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Your Financial Future Level 3. UK Edition. September 2011. Activity 11: Understanding Your Consumer Rights. A consumer is anyone who buys or uses something. We are all consumers.
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Your Financial FutureLevel 3 UK Edition September 2011
Activity 11: Understanding Your Consumer Rights • A consumer is anyone who buys or uses something. We are all consumers. • Consumer protection laws are rules that seek to prevent consumers from being taken advantage of by businesses. In the European Union, every member state has these laws and a government agency to enforce them. • In the UK, the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) is the government agency that watches over business and can take legal action against a company it suspects of unlawful practices. See http://www.oft.gov.uk/consumer-advice/ Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Activity 11: Understanding Your Consumer Rights • The Food Standards Agency (FSA) and the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MRHA) are the government agencies that regulates the safety and advertising of food, drugs, cosmetics, and medical devices. • A class-action suit is a lawsuit brought by many consumers who team up to sue a company. • Deceptive pricing is advertising one price and then charging another; the law forbids this practice. Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Activity 11: Understanding Your Consumer Rights • Businesses cannot: • Say they offer lower prices than their competitors, if it is not true. • Say they are offering something for “free,” unless it really is free. It is illegal, for example, for a garage to offer a “free oil filter” with an “oil change”, but raise the price of the oil change to cover the cost of the filter. Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Activity 11: Understanding Your Consumer Rights • Complete the Consumer Rights worksheet. This should take approximately 15-20 minutes. • I will ask for volunteers to read their answers to the class. Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Activity 11: Understanding Your Consumer Rights • Review: • Discuss the concept of truthful advertising. • Talk about how the government protects consumer rights. • Discuss reasons why a consumer or group of consumers might sue a company. • Give an example of a product claim that sounds “too good to be true.” ? Bank of America Merrill Lynch