Telecommunications sector generates most complaints

In 2015, the Consumer Council received 7,439 cases, an increase of 6.5 per cent compared to the previous year, the 2015 Work Report of the Council, released earlier this week, reveals. Among the cases, the majority of 5,499 cases are enquiries, some 1,914 are complaints, while the remaining 26 cases are suggestions. Over 97.3 per cent of the cases are handled and closed, an increase of one percentage point compared to 2014. The amount involved in the complaints exceeded MOP240 million (US$30 million). Among them, over 100 cases concerned consumers buying pre-sale housing units in Macau and Mainland China. The top five areas that received complaints are telecommunications equipment, real estate, telecommunication services, public transportation and food and beverages. Case numbers in these five areas totalled 854, accounting for around 45 per cent of all complaints the council received last year. Telecommunications dreadful The Consumer Council’s 2015 Work Report indicates that they’ve received 303 complaints with regard to the telecommunications sector, the most compared to other areas. It amounted to 16 per cent of the total complaints and it’s a growth of 46 per cent compared to 2014. The Council states that the major disputes were about retailers’ marketing strategies and the quality of products. Most consumers complained that retailers provided false or misleading information, mixing authentic products with copycats and exaggerating the functions of the products or hiding important information about the commodities. The Council points out that such behaviour from retailers harm the consumers’ rights of knowing and choosing and cautions the industry to have better self-discipline. The Council also vows to enhance efforts to tackle such behaviour in co-operation with other departments in order to safeguard an image of credibility of Macau’s retail industry. In addition, the telecommunications services took third place in the most number of complaints that the Council had received. However, cases recorded in 2015 totalled 147, a drop of 33 per cent compared to 2014. Most cases are related to mobile data plan fees, Internet speed and unstable Internet services. Presale deals danger A total of 153 complaints were received about the real estate sector, a more than fourfold increase. The Council states most cases involve presale residential units that the consumers have purchased on the Mainland or in Macau – some 112 cases. However, the Council said that due to their efforts and co-ordination with relevant Mainland consumers’ rights protection groups, most cases have been resolved. There are also 15 cases of Macau homeowners complaining about property management companies’ service quality or management fees. The public transportation sector generated 100 complaints related to aviation. Passengers reached for help due to flight cancellations and complained that some airlines didn’t provide them with adequate information or not in a timely manner. Some 24 cases of taxi drivers refusing to take passengers or over-charging are on the books, too. The food and beverage sector generated 123 cases, mostly related to expired products, fake products, and overcharging by lying about the quality of the product sold, or in Chinese ‘cheating the scale’. The Council also says that of the complaints they received, around 23 per cent were filed by tourists, a similar percentage to 2014. Tourists’ complaints are mostly to do with telecommunications equipment, clocks and jewellery, clothes and leather, and F&B.

‘Code of Practice’ for food and beverage businesses The Consumer Council has established a Code of Practice for food and beverage services to further enhance the sense of food safety of Certified Shops, and the prerequisite to label price further safeguards consumers’ rights to information and choice. The Code of Practice for F&B services takes effect from October 1, according to a statement issued by the Council yesterday. It says the Code of Practice for food and beverage services requires Certified Shops of the concerned industry to comply with local regulations to strictly follow the execution of food safety and measurements. Other requirements include: Certified Shops must let consumers know about the measured weights or volume, retail prices of food or beverage products, while other charges must be listed explicitly, description of ingredients should match the food sold to consumers, and Certified Shops should support the sustainable development of the environment in terms of operations. The Council states that the Code of Practice for F&B services safeguards consumers in areas such as food safety and information transparency; the said Code is currently the seventeenth Code introduced for industries under the Certified Shop mechanism. The Council says it will continue to establish different Codes to raise the overall standard of Certified Shops.