The Trade Competition Commission (TCC) on Tuesday gave the nod to amended guidelines to regulate online food delivery after such services mushroomed during the Covid-19 lockdown that began in April.
The guidelines, which have already undergone public hearings for all stakeholders, aim to prevent unfair trade practices and keep online food delivery platforms from taking advantage of restaurants.
Santichai Santawanpas, commissioner of the Office of Trade Competition Commission, said that after the TCC's approval, the amended guidelines will be published in the Royal Gazette for enforcement.
The guidelines will include preliminary prohibition of unfair economic benefits such as unreasonable income-sharing charges and advertising and special sales promotion fees without proper rationale and clarity.
Food delivery platforms will be required to notify restaurant operators in advance of the reason and the need for changes to their service charges.
The guidelines also address trade conditions that restrict or hinder the operations of other businesses, such as determining conditions that restrict restaurant operators' rights by prohibiting food distribution to other food delivery operators unfairly.
The guidelines subject to amendment centre on three key issues: unclear definitions of online food delivery service providers; concerns about gross profit (GP) sharing; and concerns about exclusive deal conditions.
Under the amendments, online food delivery services are defined as food delivery service providers on digital platforms, a change from food delivery service providers on an electronic channel.
On the GP sharing issue, the previous version said GP should not be collected at a considerably excessive rate or varying rates among restaurants. The wording is changed to "the GP collection should not be unreasonably higher than the rate used to be collected and the rate collected should not unreasonably vary for restaurant operators who provide similar foods".
On the exclusive deal condition, the new version says an online food delivery service provider that has signed an exclusive pact with a particular restaurant cannot bar other operators from providing delivery services from such as a restaurant.
The guidelines will function as the code of conduct for food delivery services and restaurant businesses that rely on the digital platform.