Newsletter
FAIR TRADE COMMISSION ISSUES PRINCIPLES FOR TERMINATING INVESTIGATIONS FOLLOWING SETTLEMENTS BETWEEN PARTIES
The Fair Trade Commission (FTC) of the Executive Yuan recently established principles for determining whether amicable settlements reached between parties in cases arising under Article 20 (counterfeit activities) and Article 21 (misleading advertisement) of the Fair Trade Law (FTL) should terminate the FTC's consideration of those cases. These principles are as follows:
The FTC should not discontinue investigations of cases which affect market order and public welfare, no matter at what stage of an investigation the parties withdraw their case.
Cases having little bearing on market order or public welfare should be handled in the following manner according to the stage of the FTC investigation:
1.If the complainant has not submitted evidence or if the complainant has already submitted evidence but the FTC has not investigated the evidence, the FTC may make an initial decision that there is no violation of law and terminate its investigation.
2.If the FTC has already reviewed the evidence and finds that there is no violation or connection to the FTL, the FTC may terminate the investigation.
Even if there is a violation of the FTL, if the respondent promises not to repeat the same or similar act and agrees with the complainant to resolve their dispute, the FTC may terminate the investigation.
If the respondent does not promise not to repeat the same or similar act and only agrees with the complainant to resolve their dispute, since the act is not ceased with the possibility of harming the market order, the FTC should continue the investigation.
The FTC should continue with the disposition of cases when the investigations are completed and violations of the FTL are found, regardless of the withdrawal of the case by the complainant.