FTC: Consumers' Top Fraud Complaints

Consumers have a lot of complaints about fraud in the market place. Several of the topics should be of concern, either because they could involve financial institutions or because institutions can do something to help.

The biggest complaint, by far, involves identity theft. The Federal Trade Commission reports that a whopping 42% of consumer fraud complaints involve identity theft. To put the level of complaints into context, the second most common complaint, involving Internet auctions, comprised only 10% of the complaints.

Seven percent of the complaints involved Internet services and computer complaints. While attributing any of these to banking on the Internet is a bit of a stretch, banks should be sensitive to the complaint level and monitor their website and Internet services carefully.

Also on the top ten list were complaints about advance fee loans and credit protection, coming in at 5% of the total complaints. While clearly less of a problem than identity theft, this problem relates closely to banking and the promotion of services. Review your marketing practices, particularly those relating to cross-selling products such as credit insurance. You can get the details from the FTC's website at www.ftc.gov.

Copyright © 2002 Compliance Action. Originally appeared in Compliance Action, Vol. 7, No. 1, 2/02