GVH – ÖRT workshop: guidelines for compliant communication

This article is available for reading in Trade magazin 2026/04

Ildikó Fazekas, the director of ÖRT and Csaba Balázs Rigó, the president of GVH opened the webinar. Dr Andrea Basa, head of the consumer protection office at GVH reviewed the most common risk points, with the focus on price communication and the handling of essential information.

In influencer campaigns, the platform’s logic drives the content; compliance ultimately depends on whether the disclosure is noticeable within the rhythm of consumption

Where communication goes wrong

Ildikó Fazekas
director
ÖRT

A significant proportion of the mistakes don’t start from a “far out” idea, but from systemic errors: there is no designated person responsible for what a claim is based on, where the conditions are checked, and how to ensure that the different channels convey the same message. ÖRT’s approach is that “preliminary compliance” isn’t an additional administrative burden, but a risk-reducing practice. GVH’s take on this is that the authority’s experience is useful if it can be translated into day-to-day decisions.

Csaba Balázs Rigó 
president
GVH

Csaba Balázs Rigó spoke about how cooperation in a consumer protection case has specific procedural consequences. If a company acknowledges the violation and substantially assists in clarifying the facts, this can speed up the closure of the case and may also result in lower fines. In 2025 18 consumer protection proceedings were concluded, with a total of HUF 944.2m in fines and approximately HUF 800m in consumer compensation.

Cheap… but compared to what?

Dr. Andrea Basa
head of consumer
protection section
GVH

A typical mistake in price communication is when a platform tries to do too many things at once: multiple prices, multiple discount logic, percentages, time limits, countdown timers – while it isn’t clear what is cheap compared to what, what exactly the promise applies to, and under what conditions the offer can’t be interpreted correctly.

In this context “dark patterns” are solutions that urge or divert decisions: they speed things up, but at the same time dilute the essential information. Coupons are a particular minefield: if the minimum basket value, excluded product range or time limit aren’t immediately understandable, the coupon can easily become a general promise in the consumer’s mind. In influencer campaigns advertising disclosure won’t be OK just because it appears “somewhere”, but because the consumer actually notices it – there and then, when they interpret the content.

Green claims on shaky ground

When it comes to green claims, the essence of the investigation isn’t to hunt for words, but to determine whether the claim can be verified and whether it remains true in the overall context of the communication. Green claims can also carry the risk of greenwashing: when there is no real substance behind the environmentally friendly image or the message is so general that the consumer doesn’t know exactly what it means and what it refers to. Misunderstanding often occurs not because of a single sentence or expression, but the packaging: green colour codes, icons, evocative adjectives, and programme-like references together create the impression that the given product is greener, while the specific content doesn’t add up to a verifiable claim.

Zsolt Gerendi
head of operations
ÖRT

“ÖRT will continue to cooperate with other authorities on the basis of knowledge sharing in order to provide its members with up-to-date, usable support and to strengthen ethical and lawful advertising practices”,

said Zsolt Gerendi, secretary general of ÖRT in his closing remarks.