Unfair Trading Practices Bill 2025: Complete Guide for Australian Businesses

The Unfair Trading Practices Bill is the most significant reform to Australian Consumer Law since its introduction in 2011. It creates two entirely new legal prohibitions, introduces specific subscription contract requirements, and increases the maximum penalty to 30% of a business's adjusted turnover.

This guide covers everything Australian businesses need to know: what the Bill does, what it prohibits, when it commences, and what you should be doing right now to prepare.

What the Unfair Trading Practices Bill Does

The Bill addresses a gap in Australian Consumer Law that the ACCC and consumer advocates have identified for years: the ACL's existing provisions — particularly section 18 (misleading or deceptive conduct) and section 21 (unconscionable conduct) — don't adequately cover practices that are manipulative without being technically misleading.

Consider a confirm-shaming button that says “No thanks, I don't want to save money.” This isn't misleading — the consumer really is declining a discount. But it manipulates the consumer's decision-making process by exploiting guilt and social pressure. Under the current ACL, this sits in a legal grey area. Under the UTP Bill, it's explicitly prohibited.

The Bill introduces four key changes:

1. A prohibition on conduct that unreasonably manipulates consumer decision-making
2. A prohibition on conduct that unreasonably distorts the environment in which consumers make decisions
3. Specific subscription contract requirements including cancellation parity and renewal notices
4. An increased penalty regime with turnover-based caps of 30%

New Legal Concept 1: Unreasonable Manipulation

The first new prohibition targets conduct that manipulates a consumer's decision-making process through techniques that exploit cognitive biases, emotional responses, or information asymmetries.

This is broader than the existing s18 test. Under s18, the question is: would a reasonable consumer be misled? Under the unreasonable manipulation prohibition, the question is: does this conduct exploit psychological vulnerabilities to steer consumer decisions?

Dark patterns caught by unreasonable manipulation:

• Confirm-shaming: Wording opt-out choices to make consumers feel guilty or foolish for declining
• False urgency: Fabricated countdown timers, fake scarcity claims, and artificial deadlines designed to prevent considered decision-making
• Nagging: Repeated, persistent prompts to accept an offer or change a preference after the consumer has already declined
• Trick questions: Wording options in confusing ways so consumers make choices they didn't intend — double negatives, counterintuitive toggles, misleading labels
• Social proof manipulation: Fabricated “12 people are viewing this right now” claims or fake reviews designed to create conformity pressure

The key word is “unreasonable.” Not all persuasion is manipulation. Legitimate marketing, genuine urgency, and honest social proof are permitted. The test is whether the conduct goes beyond legitimate persuasion and into exploitation of the consumer's decision-making vulnerabilities.

The Treasury consultation paper provides guidance on factors the court would consider: the vulnerability of the target audience, the degree of psychological pressure applied, whether the consumer had a genuine opportunity for considered decision-making, and whether the business was aware of the manipulative effect.

New Legal Concept 2: Unreasonable Distortion

The second new prohibition targets conduct that distorts the environment in which a consumer makes a decision — the interface, the information architecture, the visual hierarchy — in a way that impairs autonomous choice.

This prohibition recognises that manipulation doesn't always happen through words or psychological pressure. Sometimes it happens through design. The way information is structured, the visual weight of options, the friction applied to different choices — all of these shape consumer decisions without necessarily being “misleading” in the traditional sense.

Dark patterns caught by unreasonable distortion:

• Misdirection / false hierarchy: Making the desired option visually prominent (large, colourful button) while making the alternative small, grey, or hard to find — like the Microsoft Classic plan hidden inside the cancellation flow
• Obstruction: Making cancellation, unsubscription, or opt-out processes significantly more difficult than sign-up — requiring phone calls, multi-step processes, or retention gauntlets when sign-up was one click
• Information asymmetry: Presenting information in a way that makes comparison impossible — displaying subscription prices per day while charging per year, or showing prices excluding GST alongside prices including GST
• Forced action: Requiring consumers to complete unnecessary steps (account creation, surveys, marketing consent) to access a service they've already paid for

The distinction between “manipulation” and “distortion” is subtle but important. Manipulation targets the consumer's mind — their emotions, biases, and cognitive processes. Distortion targets the consumer's environment — the interface they interact with and the information they receive. In practice, many dark patterns involve both.

Subscription Contract Requirements

The Bill introduces specific requirements for subscription contracts — the first time Australian law has created dedicated rules for subscription-based business models.

Key requirements:

• Cancellation parity: Cancellation must be as easy as sign-up. If a consumer can subscribe with one click, they must be able to cancel with one click. Retention flows, phone-only cancellation, and multi-step processes are prohibited.
• Renewal notices: Businesses must send clear notice before each subscription renewal, including the renewal date, the renewal price, and a simple mechanism to cancel. This applies to all auto-renewing subscriptions, including free-to-paid conversions.
• Clear terms: The subscription period, renewal terms, total cost, and cancellation method must be disclosed prominently at sign-up — not buried in terms and conditions.
• Free trial transparency: If a free trial converts to a paid subscription, the conversion terms must be disclosed with equal prominence to the “free” offer, and a reminder notice must be sent before conversion.

These requirements codify what the ACCC has already been enforcing under existing ACL provisions. The subscription trap compliance guide covers the current ACCC enforcement approach — the UTP Bill formalises this into explicit statutory requirements.

Businesses that have already addressed subscription trap compliance under the existing ACL framework will find the transition to the new requirements straightforward. Those that haven't will need to overhaul their subscription flows before July 2027.

The Penalty Regime: 30% of Turnover

The UTP Bill increases the maximum penalty for unfair trading practices to the greater of:

• $50 million per contravention
• Three times the benefit obtained from the contravention
• 30% of adjusted turnover for the relevant period

The current ACL caps the turnover-based penalty at 10%. The UTP Bill triples this to 30%. For large businesses, this is transformative — it means penalties can reach hundreds of millions of dollars for practices that generate significant revenue.

The penalty escalation trajectory is clear: from $0 penalties for unfair contract terms before 2023, to $50 million per contravention in 2023, to 30% of turnover from 2027. The cost of non-compliance is growing exponentially while the cost of compliance remains fixed and modest.

Individual penalties also increase. Directors, product managers, and UX designers who are “knowingly concerned in” a contravention face personal penalties of up to $2.5 million — a number the ACCC has indicated it intends to seek in appropriate cases. Our compliance facts article covers accessorial liability in detail.

Commencement Date: 1 July 2027

The proposed commencement date for the UTP Bill is 1 July 2027. This gives businesses approximately 15 months from March 2026 to prepare.

However, three important caveats:

1. The ACCC is already enforcing. The new prohibitions are additions to the existing ACL, not replacements. The ACCC is already prosecuting dark patterns under sections 18, 21, 29, and 48. Waiting for the UTP Bill to commence does not reduce your current enforcement risk.
2. Compliance lead times are real. Overhauling subscription flows, checkout processes, and pricing pages requires product changes, development work, testing, and rollout. For most businesses, this is a 3-6 month process. Starting in early 2027 means you're already behind.
3. The ACCC expects proactive compliance. When seeking penalties, the ACCC presents evidence about whether the business had a compliance program, conducted audits, and took proactive steps. Demonstrating that you prepared well in advance of commencement is materially better than demonstrating you scrambled at the last minute.

What Businesses Should Do Now

The compliance window is open. Here's what to do with it:

Step 1: Audit Your Current State

Identify every dark pattern on your website using the unfair trading practices audit framework. Map each finding to the relevant ACL section and the corresponding UTP Bill provision. Prioritise by risk — subscription traps, drip pricing, and pre-selected add-ons are the ACCC's highest priority enforcement targets.

Step 2: Fix the High-Risk Patterns

Address the patterns most likely to attract enforcement first:

• Ensure subscription cancellation is as easy as sign-up
• Remove all mandatory fees from the checkout that aren't in the displayed product price
• Change all pre-selected add-ons to unchecked by default
• Remove or verify all urgency and scarcity claims
• Ensure confirm-shaming copy is replaced with neutral language

Step 3: Implement Ongoing Monitoring

Dark patterns creep back in through new feature deployments, third-party app updates, and A/B test variations. Set up automated scanning to catch new issues before the ACCC does. Our scanner tools comparison evaluates the options.

Step 4: Document Everything

Regulators assess compliance culture, not just compliance outcomes. Document your audit findings, remediation timeline, ongoing monitoring setup, and any training provided to product and design teams. This documentation is your best defence if the ACCC investigates.

Step 5: Review Subscription Contracts

If you operate a subscription business, review your contracts against the Bill's requirements: cancellation parity, renewal notices, clear terms, and free trial transparency. Build these into your product roadmap now — they require development work that takes time.

How the Bill Relates to Existing ACL Provisions

The UTP Bill supplements the existing ACL — it does not replace it. The key existing provisions remain fully in force:

• Section 18 (misleading or deceptive conduct) — still the broadest prohibition, covering any conduct that creates a false impression
• Section 21 (unconscionable conduct) — still covers systems of conduct that are unconscionable in all the circumstances
• Section 29 (false or misleading representations) — still covers specific categories of false claims about price, quality, and endorsement
• Section 48 (component pricing) — still requires total price disclosure when a price is displayed

The UTP Bill fills the gap between these provisions. Practices that are manipulative but not technically misleading (s18), and exploitative but not quite unconscionable (s21), are now caught by the unreasonable manipulation and distortion prohibitions. For a complete overview of how these provisions interact, see our Dark Patterns Under Australian Consumer Law guide.

The Treasury Consultation Process

The Bill was developed following a comprehensive Treasury consultation process. The consultation paper, released in late 2024, drew on:

• ACCC enforcement experience with dark patterns under existing provisions
• International legislative models, particularly the EU's Digital Services Act and the UK's Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024
• Submissions from consumer advocacy groups, industry associations, and individual businesses
• Academic research on the psychological mechanisms behind dark patterns

The consultation process refined the “unreasonableness” test to balance consumer protection with legitimate business practices. The Bill acknowledges that not all persuasion is manipulation, and not all design choices are distortion — only those that are “unreasonable” in all the circumstances.

Start Preparing Today

The UTP Bill commencement date gives businesses a defined window to prepare — but that window is closing. The businesses that will be in the strongest position when the law takes effect are the ones that start now.

Run a free TrustScan compliance scan to identify your current dark pattern exposure. The scan analyses your website against all 10 dark pattern categories and maps findings to both current ACL provisions and the forthcoming UTP Bill prohibitions — giving you a single compliance baseline that covers both the law today and the law in July 2027.