Internal dispute-resolution mechanism for business users

Description

Dispute resolution mechanisms for business users are the EU P2B Regulation's structural answer to the asymmetry between platforms and the businesses that depend on them: a marketplace, app store, search engine, or other intermediation service that hosts business users has to operate an internal complaints-handling system that is effective, transparent, free, and produces documented outcomes within stated timeframes. The DMA layers a stricter version on top for designated gatekeeper platforms. A working mechanism has four pieces: the intake surface (typically a dedicated business-user route distinct from the consumer support channel, because the issues differ), the substantive review with documented reasoning (P2B Article 11 requires an actual decision, not just an acknowledgment), the response cadence with the regulation's preferred timeframes documented and met, and the escalation route to either out-of-court mediation (P2B Article 12) or the relevant national authority. The transparency-reporting obligation drives the architecture: the regulation requires the operator to publish aggregate transparency data on dispute volume and outcomes annually, which means the routing has to be instrumented for reporting from day one rather than retrofitted later. Most P2B enforcement to date has turned on either missing transparency reports or response cadences that visibly degraded under load.

Applicability

Applies when: business model role is intermediary or mixed.

How predicates are evaluated

Required by (1 regulation)

• DSA

  Article 20 — internal complaint-handling system for online platforms.

  Regulation (EU) 2022/2065 of the European Parliament and of the Council (Digital Services Act)

Fulfilled by (1)

• In-house build · medium effort

ClearLaunch does not accept payment from vendors. Methodology.

Evidence formats

• complaint intake form
• response-time SLA
• annual transparency report