Already required to pay $1.2 million (€900,000) in damages, Apple has been fined another $264,000 (€200,000) by Italy’s ‘antitrust authority’ Autorità Garante della Concorrenza e del Mercato (AGCM) for failing to comply with local laws with its Applecare warranties between March 28 and Nov. 10, reports "The Next Web" (http://tinyurl.com/ckqgwz7).

In a statement -- which you can read in its entirety at http://tinyurl.com/cg2c2g7 -- the AGCM says that while Apple has since amended its warranty policies, its actions between March and November continued to infringe on rights covering “Legal guarantee of conformity and commercial guarantees for consumer goods” in the Italian consumer code.

In December 2011, Italy's Antitrust Authority fined Apple 900,000 euros (approximately US$1.2 million) for its handling of customer guarantees. The watchdog group said Apple had failed to inform shoppers of their legal right to two years' technical support, recognizing instead only a one-year standard warranty. The Antitrust Authority said the firm's action had led people to pay extra for Apple's own support service, which overlapped in part with the free guarantee.