back to menu"The wrong sort of information - too much, too little and hard to compare - is at the heart of the difficulties consumers face when trying to make major buying decisions", reports the National Consumer Council following a poll of 2,000 adult consumers. For over a quarter the most helpful information on purchases came from an informed shop assistant. Only a sixth got their information from the media while one in twenty relied on buying branded goods from a well known company. Even Which? reports do not always make comparison easy in their desire to make their articles more readable. Go into any electrical appliance store and the tags do not give all the information you may be seeking. In some cases, such as cookers, you may be lucky enough to find an instruction booklet inside the appliance. In the case of financial services, or the power utilities, the information necessary to make a wise choice may be deliberately withheld. The NCC has put forward a Consumer Agenda 2001 which suggests ways that matters might be improved, including a legal duty for all traders and businesses to trade fairly.
"The Office of Fair Trading's job is to make markets work for consumers by strengthening the grounds for consumer confidence, and through competition, the power of choice", says the Director General in the introduction to his Annual Report 2000. "Markets will not work well for consumers unless they also work well for businesses that are good at providing what consumers want." Do the majority of firms know what we want? An example of a firm that always thought they knew best were Marks & Spencer. There was always an excuse when a consumer organisation approached them with suggestions, and then a few years later they caught up with the fact that consumers were right. Examples are vegetarian dishes and organic foods, as well as the withdrawal and later reinstatement of ranges of shoes bought by their more mature customers. Are things improving? Are we getting the goods we really want more easily today? Write, phone, send a floppy disk, fax or e-mail to the Editor and tell us what you think.
Rough Guides were an innovation when they were introduced. They included the type of information the independent traveller wanted to know about a country or town they were visiting, not just the tourist sights. Now they have turned their efforts to producing a new guide written by Dr Nick Jones, who got the idea when undertaking an eventful, and sometimes frightening, journey in south east Asia, including Nepal. It starts with the preparations you should take before leaving home followed by an A to Z of diseases and health risks with symptoms and treatment. Part 3 consists of specific health risks and how to prepare for them, and part 4 has a directory of health contacts world-wide including on-line contacts. It is pocket sized and costs £5.00 for 576 pages (ISBN: 1-85828-570-4).
Last minute holiday deals may not be as cheap as they appear, according to the Sunday Times. Unlike the all-in package, late bookings may understate the cost by up to 25%. Services included in the original package may now be charged separately. Such charges include a late 'ticket on departure' fee of £10, an additional £12 for transfers from the airport to the resort hotel and even £5 for the meal on the flight. Another ploy is to allow only 15 kg baggage allowance and then charge an extra 25 to bring this up to the normal 20 kg. Trading Standards Officers suspect that the law is being broken as the fees should be included in the advertised price of the holiday. Of course, a third or more of the holidays will be found to be unavailable when you try to book them.
The first Consumers International World Congress to be held in Africa showed up the problems created by global companies. Their final statement called for a moratorium on the cultivation and marketing of new GM foods until proven to be safe, environmentally sustainable and acceptable to consumers. Patents on life forms should be prohibited and there should be an end to the export of hazardous products, such as herbicides, where these are banned in the exporting countries. This would also include a convention on tobacco control, where third world countries tend to be exploited as sales in the home producing countries fall. A call we would all support is to ensure that trade and economic policies are formed with input from consumers. Perhaps less realistic was the call to cancel, the debts of the least developed countries.
The cost of becoming 'modernised' may be falling but it is still too much for many people. The Department of Trade and Industry has unveiled details of a plan to provide a series of neighbourhoods across the country with free conversion to digital TV. The project will be led by the
Independent Television Commission and the Government will be joined by twenty or more broadcasters, retailers and manufacturers. The equipment will allow those taking part to watch all the existing free terrestrial channels on digital TV but they will have to pay additional subscriptions to see the pay channels. In addition they will be able to use their sets to access interactive Internet services including learning and shopping sites and to send and receive e-mails. This free access will show the use that people are likely to make of digital TV, including those who only want a free service. Surprisingly we are told that 1 in 3 households already have digital TV.
The average home is paying £129 less a year than in 1996 for electricity, gas. telephones and water, while using the same amounts. These include a reduction of £55 a year for telephones, £42 for gas and £43 for electricity. Despite the much vaunted 'cuts', we are still paying £12 more for water than in 1996.
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