EU Directive on Distance Marketing of Financial Services: One month to the transposition deadline

There is now just over a month to go until the deadline for transposing the EU Directive on financial services contracts concluded at a distance (EU Directive 2023/2673) (the “2023 Directive”), with legislation giving effect to the 2023 Directive then applying from 19 June 2026. The 2023 Directive, which repeals and amends existing legislation, imposes obligations around the information to be provided and rights that must be granted when entering into distance contracts with consumers for the supply of financial services (“FS distance contracts”). 

Read our briefing note on our Knowledge Portal for more detail on the key features and areas of focus for firms.

Overview

The 2023 Directive repeals the current Directive governing distance marketing of consumer financial services (Directive 2002/65/EC) and amends the EU Consumer Rights Directive (Directive 2011/83/EU), which did not previously apply to financial services, such that certain additional consumer protection obligations now also apply in the financial services context. The purpose of these amendments is to consolidate and streamline the existing legislation, whilst also updating the legislative framework to better align with market developments (in particular, rapid technological developments and digitalisation of financial services contracts). 

Timing and next steps

The deadline for transposing the 2023 Directive is 19 December 2025, although draft transposing legislation still needs to be finalised in a number of jurisdictions. Therefore, the extent to which Member States goldplate the requirements in the 2023 Directive remains to be seen. 

Once transposed, the obligations set out in the 2023 Directive will apply from 19 June 2026 onwards.