FAS opened a case against the project “Roskontrol” because of the prefix

FAS suspected the Roskontrol project of unfair competition due to the prefix “ros-“

This is a non-state control system that evaluates the quality of goods. The FAS came to the conclusion that due to the prefix “ros-” in the project name, consumers may think that the goods were evaluated by a government agency, but this is not so.

FAS opened a case of unfair competition against companies that are part of the non-state project “Roskontrol”, specializing in checking the quality of goods, report “News”.

The service confirmed that the case was opened at the end of 2021 against three companies implementing the Roscontrol project: ANO National Institute for Expertise and Quality Control, ROO ZPP Consumer Union R.O.S. Control (the creator of the independent control system quality), JSC “Agency” RK-Media “(administrator of the site” Roskontrol “). The case was filed under Art. 14.2 of the Law “On Protection of Competition”.

According to the service, a statement was received there from the Association of Consumers of Russia, which spoke of a violation of competition law by the Clean Line company. The association clarified that the company uses the Roskontrol quality mark on the packaging, which is put not by a state structure, but by a project that assesses the quality of goods on a voluntary basis.

The FAS, in turn, came to the conclusion that the prefix “ros-”, which this system uses, causes consumers to associate with the system of state quality control, although the state does not participate in it. They also concluded that this could provide a competitive advantage in the market for voluntary certification systems.