CPA
Consumer Protection Act, 2008 (Act No. 68 of 2008)
The Act that decides what you may say to a customer, what you may put in your terms, what you owe when the goods or the service fail, and who pays when they cause harm.
Sections
19
Duties
29
Questions
52
Assessment from
R 31 500
What it covers
The Consumer Protection Act governs every transaction in South Africa in which goods or services are supplied to a consumer, and the promotion of those goods or services. It applies to a courier, a passenger carrier, a shop, a factory, a software business and a professional practice on the same terms, and there is no size threshold on the supplier's side. The only threshold is on the customer's: a juristic person whose asset value or annual turnover reaches the figure determined under s 6 is not a consumer for the purposes of the Act, which is why a business selling only to large companies is largely outside it and a business selling to the public is not. Chapter 2 sets out eight fundamental consumer rights, and each one is a list of things a supplier must or must not do. This assessment covers nineteen of those sections, grouped the way the Act groups them: the information you have to give (plain language, price, labelling, a sales record), the way you may market (no misleading representation, no unconscionable conduct, the disclosures direct marketing requires), the terms you may impose (nothing unfair, unreasonable or unjust, nothing in the prohibited list, and conspicuous advance notice of any term that shifts risk onto the customer), and what you owe when something fails (quality service, safe and good quality goods, a six month warranty, and liability for harm). Three of those provisions move real money and are the reason this record exists. Section 56(2) gives a consumer six months to return goods that fail the s 55 quality standard, at the supplier's risk and expense, and the choice between repair, replacement and a refund is the consumer's, not the supplier's. Section 61 makes the producer, importer, distributor and retailer of goods liable for death, injury, illness, property damage and the economic loss that follows, irrespective of negligence and jointly and severally, and s 61(2) treats a service provider who supplies, installs or provides access to goods as a supplier of those goods. Section 65(2) makes a supplier holding a consumer's prepayment, deposit or other property a trustee of it, bound to the care, diligence and skill expected of somebody managing another person's property and liable for any loss if it falls short. Section 51 is the one that voids documents. A term that waives a consumer's rights under the Act, that avoids a supplier's duty under it, that limits liability for gross negligence, that falsely records an acknowledgement, or that makes the consumer forfeit money the supplier is not entitled to, is void to the extent that it contravenes the section. A standard form contract written before 2011 and never revisited is the single most common finding in this assessment, and the business usually does not know because nothing happens until somebody relies on the clause. This assessment does not cover the National Consumer Commission's powers, the National Consumer Tribunal, consumer courts, accredited industry ombuds or the industry code machinery, because a business cannot comply with any of them. It also does not cover the regulations made under the Act: those are separate records in the library, including the Digital Commerce Regulations, which this record cites across to rather than restating.
Does this apply to you?
This applies to you if any part of what you sell is bought by a person, or by a small juristic person, in South Africa. There is no exemption for a small supplier and no exemption for a supplier that is not making a profit. Section 5(8) says so explicitly: the Act reaches you whether you are inside or outside the Republic, for profit or not, an individual, a company, a trust, an organ of state or a public private partnership.
The threshold is on your customer, not on you. Under s 5(2)(b) a transaction is outside the Act if the consumer is a juristic person whose asset value or annual turnover at the time of the transaction reaches the threshold determined by the Minister under s 6. The figure determined when the Act came into force was R2 million, and it has not been raised since, so check the current determination before relying on the number. Above it, a transaction with that company is outside the Act. Below it, and for every natural person, the transaction is inside. Most businesses have both kinds of customer and must answer this assessment for the consumer side of the book.
Four kinds of transaction are outside it even with a consumer: a supply to the State, a credit agreement under the National Credit Act, although the goods or services financed by it are still inside, services under an employment contract, and anything giving effect to a collective agreement. If you supply the State only, most of this record is not yours. If you finance your sales, the credit agreement is the National Credit Act's business and the goods remain this Act's.
Franchising is in, whatever the size of the franchisee. Section 5(6)(b) to (e) brings the solicitation, the offer, the agreement and the supply of goods to a franchisee inside the Act, and s 5(7) says the s 6 threshold does not save it.
Section 5(5) is the trap for a business that thinks it is exempt. Even where a transaction is exempt from the Act, the goods supplied under it and the importer, producer, distributor and retailer of those goods remain subject to ss 60 and 61. Product liability does not switch off because your customer was large.
Answer per product line and per document, not per company. The Act licenses nothing and certifies nothing, so there is no single thing to hold. What it does is test each document you give a customer, each claim you make, each term you impose and each thing you hold for them. A company level yes hides the one contract template still carrying a 2009 indemnity and the one product line with no instructions in the box.
Where this text comes from
Transcribed 2026-10-20. Check the provision against the source before relying on it in a filing.
What non-compliance costs
The Act has no general offence for contravening a duty. That makes it easy to misjudge, because the exposure is civil and administrative rather than criminal, and it is larger than a fine.
Under s 112 the National Consumer Tribunal may impose an administrative fine for prohibited or required conduct of up to the greater of 10 per cent of the respondent's annual turnover in the preceding financial year, or R1 000 000. Ten per cent of turnover is not a cap on profit, and s 112(3) lists what the Tribunal weighs, including the level of profit derived from the contravention and whether the respondent has been found in contravention before.
Two things are criminal offences. Under s 110(1) it is an offence to alter, obscure, falsify, remove or omit a displayed price, labelling or trade description without authority. Under s 110(2) it is an offence to fail to act in accordance with a compliance notice, unless the Commission has instead applied to the Tribunal for an administrative fine for the same failure. Section 111(1)(b) puts both in the bracket of a fine or imprisonment for up to 12 months, or both, and s 111(2) gives a Magistrate's Court jurisdiction to impose it.
The money mostly moves through the civil consequences written into the duties themselves. Section 51(3) makes a prohibited term void to the extent that it contravenes the section, and s 115(1) says a provision declared void must be regarded as having been of no force or effect at any time, so the clause you relied on was never there. Section 56(2) puts the cost of repair, replacement or refund on the supplier for six months, at the supplier's risk and expense. Section 61 attaches liability for death, injury, illness, property damage and consequential economic loss without proof of negligence, and s 61(3) makes it joint and several, so a claimant may recover the whole of it from whichever of you is solvent. Section 65(2)(c) makes a supplier liable to the owner for any loss of property it held and mishandled.
Time limits run both ways. Section 61(4)(d) gives a product liability claimant three years from the death, injury, knowledge of the illness, knowledge of the property damage or the latest economic loss. Section 116(1) stops a complaint being referred to the Tribunal or a consumer court more than three years after the act or omission, or after a continuing practice ceased. A practice you stopped is not a practice you are safe from for three years.
What the assessment covers
The assessment works through 52 questions across 29 duties, scored out of 376. Each answer generates the specific actions needed to close or prove that duty, and a “yes” only counts once its evidence is in, which is what makes the score defensible rather than self-declared.
The questions themselves are part of the assessment.
Find out where you stand on CPA
Run the assessment, get your score, and get the exact list of what to fix, with the evidence trail an auditor will ask for.