Definitions

For the purposes of this Act: 1. "persons with disabilities" means persons who have long-term physical, mental, intellectual or sensory impairments which in interaction with various barriers may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others; a period is deemed long-term where it is highly likely to last longer than six months; 2. "product" means a substance, preparation or good produced through a manufacturing process, excluding food, feed, live plants and animals, products of human origin, and products of plants and animals relating directly to their future reproduction; 3. "service" means a service within the meaning of Article 4 no. 1 of Directive 2006/123/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 December 2006 on services in the internal market (OJ L 376, 27.12.2006, p. 36); 4. "service provider" means any natural or legal person, or a partnership with legal capacity, that provides a service on the Union market for consumers or offers to provide such a service; 5. "audiovisual media services" means services within the meaning of Article 1(1)(a) of Directive 2010/13/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 10 March 2010 on the coordination of certain provisions laid down by law, regulation or administrative action in Member States concerning the provision of audiovisual media services (OJ L 95, 15.4.2010, p. 1; L 263, 6.10.2010, p. 15), as amended by Directive (EU) 2018/1808 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 November 2018 (OJ L 303, 28.11.2018, p. 69); 6. "consumer terminal equipment with interactive computing capability used for accessing audiovisual media services" means any equipment the main purpose of which is to provide access to audiovisual media services; 7. "electronic communications service" means an electronic communications service within the meaning of Article 2 no. 4 of Directive (EU) 2018/1972 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 December 2018 establishing the European Electronic Communications Code (OJ L 321, 17.12.2018, p. 36; L 334, 27.12.2019, p. 164); 8. "real-time text" means a form of text conversation used in point-to-point situations or in multipoint conferencing, where the text being entered is sent in such a way that the communication is perceived by the user as being continuous on a character-by-character basis; 9. "making available on the market" means any supply of a product for distribution, consumption or use on the Union market in the course of a commercial activity, whether in return for payment or free of charge; 10. "placing on the market" means the first making available of a product on the Union market; 11. "manufacturer" means any natural or legal person, or a partnership with legal capacity, that manufactures a product or has a product designed or manufactured, and markets that product under its own name or trade mark; 12. "authorised representative" means any natural or legal person, or a partnership with legal capacity, established within the European Union who has received a written mandate from a manufacturer to act on its behalf in relation to specified tasks; 13. "importer" means any natural or legal person, or a partnership with legal capacity, established within the European Union who places a product from a third country on the Union market; 14. "distributor" means any natural or legal person, or a partnership with legal capacity, in the supply chain, other than the manufacturer or the importer, that makes a product available on the market; 15. "economic operator" means a manufacturer, an authorised representative, an importer, a distributor or a service provider; 16. "consumer" means any natural person who purchases or receives a product or service covered by this Act for purposes that are predominantly outside that person's trade, business, craft or profession; 17. "microenterprise" means an enterprise employing fewer than ten persons and having either an annual turnover not exceeding EUR 2 million or an annual balance sheet total not exceeding EUR 2 million; 18. "small and medium-sized enterprises" means enterprises, other than microenterprises, employing fewer than 250 persons and having either an annual turnover not exceeding EUR 50 million or an annual balance sheet total not exceeding EUR 43 million; 19. "harmonised standard" means a harmonised standard within the meaning of Article 2 no. 1(c) of Regulation (EU) No 1025/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 October 2012 on European standardisation, amending Council Directives 89/686/EEC and 93/15/EEC and Directives 94/9/EC, 94/25/EC, 95/16/EC, 97/23/EC, 98/34/EC, 2004/22/EC, 2007/23/EC, 2009/23/EC and 2009/105/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council and repealing Council Decision 87/95/EEC and Decision No 1673/2006/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council (OJ L 316, 14.11.2012, p. 12); 20. "technical specification" means a technical specification within the meaning of Article 2 no. 4 of Regulation (EU) No 1025/2012 which provides a means to comply with the accessibility requirements applicable to a product or service; 21. "CE marking" means the marking by which the manufacturer indicates that the product is in conformity with the applicable requirements set out in Union harmonisation legislation providing for its affixing; 22. "market surveillance authority" means any authority competent under Land law for carrying out market surveillance; 23. "withdrawal" means any measure aimed at preventing a product in the supply chain from being made available on the market, or aimed at causing a product already made available on the market to be withdrawn from the market; 24. "banking services for consumers" means the provision of the following banking and financial services to consumers: a) credit agreements within the meaning of Directive 2008/48/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 April 2008 on credit agreements for consumers and repealing Council Directive 87/102/EEC (OJ L 133, 22.5.2008, p. 66), with the proviso that the threshold under Article 2(2)(c) of Directive 2008/48/EC does not apply, or credit agreements within the meaning of Directive 2014/17/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 4 February 2014 on credit agreements for consumers relating to residential immovable property and amending Directives 2008/48/EC and 2013/36/EU and Regulation (EU) No 1093/2010 (OJ L 60, 28.2.2014, p. 34); b) services referred to in points (1), (2), (4) and (5) of Section A and points (1), (2), (4) and (5) of Section B of Annex I to Directive 2014/65/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 May 2014 on markets in financial instruments and amending Directive 2002/92/EC and Directive 2011/61/EU (OJ L 173, 12.6.2014, p. 349; L 74, 18.3.2015, p. 38; L 188, 13.7.2016, p. 28; L 273, 8.10.2016, p. 35; L 64, 10.3.2017, p. 116; L 278, 27.10.2017, p. 56), as last amended by Regulation (EU) 2019/2115 (OJ L 30, 11.12.2019, p. 1); c) payment services under section 1(1), second sentence of the Payment Services Supervision Act of 17 July 2017 (Federal Law Gazette I, p. 2446), as last amended by Article 9(8) of the Act of 9 December 2020 (Federal Law Gazette I, p. 2773); d) services linked to a payment account under section 2(2) of the Payment Accounts Act of 11 April 2016 (Federal Law Gazette I, p. 720), as last amended by Article 9(7) of the Act of 9 December 2020 (Federal Law Gazette I, p. 2773); and e) electronic money under section 1(2), third sentence of the Payment Services Supervision Act; 25. "payment terminal" means a device the main purpose of which is to allow payments to be made using payment instruments within the meaning of section 1(20) of the Payment Services Supervision Act at a physical point of sale, but not in a virtual environment; 26. "e-commerce services" means digital services under section 1(4) no. 1 of the Digital Services Act (national implementing act) that are provided through websites and applications on mobile devices, and that are provided electronically and at the individual request of a consumer with a view to the conclusion of a consumer contract; 27. "air passenger transport services" means commercial passenger air services under Article 2(l) of Regulation (EC) No 1107/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 5 July 2006 concerning the rights of disabled persons and persons with reduced mobility when travelling by air (OJ L 204, 26.7.2006, p. 1; OJ R 026, 26.1.2013, p. 34), where departing from, arriving at, or transiting through an airport situated in the territory of a Member State, including flights from an airport in a third country to an airport situated in the territory of a Member State where these services are operated by a European Union air carrier; 28. "bus passenger transport services" means services covered by Article 2(1) and (2) of Regulation (EU) No 181/2011 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 February 2011 concerning the rights of passengers in bus and coach transport and amending Regulation (EC) No 2006/2004 (OJ L 55, 28.2.2011, p. 1); 29. "rail passenger transport services" means all rail journeys and services within the meaning of Article 2(1) of Regulation (EC) No 1371/2007 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 October 2007 on rail passengers' rights and obligations (OJ L 315, 3.12.2007, p. 14), with the exception of the services referred to in Article 2(2) of that Regulation; 30. "waterborne passenger transport services" means all passenger services within the meaning of Article 2(1) of Regulation (EU) No 1177/2010 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 November 2010 concerning the rights of passengers when travelling by sea and inland waterway and amending Regulation (EC) No 2006/2004 (OJ L 334, 17.12.2010, p. 1), with the exception of the services referred to in Article 2(2) of that Regulation; 31. "urban and suburban transport services" means transport services using rail, bus, underground, tram and trolleybus, the main purpose of which is to meet the transport needs of an urban area or conurbation, including a cross-border conurbation, as well as the transport needs between such an area or conurbation and its surrounding areas; 32. "regional transport services" means transport services using rail, bus, underground, tram and trolleybus, the main purpose of which is to meet the transport needs of a region, including a cross-border region; 33. "assistive technology" means any item, piece of equipment, or product system, including software, a) used to increase, maintain, substitute or improve the functional capabilities of persons with disabilities, or b) used to ease and enable the alleviation or neutralisation of impairments, activity limitations or participation restrictions of persons with disabilities; 34. "operating system" means software which, among other things, handles the interface with peripheral hardware, schedules tasks, allocates storage, and presents a default interface to the consumer in the absence of an application program, including a graphical user interface, whether that software is an integral part of consumer general purpose computer hardware or is free-standing software intended to run on consumer general purpose computer hardware; excluded are the loader of an operating system, a basic input-output system (BIOS), or other firmware required at start-up time or when installing the operating system; 35. "consumer general purpose computer hardware system" means a combination of hardware a) forming a complete computer, characterised by its multi-purpose nature and its capability, with the appropriate software, to perform, with the help of the user, the most common computing tasks requested by consumers, and b) intended to be operated by consumers, including personal computers, in particular desktops, notebooks, smartphones and tablets; 36. "interactive computing capability" means functionality supporting human-device interaction which allows for the processing and transmission of data, voice or video or any combination thereof; 37. "e-books and software designed for them" means a) a service consisting of the provision of digital files that convey an electronic version of a book to allow access, navigation, reading and use, and b) software, including services offered on mobile devices, including mobile applications, that is specifically designed to access, navigate, read and use those digital files, and excludes software for e-readers under no. 38; 38. "e-reader" means dedicated equipment, including both hardware and software, used to access, navigate, read and use e-book files; 39. "electronic tickets" means systems in which an entitlement to travel, in the form of a single ticket, several tickets, a season ticket or a travel credit, is not printed on paper but is instead stored electronically on a physical travel card or other device; 40. "electronic ticketing services" means systems in which travel entitlements are purchased, among other things, online using a device with interactive computing capability and delivered to the buyer electronically so that they can be printed on paper or displayed for the journey using a device with interactive computing capability; 41. "putting into service" means the first use of a self-service terminal for its intended purpose.