UK issues guidance to help shoppers spot counterfeit second-hand fashion

Trust is the choke point in online resale, and the UK’s new counterfeit-fashion guidance goes straight at it. The Intellectual Property Office says one in four second-hand clothing buyers unknowingly purchased a fake online in the past year, while one in three never check authenticity before paying. That is the problem in one ugly little stack of stats: nearly 60% of counterfeit buyers said they ran into poor quality, rapid deterioration or refund disputes, and 14% said the experience pushed them out of second-hand shopping altogether.

The guidance, published on 27 May 2026 and rolled out publicly the next day as part of the IPO’s “Second-hand, not second best” campaign, was developed with support from Vinted. It targets the part of resale that still feels like a gamble when the listing looks too clean, the price is too good, and the product photos are doing all the heavy lifting. Counterfeit clothes, shoes and accessories are the flashpoint here, and the IPO says they often come with inferior materials, poor stitching and, in some cases, harmful chemicals. The bigger damage is wider than one bad purchase: landfill waste, toxic dyes and underpaid or forced labour sit in the same supply chain.

The timing is not random. The IPO says the UK’s pre-loved market is growing at around 11% a year, and its blog says online shopping has more than doubled its share of UK retail over the past decade. Resale platforms such as Vinted, Depop, Gumtree and Preloved now reach tens of millions of UK consumers, which means the counterfeit market is scaling right alongside the legitimate one. Younger shoppers are deepest in the feed: nearly 70% of Gen Z and Millennials bought pre-loved items last year, and 45% of 18 to 24-year-olds encountered counterfeit goods on resale platforms, compared with 23% of 55 to 64-year-olds.

The practical advice is refreshingly specific. Check for price outliers, seller history, original photos, labels, swing tags, QR codes and whether the listing matches the product in front of you. For high-value pieces, the IPO says professional verification services can add another layer of reassurance. That matters most for the categories buyers chase hardest and fakes copy best: designer bags, sneakers, outerwear, watches, and logo-heavy accessories.

There is a harder edge behind the consumer advice. The IPO’s June 2025 counterfeit research found that 24% of respondents had knowingly bought counterfeit goods, while 76% said they had never knowingly done so. Clothing, footwear and accessories carried a 12% counterfeit purchasing rate, tied with sports. Add in more than £4 million of luxury goods seized in recent raids, and the message is blunt: resale will not scale on aesthetics alone. It has to earn trust at checkout.