The recycling box was ticked before the customer arrived.

On 18 June 2026, the UK Competition and Markets Authority said online appliance retailer Marks Electrical would refund customers and pay a £720,000 fine. The regulator found that, between April and November 2025, nearly 40,000 customers were automatically opted into paid ‘Recycle Old Appliance’ and ‘Unwrap & Recycle Packaging’ services. The CMA says refunds will total about £600,000, or roughly £15 per person on average.

Marks Electrical admitted infringing consumer protection law and agreed not to appeal. The fine includes a 40% settlement reduction. The CMA used the direct enforcement powers it gained under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024, which let it decide a case and impose a penalty without first going to court. Emma Cochrane, the CMA’s executive director of consumer protection, said automatically opting customers into extra charges “is never ok”.

A default is a decision someone else made

Recycling an old fridge or taking away packaging can be genuinely useful, which is what makes a pre-selected box effective. It looks helpful rather than commercial. But a checkout that assumes the answer moves the burden to the customer: notice the line, understand it costs money and actively remove it, often at the moment they are checking delivery dates and card details.

Fifteen pounds is small enough that few people would chase it individually. Across 40,000 orders it becomes a revenue line. That is the pattern this site returns to repeatedly, from Hopper’s pre-selected fees in the US to ticketing drip pricing in the UK: small charges placed where attention is lowest, relying on the cost of objecting being higher than the charge.

What to do

The CMA says affected customers do not need to act. Marks Electrical will contact them and refund the original payment method. If you bought an appliance from Marks Electrical between April and November 2025 and paid for recycling or packaging removal you did not ask for, check your order confirmation, and look for that contact.

At any checkout, read the order summary line by line before paying, not just the total. Untick anything you did not choose and screenshot the summary. In the UK, if you are charged for something you did not actively select, the CMA’s guidance on refunds and your card provider’s dispute process are both routes to getting the money back.