The Supreme Court has finally ruled in favor of the Fair Trade Commission in the case of LG Electronics' abuse of dominant position (built-in home appliances) against Kim & Chang Law Firm.

Lawyer Han Byul Ahn Byeong-han, who handled the case himself, centered the lawsuit on the relationship that a sales specialty store of a large company has no choice but to accept the joint warranty request and the part that may cause problems under the Fair Trade Act based on the specific contents of the contract.

The following is the relevant content reported through KBS News (based on the official press release of the Fair Trade Commission)

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The Supreme Court ruled that LG Electronics' request for a joint guarantee for the payment of the construction company's payment to the sales outlets it intermediated while delivering built-in home appliances was a violation of the Fair Trade Act.

The Supreme Court's Special Division 2 confirmed the trial court's ruling that LG Electronics lost a lawsuit against the Korea Fair Trade Commission to cancel a corrective order and penalty.

In 2014, the KFTC issued a corrective order and imposed a fine of 1.865 billion won ($1.865 billion) on LG Electronics for abusing its dominant position, alleging that the company demanded joint guarantees for payment to construction companies from sales specialty stores it intermediated while selling built-in home appliances.

The KFTC's investigation revealed that LG Electronics required 29 sales specialty stores to provide joint guarantees for 20% to 100% of the delivery price from June 2008 to December 2013. The number of transactions was 441 and the amount of the transactions amounted to 130.09 billion won.

The KFTC said LG Electronics had purchased bond insurance in case it could not collect the sales price due to the deterioration of the construction economy, but when the insurance could not cover the part due to the credit rating of the construction company, it passed on the risk to the sales outlets.