Consumer

As a consumer or consumer is a natural person is designated who acquires one or more goods or services for your own personal gratification for sale.

Term originating

The term "consumer" has the origin in the activity of consuming products, that is the appropriate person might take regularly a certain amount of it and used it for a particular purpose, until nothing of it there to get a new one then obtain. The same process is also referred to as consumption, hence the term " consumer" is derived.

Conceptual expansion

In the meantime, do not be consumed necessarily in the traditional sense goods but on the contrary it is often a (temporary ) use of resources. In contrast to consumption, the consumption is extended by the use of any services or the use of resources.

Definition

Legal concept

The law is called the consumer means any natural person who enters into business transactions with an entrepreneur without, however, to act itself as an entrepreneur. Due to its typically given economic inferiority of the consumer is particularly worthy of protection ( consumer protection).

European Union

According to the definition used by the EU is to be understood by a consumer means any natural person who is acting in the course of business for purposes which can not be attributed to their professional or commercial activity.

German legal definition

According to the German definition in § 13 BGB a person is already then consumers when they enters into a transaction that can not be assigned to their commercial or independent professional activity. For transactions that serve the salaried professional activity of a person, such as the purchase of uniforms, training literature, etc. by the employee, that person is a consumer. But consumer is also an employer who enters into a transaction for private purposes, eg Entrepreneur buys a thing for private use. It depends on the purpose of the transaction.

Consumers must depend on the consumable or of performance pay different excise duties. In addition, the consumption is usually charged sales tax. The law supports and protects consumers. Over-indebted consumers have the option to register consumer bankruptcy.

Austrian law definition

Under Austrian law, the definition of consumer is broader: Makes a person is a business that is not part of the operation of their business, that person dealing as a consumer ( § 1Vorlage: § / Maintenance / RIS Search Section 1 Z1, 2 Consumer Protection Act). Consumers can therefore also be a non -entrepreneurs partnership or legal person ( as Ideal club ). Accordingly, the bus ride of an employee is to work a business ( carriage paid), at which the employee is acting as a consumer against the bus company because the person is not employed, but not entrepreneurs. Undertakes an entrepreneur a private bus ride from his home to a friend, then it acts also as a consumer, not a part of this drive to the operation of their business.

This term expansion of the Austrian and German notion of consumer is generally permitted, as European guidelines specify a minimum level of protection and do not preclude usually an extension of the scope of protection.

Deserves notice that the definition for each business (especially a contract ) new occurs again, with the determination thereby decisively oriented towards the inner direction of the will of the acting person in legal transactions. For example, the lawyer who buys envelopes, consumers have been if he wants to send in private mail, but also an entrepreneur, if he wants to use the envelopes for his law firm.

The definition of consumer allows to pre- staging of debtor protection. The consumer is protected in civil law the most. It therefore access regulations on special contracts and in particular in the use of general terms and conditions ( GTC) of an entrepreneur towards a consumer. With a purchase of a consumption of an entrepreneur, the supplementary provisions of the sale of consumer goods are to be applied.

In Austria, the technical term is for the consumer " Consumer". This is protected under the Consumer Protection Act 1979 ( Consumer Protection Act). The antonym entrepreneurs was also uniquely determined in the first and Consumer Protection Act on 1 January 2007, with the amendment of the Commercial Code to the Corporate Code, also taken there. The old merchant term is omitted it.