Trading standards advice sheets help residents know their consumer rights

Businesses and residents in the Royal Borough will today (Thursday 18 November) have better information about their consumer rights thanks to a new trading standards online initiative.

Officers have produced advice sheets - available on the trading standards pages on the Royal Borough website - on a range of consumer information including:

• Knowing your rights when shopping from home
• Knowing if the trader is right when dealing with a dispute in a shop
• Being armed with your legal rights when buying goods or services.

Embedding this information within the trading standards pages on the Royal Borough's website is a low cost option saving the council money, as the work involved in writing and updating the leaflets is centralised, and the publishing of them online is shared between many trading standards services around the country, co-ordinated by the Trading Standards Institute.

Launching the new online leaflets Cllr Phill Bicknell, lead member for public protection, said: "I am delighted that in these challenging economic times residents can wisely and confidently spend their money armed with all the information they need on their rights.

"This purchasing confidence will help legitimate businesses benefit from an increase in sales, cut red tape and efficiently provide the legal information they need free of charge.

"This is an excellent innovation from trading standards which will positively affect our business and consumer communities. It clearly demonstrates that once again the council is putting residents first."

Steve Johnson, trading standards manager, said: "In addition to benefiting local businesses, we hope this advice will build consumer confidence, arming shoppers with the information they need to confidently buy online and engage with local shops and services."

The online consumer and business advice sheets can be found under 'what's new' at http://www.rbwm.gov.uk/web/trading_standards.htm

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