings.
4. Joining third parties. Where the party who should answer is the manufacturer, the importer, the platform or the carrier, we raise it at the procedural moment when it can be raised.
5. Settlement. We assess with numbers when it makes sense to resolve the case and how to document that agreement so it genuinely closes the matter.
6. Appeals. We file the available appeals against the decision and give a written opinion on the routes that follow.

What the file teaches goes back into the operation

A case, won or lost, shows where the problem sits: in the sales script, in a clause, in a response time or in a supplier. When we close the matter we hand over the concrete corrections that prevent the next identical case, because consumer claims are almost never one-off: they arrive in series.

What the client receives

• A map of the matter: what is being disputed, at what stage, which deadlines are running and what scenarios exist.
• The reconstructed and organised file, which is the asset that serves this case and the ones that follow.
• The responses, defences, evidence requests and submissions filed on their behalf.
• Representation at the hearings and procedural steps that take place.
• A written analysis of the options, with the risk and cost of each, before the decision is made.
• The operational and documentary corrections that follow from the case.

Typical situations we handle

• An information request arrives and the company does not know how much of what is asked it has to hand over.
• A consumer sues on the warranty and the product was made or imported by a third party.
• A campaign that already closed generates several claims running the same argument.
• The company is sued over a sale made through a third-party platform.