The Netherlands - Consumer Authority's website Consuwijzer gets more than two million visits in 2009.

In 2009, consumers consulted the website of ConsuWijzer, the government information desk for consumers, over two million times; almost double the number of hits in 2008. What is more, 100,000 consumers received individual advice with regard to their rights. "It is good to see that consumers are now making use of the ConsuWijzer website. Consumers can obtain valuable information regarding their rights and obligations via this information desk. For the enforcement authorities behind ConsuWijzer, it forms a significant source of information when it comes to investigating unfair trading practices", explains State Secretary of Economic Affairs, Heemskerk.

Queries and Complaints 2009

The website www.consuwijzer.nl was visited over two million times throughout 2009, signifying an enormous growth when compared with 2008, at which point this figure stood at 1,050,000. Over 100,000 consumers use ConsuWijzer in order to request individual advice or submit a complaint by telephone (75,000), by e-mail (30,000) or by letter (2,000). 328,000 sample letters were downloaded from this site and 200,000 comparisons have been made using EnergieWijzer on this site.

The five types of problems most frequently reported to ConsuWijzer were as follows:

• Guarantee and non-conformity (the right to have a sound product)
• Telemarketing (misleading and/or unwelcome sales calls)
• Energy contracts (canvassing for customers)
• SMS services (unwanted subscriptions)
• Online purchases

For more information click here.