South Korea: South Korea's antitrust regulator announced on Tuesday that it has uncovered unfair practices by wedding planners involved in organizing services like photography, dress rentals, and makeup. These services are often cited as major contributors to the rising costs of weddings in the country. According to Yonhap News Agency, the Fair Trade Commission (FTC) revealed that it had identified six types of unfair contract clauses after scrutinizing the terms of service from 18 wedding planning agencies that had the highest number of consumer complaints. The review found that some contracts were structured in a way that broke down essential services into optional add-ons, thereby allowing companies to impose additional fees for services that should have been included in the initial agreement. The FTC has since mandated adjustments to such contract terms to protect consumers. The regulator also released survey findings showing that approximately 52.3 percent of newlyweds used wedding planning agencies a s of last year. In a survey conducted with 500 customers between September and October, 74.2 percent of respondents stated that they found the additional fees charged by these agencies to be unreasonable. On average, customers paid between 2.5 million won and 3 million won (US$2,140) per service but faced extra expenses amounting to 1.44 million won beyond their initial budget due to unexpected charges. Industry surveys indicate that the average cost of a wedding in South Korea is nearly 72 million won, not accounting for the cost of buying or renting a home. A separate report by Statistics Korea highlighted that over 70 percent of South Koreans perceive wedding expenses to be excessively high.