The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has issued guidance on how to comply with consumer law when deploying AI agents. It says that using AI agents can help make a business model more productive and efficient, while also improving the customer experience. However, to benefit fully from agentic AI, the CMA says that businesses need to use it responsibly and in compliance with consumer law. It points out that if customers do not have trust or have confidence in AI or AI-driven services, they are less likely to use them and benefit from them, and any innovative use of AI may not reach its full potential.
When it comes to dealing with customers, the same consumer law rules apply whether using AI or human agents and the CMA points out that businesses are responsible for their agents even if they were designed or provided by a third party.
The CMA advises that businesses should be clear and open about how they use AI agents. Consumer laws require businesses to give consumers the information they need to make informed decisions, and to not mislead them. It says:
“If you use an AI agent, consider whether you need to label it so you do not mislead customers into thinking that a service is being provided by a real person – if the fact they are dealing with AI rather than a person might affect people’s decisions then you should tell them. Do not overstate the role or AI involved in providing a service, or what it can or cannot do.”
The CMA also advises businesses to train AI agents to comply with consumer law. Businesses should think about what data an AI agent will need, and how it will be prompted to respect customers’ statutory rights and the terms of contracts (for example to make sure cancellation rights aren’t being breached); avoid misleading customers (both through acts and omissions) and properly obtain any necessary consents required by consumer law
Testing is a crucial part of training AI agents. Businesses should use the results of any testing to check and if necessary, improve the AI agent’s performance before they deploy it. The CMA also advises businesses to make sure that they monitor how their AI agents are performing and checking that they are delivering the right results, behaving as intended and complying with consumer law
It points out that some AI models can hallucinate results that are nonsensical or inaccurate and therefore human oversight is important to catch mistakes and ensure that AI agents are completing tasks in a legally compliant way. If an AI agent is not performing as expected, businesses need to act quickly to address the problem, for example by refining prompts or workflows. It’s especially important to act quickly if an AI agent interacts with large numbers of people (or its outputs could reach a lot of people) or vulnerable customers.
The CMA points out that if traders breach consumer protection law, they could ultimately be fined up to 10% of their worldwide turnover, and possibly be required to compensate affected consumers.
The CMA has also issued research on agentic AI in a consumer context and it could affect consumers’ lives, how the law applies, and what businesses should do to mitigate risk.
