The Senate Commerce Committee passed the 2015 E-Warranty Act (S-1359) in a voice vote Wednesday during an executive session markup. The legislation introduced by ranking member Bill Nelson, D-Fla., and Sen. Deb Fischer, R-Neb., “streamlines warranty notice rules and provides explicit direction to manufacturers that they have the option to meet their warranty requirements on their company’s website,” said a news release introducing the legislation (see 1505150037). The senators said the legislation is needed since FTC rules aren't clear if posting a warranty online meets warranty notice requirements, the release said. No amendments were proposed or adopted during the markup. CEA applauded the bill and urged the Senate to take quick action to pass the legislation. The "common sense bill" would reduce "paper usage, helping the environment, cutting costs and providing consumers easy access to product warranties," and there should be "broad, bipartisan support" and "quick" Senate action on the legislation, said Veronica O’Connell, CEA vice president-government and political affairs, in a news release Wednesday.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau filed a complaint and proposed consent order against PayPal in U.S. District Court in Greenbelt, Maryland, Tuesday, for “illegally signing up tens of thousands of consumers for its online credit product, PayPal Credit,” formerly known as Bill Me Later, CFPB Director Richard Cordray said about the complaint. CFPB alleges PayPal “lured in consumers to this product with deceptive advertising, signed up people without them knowing it, and then mishandled billing disputes when they arose,” Cordray said, which violates the Dodd-Frank Act. “This kind of conduct has no place in the consumer financial marketplace,” he said. Under the proposed consent order, PayPal would pay $15 million in consumer redress, a $10 million penalty and be required to improve disclosures and procedures, a CFPB news release said. Online shopping and the financial products that make it possible are great, but financial services providers need to ensure people are treated fairly and according to the law, Cordray said. "PayPal Credit takes consumer protection very seriously," a PayPal spokeswoman said. "We continually improve our products and enhance our communications to ensure a superior customer experience," she said. "Our focus is on ease of use, clarity and providing high-quality products that are useful to consumers and are in compliance with applicable laws."

Reported plans by Alibaba to offer LCD TVs as a promotional tool would put more pressure on traditional Chinese TV vendors, DisplaySearch analyst David Hsieh said in a blog post. Hsieh was responding to discussions in the Chinese LCD TV supply chain about e-commerce company Alibaba introducing an “Ali-TV” as a shopping platform for its users. “The biggest attraction is that the TV might be offered for free,” Hsieh said. A free TV would “definitely threaten many traditional TV players” and represent a “totally different business model where the TV is seen only as a tool to promote other services, such as e-shopping,” he said. Hsieh compared the strategy to that of telecom providers subsidizing smartphones. “So why not free TVs, too?” he said, saying smartphones and TVs are similarly priced. Already, new players have entered the TV market in China, including Internet service providers, content providers and telecom operators who are “eyeing new opportunities” outside of TV hardware and entering platform, content, terminal, advertising, apps and broadband service markets, Hsieh said. That has created “tough competition for traditional TV brands that have focused mainly on enhancing the display performance to add value,” he said. Envisioning the Ali-TV, Hsieh speculated it could be a 40-inch flat-panel 4K TV with “most of its hardware already in the box, independent of the display.” That would represent “a new type of TV,” in between a smart TV and a passive monitor that combines the hardware, platform, content, terminal, advertising, apps and broadband, Hsieh said. The revenue stream would come from the software, and the hardware would become “the carrier for the software,” he said.

Amazon cut the price again on the Fire Phone, bringing it to $189 off contract in a limited-time offer, $10 below its Black Friday blowout price in November (see 1411260020). It also made the phone unlocked and is tossing in a free year of Amazon Prime (valued at $99). According to published reports, Amazon had $83 million worth of unsold Fire Phones last fall. The phone is listed as $0.00-$0.99 at Amazon, with a two-year AT&T contract.

Hammacher Schlemmer began selling a hardwood end table billed as a “device-charging table.” The top of the table flips open to reveal a two-outlet electrical plug with an additional USB port for charging smartphones, tablets and other devices, said the catalog company. A storage drawer is designed to hold remote controls and other small items. A 5- to 6-foot electrical cord is included, a company spokeswoman told us. The $249 table measures 23 x 22 x 16 inches and is made of hardwood solids with a birch veneer and chestnut finish, it said.

The Internet Tax Freedom Forever Act was reintroduced Tuesday by Sens. John Thune, R-S.D., and Ron Wyden, D-Ore., a joint news release said. The bill is the Senate version of House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte’s, R-Va., Permanent Internet Tax Freedom Act (HR-235) and would ban taxes on Internet access permanently (see 1501090042). Without the bill, “access to information would no longer be tax-free,” Wyden said in the release. ITFFA would “encourage more American innovators and entrepreneurs to use broadband to develop the next big thing,” Thune said. The Senate bill has 39 co-sponsors; HR-235 has 29 House co-sponsors. CTIA and USTelecom applauded the Senate bill in statements Tuesday.

Chinese E-Commerce marketplace DHgate announced integration with e-commerce platform Shopify, which gives buyers the chance to buy and manage shipping from major Chinese manufacturers directly through Shopify at discounts of 20-30 percent. The arrangement enables Shopify buyers to “effectively source products,” said Noah Herschman, DHgate chief operating officer, and gives them access to low minimum orders and “fast, affordable shipping.”

The Consumer Product Safety Commission and Alibaba are collaborating on voluntary consumer safety, CPSC said in a news release Tuesday. China’s online and mobile commerce company will block the sales of illegal or recalled U.S. products or make them unavailable to U.S. buyers on Alibaba platforms, it said. The company will also provide product safety information for U.S. importers on its platforms.

Panasonic apologized to its e-commerce customers Thursday for a website crash the previous day, which it attributed to “overwhelming demand of shoppers” for an advertised two-day free shipping offer. The company didn’t elaborate on the issues but said it had extended its deals and free two-day shipping to 11:59 p.m. EST Friday. Among the highlighted CE deals: a 60-inch LED HDTV marked down $500 to $799 and a Lumix GH3 camera body cut by $200 to $699, lens not included. Panasonic also sliced the price of its over-ear noise-canceling headphones by 57 percent to $34.40.

Online consumer electronics prices were “significantly less price competitive” last week, said an e-commerce report issued Monday by Goldman Sachs, which said Amazon, Best Buy, Target and Walmart raised their overall basket prices more than 8 percent over the previous week. Prices on TVs, which were “almost at parity” across the board the last week of November, were bumped up by varying percentages last week at the four major retailers, with the average TV price in Goldman’s sample basket up 18.5 percent for the week. Goldman’s basket included eight Samsung and Vizio TVs, three Beats by Dr. Dre headphones, two Canon digital cameras, the 16 GB iPad minis, two PlayStation SKUs and an Xbox 360, an iHome Bluetooth speaker and a Garmin navi unit. Among the Goldman basket items, the most highly discounted product was the Samsung 1080p 60-inch smart TV, slashed by 23 percent at Amazon to $998, compared with $1,397 at Walmart, $1,699 at Target and $1,099 at Best Buy. The Samsung 60-inch TV repeated as the main driver of price competitiveness for the week, averaging 15 percent in discounts, Goldman said. For the week just ended, Best Buy raised prices on eight items, while trimming the price of the iPad mini $10 to $239, matching Walmart. Walmart’s basket price, meanwhile, rose 12 percent last week on seven basket price hikes. The retailer was out of stock on five of its eight TVs, with the Samsung 50-inch, a key driver of Walmart’s below-average basket price, selling out for the week. Target raised its TV prices by 17 percent, the most of the four retailers, Goldman said.