On 3 August 2026, the Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) said that Bol, the Dutch online marketplace, has offered commitments to resolve the concerns raised in its investigation of the platform. ACM intends to make them binding. The draft decision was open for consultation until 13 September 2026, and a final decision follows. The outcome is a useful case study in how to discipline a dominant marketplace without slowing it down.
The strongest case for tougher action
The worry behind the probe is real. When ACM opened the investigation on 14 February 2024, it did not name the platform. It reported that businesses said the platform gave "preferential treatment to itself and to certain business users", so that their products were "less well visible" even when they offered the best price or quality. Businesses also alleged that the platform used their data to strengthen its own position.
A marketplace that is both referee and player has an obvious incentive to tilt the field. Sellers cannot easily leave a platform where most Dutch shoppers begin their search. A regulator that only ever accepts promises could, critics argue, be accepting promises that are hard to check. That is a fair argument for demanding measurable, auditable terms.
What Bol has committed to
According to ACM's announcement, Bol will improve how it decides which offers consumers see first and will not use data collected on the platform to gain an advantage as a seller over other sellers. It will also:
- speed up communication and complaint handling with sellers;
- make contact options beyond the chatbot easier to find;
- improve reporting of illegal content and clarify its terms for commercial sellers;
- adjust price indications so costs are presented more clearly.
Bol's own partner-platform notice adds detail on the seller side: an improved Buy Box, additional data and analyses for partners, and access to Select Deals on the same conditions as Bol. The news hook also describes Bol ending the extra prominence of its own offers over third-party offers.
These are structural changes to how the marketplace ranks, shares data and treats its own retail arm. Vague pledges about fairness would not have covered any of them.
Why a commitments decision is the right instrument
The ACM draft decision page states that ACM will stop its investigation into the conduct covered by the commitments once they are declared binding. Because they will be binding, they can be enforced. They also arrive sooner than a contested infringement finding would, which typically means years of appeals. The probe itself ran about 30 months, from February 2024 to August 2026. Litigation on top of that would have left sellers waiting much longer for relief.
A commitments route also has an advantage that an infringement decision lacks: it can specify remedies that sellers can actually use. Better analytics, faster complaint handling and a more transparent Buy Box are things sellers feel in daily operations. A fine paid to the treasury does nothing for them.
The process is also open. Third parties could request access to the draft and submit views by 13 September 2026. Sellers who doubt Bol's promises had a formal channel to say so before ACM finalises anything. That market-testing step is what keeps commitments credible.
Where the pro-innovation concern sits
The risk is not that ACM did too little. It is that self-preferencing rules, applied bluntly, punish legitimate marketplace design. A platform that sells its own goods and hosts others' can offer faster delivery, consistent returns and a trusted brand. Those features raise consumer welfare. A blanket ban on favouring one's own offers would treat those benefits as offences.
The Bol terms avoid that trap. They target the specific mechanisms that can disadvantage sellers: opaque ranking, data used against the people who supplied it, and complaint processes that go nowhere. They do not stop Bol from being a retailer. Nor do they hand rivals a right to a fixed rank. Ranking still rests on relevance and quality, not on ownership. This is proportionate regulation in practice: a defined concern, a defined fix, and continued room for the platform to compete.
The European Commission's Digital Markets Act (DMA) takes a heavier, ex-ante approach for designated gatekeepers. Bol was not the target of that regime here. This case shows that ordinary national competition tools can address a large domestic marketplace's conduct without importing a full gatekeeper framework.
What to watch in the final decision
The value of the decision will depend on details that the public materials do not fully settle:
- Verifiability. Sellers need to be able to test whether the Buy Box and ranking changes are working. Reporting or audit terms would make the promises credible.
- Duration. The public announcement does not say how long the commitments last, and that period matters.
- Data separation. A promise not to use seller data for an advantage is only as good as the internal controls behind it.
- Consultation feedback. If sellers raised gaps, ACM's final decision should say how it responded.
The lesson for other European regulators is that a negotiated, binding, publicly consulted remedy can achieve much of what an infringement case would, faster and with less collateral damage to innovation. If ACM's final decision keeps these commitments intact and Bol delivers, a marketplace's conduct will have changed with no new statute and no fine. That is a better test of regulatory competence than the size of a penalty.