How to protect your consumer rights in the COVID crisis

By LESLEY GREGORY

A task force looking out for poor behaviour by businesses says a few bad apples are using the COVID-19 crisis to take advantage of consumers, mostly through price gouging and by refusing refunds. So how can you protect your consumer rights during this challenging period?

The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) works to ensure that consumers get a good deal when buying goods and services and that businesses operate within the law. It established a COVID-19 Taskforce to monitor and respond to competition and consumer problems arising from the pandemic and the measures taken to contain it.

In a recently released report, it analyses about 14,000 coronavirus related complaints it received between March 10 and April 19 – an average of 637 a day. (It received a further 7000 complaints via other channels.)

“The vast majority of businesses are behaving responsibly and fairly in the unprecedented circumstances created by the coronavirus outbreak,” it says.

“But we are concerned that a small minority may be exploiting the situation, for example by making misleading claims about goods or services, charging excessive prices, or ignoring customers’ cancellation or other rights.”

Price increases

Initially, most complaints were about price rises, particularly for personal hygiene goods like hand sanitiser, and especially online. (The median price increase for sanitiser in the CMA’s complaint monitoring was 367%. The average price increase across all such complaints was 130%.)

In more recent weeks, however, there has been a big rise in complaints about cancellations and refunds. The handling of cancellations now account for four out of five complaints, the CMA says.

People have had to cancel holidays, travel and other plans because of the pandemic. The CMA is concerned about businesses refusing refunds, introducing unnecessary complexity into the refund process, charging high cancellation fees, and pressing consumers into accepting vouchers instead of cash refunds.

The CMA’s response to individual complaints can range from issuing a warning to taking enforcement action under consumer law. It’s also able to advise the government on special action. It has also been liaising with business groups and with online platforms like Amazon and eBay.

Buyer beware

What can we do to protect ourselves as consumers in the meantime? The Which? consumer organisation has some great, coronavirus-specific consumer advice, but here are eight “buyer beware” guidelines to follow, especially for larger purchases, crisis or no crisis:

1. Always check the return or cancellation terms and conditions when making a purchase. Can you cancel a purchase or return an item just because you’ve changed your mind?

2. If you can return or cancel, will you get a cash refund or just a credit note?

3. Make sure you get those terms and conditions in writing, not just a verbal promise.

4. Check online product and service reviews. Businesses are very good at saying how great they are. See if their customers agree.

5. Price check. It’s so easy to do these days. Remember to factor in shipping costs, and be wary of “free delivery” claims where the delivery cost is just built into a higher price.

6. Never feel pressured by a salesperson to make a quick decision. Have a think over a coffee.

7. Don’t shop online when you’re tired.

8. Know what to do if something goes wrong. Your first step should be to talk to the seller. You need to do that before escalating your complaint to a consumer protection agency. Note: If you paid by credit card you may be able to lodge a dispute with your bank.

A heartening result from the CMA study is that only 6000 of the 6 million private sector businesses in the UK came up in complaints in recent weeks — that’s just one bad apple among a thousand good ones in the basket. Most businesses try to do the right thing by their customers, in what is an extremely difficult time for them too.