Overview
- The EU‑driven law entered into force on Friday, June 19, 2026, and adds § 356a to the German Civil Code to make an electronic withdrawal function mandatory for many business‑to‑consumer online contracts.
- The function must be clearly visible, easy to find, available for the statutory 14‑day withdrawal period, and operate as a two‑step flow that does not require a login or a reason from the consumer.
- The rule covers almost all B2C online sales and services and makes platform operators responsible for marketplace implementations, while standard exclusions remain for custom goods, perishable items, opened hygiene products, many travel tickets and some sealed media.
- Trade groups warn the mandate will raise compliance costs for smaller sellers, create technical, accessibility and data‑protection challenges, and risk bot‑driven misuse; failing to meet the law’s placement and data‑minimisation rules can trigger warnings or legal sanctions.
- The legislative package also ends some paper‑document duties and narrows long extended withdrawal windows for certain financial products, and regulators and courts now become the centre of attention for enforcement and platform rollout issues.