WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline) — The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has announced final amendments to its Disclosure Rule and Pre-Sale Availability Rule that affects the E-Warranty Act.
The Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act (MMWA), enacted in 1975, includes a disclosure rule promulgated by the FTC that provides specific rules for written warranties on products costing more than $15. The guidelines also specify language for certain disclosures and mandate simple language in a single document.
The FTC also promulgated the Pre-Sale Availability Rule under the MMWA, which details how warrantors and sellers must give the terms of a warranty before selling a product.
In 2015, the E-Warranty Act was created, amending the MMWA and making it so that warrantors could post their terms online. To post online, however, the warrantor needed to provide a non-Internet-based method as well. The new act also allowed select sellers to use electronic methods to display terms of warranty pre-sale.
In 2016, the FTC developed proposed amendments that finalized how a warrantor could display terms online. Under the amendment, warrantors will need to provide information on how a consumer can gain access to non-Internet-based warranty information.
Sellers can supply pre-sale warranty terms online or through conventional means – if the warrantor has chosen to display its warranty terms online. The FTC sought public comment on the rule in May, and now has approved the rule in the Federal Register Notice.