China's State Administration for Market Regulation recently drafted the "Compliance Guidelines for Charging Behavior of Online Trading Platforms (Draft for Comments)" and is collecting public opinions.

This is to regulate the behavior of online trading platforms in charging commissions, membership fees, technical service fees, information service fees, and marketing promotion fees from operators within the platform; protect the legitimate rights and interests of operators within the platform; and promote the healthy and orderly development of the platform economy.

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The guidelines set out rules for platforms to require merchants to participate in promotional activities, clearly stating that platforms should adhere to the principles of equality and voluntariness when conducting promotional and marketing activities, and must not force or indirectly force operators within the platform to participate and charge fees.

Moreover, when platforms organize operators within the platform to conduct discount promotional activities, they must specify the sharing method and proportion of discounts and subsidies between the platform and operators within the platform in advance. Without mutual agreement with operators within the platform, platforms must not temporarily impose promotional fees on them.