Who actually sells this?

On the big retailers you are often not buying from the retailer. That changes who you go to when something goes wrong - and it is on the page, in small type.

Amazon, bol, Fnac and most large retailers sell two things side by side: their own stock, and that of thousands of third-party sellers using their platform. On a product page they look identical. In terms of your rights they are not.

The information is there, somewhere under the buy button, in two lines. "Sold by" is the party you form a contract with. "Shipped by" is whoever packs and sends the parcel. Those are frequently not the same: a third-party seller can outsource storage and dispatch to the platform, so you buy from them while Amazon delivers.

Why this matters: your legal guarantee and your right of withdrawal run against the seller, not against the platform. If the product fails after a year, the third-party seller is the one who must repair or replace it - even though the parcel came from the platform's warehouse. If that seller does not answer, you are dealing with a company that may be outside Europe, and only then do you discover which question you should have asked before ordering.

Platforms lay their own safety net over this: a buyer protection or satisfaction guarantee that in practice often resolves things faster than the law would. Just know what it is. That is platform policy, not a legal right. It can change, it has exclusions, and it is not what you fall back on when it is refused.

Since December 2024 there is one more handle. The EU's General Product Safety Regulation requires a listing to name the manufacturer with an address, and for goods made outside the EU, a responsible person inside it. That is who can be approached if something is wrong with the product itself. A listing missing all of that is not compliant - and that is a usable signal long before you have ordered anything.

In practice this comes down to a single action. Before you order, look at who the seller is and open their page: it carries their address, their returns policy and other buyers' ratings of *them*, not of the product. A seller with no address, no history and a name made of random letters tells you enough. On an expensive purchase it is the most useful minute of the whole checkout.

And counterfeits belong on no marketplace at all. If you think you have received one, report it to the platform and the seller straight away: that is exactly the case buyer protection exists for.

Questions

Is the platform liable if the seller does not deliver?

Legally your claim is against the seller. Most platforms additionally offer their own buyer protection, but that is policy rather than a legal right.

How do I see who the seller is?

Under the buy button it says "sold by" and "shipped by". The first is the party you contract with; click the name for their address, returns policy and ratings.

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