European Union consumer complaint data

How complaint data is organised in the EU

Consumer complaints in the EU are handled at several levels. ECC-Net is a network of independently managed offices co-funded by the European Commission. It helps consumers with disputes involving sellers in another EU country, Iceland or Norway, and consumers contact the centre in their country of residence ¹.

FIN-NET was set up by the European Commission in 2001. Its members settle consumer complaints about financial services out of court and cooperate on cross-border disputes under a memorandum of understanding ³. The Commission's Consumer Redress portal lists ADR bodies that offer out-of-court procedures for consumer disputes ⁴.

Each of these sources counts something different. An ECC-Net enquiry, an ADR dispute and a complaint to a national regulator are not the same record, so the figures should not be added together ^{2,6 7}.

ECC-Net cross-border figures

The ECC-Net Report 2023 says the network's legal experts gave individual answers to 124,119 enquiries, and almost 125,000 consumers sent a request for intervention to their local centre ². It reports 8,821,728 € recovered for consumers and says 60% of cross-border consumer complaints could be resolved amicably by the centres ². Air travel was the one sector given a figure, with over 22,000 requests about international flights ².

The Commission's ECC-Net page gives rounded 2023 figures that differ from the report. It says the network assisted over 125,000 consumers, intermediated directly with traders in 22,500 cases and recovered more than EUR 9 million ¹. The report was published on 3 July 2024 ¹. The page and the report are both quoted here as printed.

In the report itself, the table of enquiries by consumer country adds up to its printed total of 124,119. The table by trader country prints the same total of 124,119, but the 29 country entries in that column add up to 21,430. The report does not explain the difference ².

Ireland: Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman

The FSPO's Overview of Complaints 2025 reports 7,004 complaints received, a 13% rise on 2024, and 6,282 complaints closed ⁵. Its decisions are legally binding on both parties, and the only route of appeal is to the High Court ⁵.

Ireland under the EU ADR rules

The FSPO publishes a separate ADR activities report under S.I. No. 343/2015, the European Union (Alternative Dispute Resolution for Consumer Disputes) Regulations 2015 ⁶. For 2025 it reports that 1,521 of the 2,586 complaints closed by its Dispute Resolution Services reached a mediation settlement, 59% ⁶. It says 88% of complaints closed in 2025 were closed within 12 months, and the average time was 8.3 months ⁶.

The report flags disputed transactions, including fraud and unauthorised withdrawals, as 34% of banking complaints, or 1,297 complaints, up from 1,015 in 2024 ⁶.

Germany: BaFin complaint statistics

In a BaFin interview published on 4 May 2026 about its 2025 complaint statistics, BaFin's Consumer Protection Officer reported more than 46,400 complaints, over a third more than in 2024 ⁷. Banks drew 25,744 complaints, up from 22,123. Insurers drew 14,285 complaints and enquiries, up from 8,806, and securities drew 6,860 complaints, up from 5,910 ⁷.

BaFin does not resolve individual complaints or enforce individual claims. The officer says that is the job of dispute resolution entities and courts. BaFin uses complaints to spot structural problems ⁷. The officer says much of the insurer increase came from one individual case, so it is not a sector-wide trend ⁷.

Limits of EU complaint figures

• The latest ECC-Net annual report on the Commission page covers 2023 ¹.
• FIN-NET's page gives no cross-border complaint statistics ³.
• BaFin's insurer figures include enquiries, so they are not purely complaints ⁷.
• FSPO reports full outcome splits for tracker mortgage decisions only, and not for all decisions ⁵.