Safeguarding Consumer Rights

Safeguarding Consumer Rights—Lack of Awareness Hindering the Cause

Absract

Consumers face a lot of exploitation from manufacturers to retailers and service providers. So it becomes necessary to study about the awareness of their rights, need for consumer education  and related redressal mechanisms. For this, a survey was conducted among 50 consumers of consumer products at Thiruvananthapuram city. The analysis of various variables like awareness level of consumers, right to be informed, redressal mechanism indicates that a majority of consumers are unaware of the present resources and mechanisms designed by the government for protecting the interest of consumers. . It may be concluded that lack of consumer education is the major reason for the unawareness of rights and their proper use.

Key words

Consumer awareness, consumer rights, redressal mechanism

1. Introduction

The Maharashtra State Consumer Commission has asked Coca Cola, one of the international fizzy drinks manufacturer, its bottler and distributor to pay Rupees one lakh in damage to a consumer named  Chandrashekhar Paradkar who found impurities in a bottle of soft drink that he had bought. This is one of the instances of many issues that a consumer has to face in the purchase, use and consumption of goods and services. The above case also highlights the need for an appropriate legal machinery to protect the customers against such exploitation from the manufacturers, distributors and sellers.

            A consumer is said to be the king in a free market economy. The earlier approach of caveat emptor (let the buyer beware) has now been changed to caveat venditor ( let the seller beware ). However with the growing competition and in an attempt to increase their sales and market share, manufacturers and service providers may be tempted to engage in unscrupulous, exploitative and unfair trade practices. This may in the form of unsafe and defective products, adulteration, false and misleading advertisement, overcharging etc. Thus it demands for the awareness of one’s own on his rights as a consumer and the existence of strong redressal mechanism for protecting the customers against the wrong practices of the sellers. Now let us examine the legal framework in the Indian context.

i.        The Consumer Protection Act, 1986: The Act provides for the setting up of a three tier machinery ie. District Forums, State Commissions and the National commission. The Act provides safeguards to consumers against defective goods, unfair trade practices and such other exploitation.

ii.      The Contract Act, 1872: This Act lays down the conditions in which the promises made by parties to a contract will be binding to each other.

iii.    The Sale of Goods Act, 1930: This Act provides safeguards and remedies to the buyers of goods in case the purchased items do not comply with the conditions and warranty.

iv.    The Essential Commodities act, 1955: The Act aims at controlling production, supply and distribution of essential commodities. It also provides for action against anti social activities of profiteers, hoarders and black marketers.

v.      The Agriculture Produce (Grading and Marking) Act, 1937: The Act prescribes grade standards for agriculture commodities and live stock products. The quality mark provided under the Act is AGMARK, an acronym for agricultural marketing.

vi.    The Prevention of Food Adulteration Act, 1954: the Act aims at checking adulteration of food items and ensures their purity.

vii.  The Standards of Weights and Measures Act, 1976: The Act provides protection to consumers against the malpractice of underweight or under measure.

viii.The Trade Mark Act, 1999: The act prevents the use of fraudulent marks on products and thus provides protection to the consumers against such products.

ix.    The Competition Act, 2002: The Act provides protection to the consumers in case of practices adopted by business firms which hamper competition in the market.

x.       The Bureau of Indian Standards Act, 1986: The Act permits the manufacturers to use the ISI mark on their products only after ensuring that the goods conform to the prescribed quality standards. It also provides a grievance cell to complaint about the quality of products carrying the ISI mark.  

2. Consumer Rights

      The Consumer Protection Act provides six rights to consumers

i.        Right to Choose: A consumer has a right to choose the best quality products at fair price.

ii.      Right to Safety: A consumer has a right to protect health and safety from the goods and services he buys.

iii.    Right to be Informed: A consumer has a right to be informed of the Quality, price, ingredients, purity, quantity and other pertinent facts relating to the products, he buys.

iv.    Right to be Heard: It assured that consumer interests will receive due consideration at appropriate forums.

v.      Right to seek Redressal: A consumer has a right for the redressal of his grievances if any.

vi.    Right to Consumer Education: A consumer has a right to receive proper instruction on his rights and redressal mechanism available.

3.      When to Complaint

·         As a result of an unfair trade practice adopted by any trader, you have suffered loss or damage

·         The goods purchased by you suffer from any defects

·         The services in respect of the goods purchased  by you suffer from any deficiency

·         A trader has charged for the goods a price in excess of the price fixed by or under any law for the time being in force or displayed on the goods or any purchase containing such goods.

4.      Whom to Approach for Redressal

You may take your complaint in writing along with the proof of purchase to the following forums

·         District Forum- If  the compensation claimed is less than Rs.20 Lakhs

·         State Commission-  If  the compensation claimed is between Rs.20 Lakhs and

1 crore

·         National Commission- If  the compensation claimed is above Rs. 1 crore

5.      Awareness of Consumer Rights and Redressal Mechanism- an Overview

            For the study, data have been collected from the consumers of consumer goods at Thiruvananthapuram city. The sample size was 50 and the same was selected by convenient sampling method. The objective was to have an insight into the level of knowledge of consumers on their rights and redressal mechanism and how far they are applying the rights in buying consumer goods and seeking remedy.

Table 1

Awareness level of Consumer Rights

Scale	No. of Respondents	Percentage
High	03	06
Moderate	41	82
Low	06	12
Total	50	100

                        Source: primary data

As per table 1, it is found that only 6% of the respondents have a good amount of knowledge on consumer rights. Majority that is 82% have only minimum knowledge on consumer rights.

Table 2

The Level of Verification of price, grade, quantity etc. before buying

Scale	No. of Respondents	Percentage
Always	25	50
Somewhat	24	48
Not at all	01	02
Total	50	100

                           Source: primary data

As per table 2, it is clear that 50% of the sample used to verify the price, grade, manufacturing date, expiry, ingredients etc. before they purchase a consumer item. Another 48% used to verify the details occasionally.

Table 3

Level of application of the Right to Choose

Scale	No. of Respondents	Percentage
Always	34	68
Somewhat	14	28
Not at all	02	04
Total	50	100

            Source: primary data

According to table 3, it is clear that 68% of the respondents apply the right to choose the goods while purchasing consumer articles.

Table 4

Level of application of the Right to be informed

Scale	No. of Respondents	Percentage
Always	09	18
Somewhat	34	68
Not at all	07	14
Total	50	100

                       Source: primary data

As per table 4, it is revealed that only 18% use the right to be informed on their purchase. Majority that is, 68% of the respondents occasionally use this right.

Table 5

Level of satisfaction of Right to Safety

Scale	No. of Respondents	Percentage
Highly	09	18
Moderate	35	70
Not at all	06	12
Total	50	100

                      Source: primary data

Table 5, says that only 18% think that the manufacturers and sellers are taking care of the quality life of consumers and highly considering the safety and security. 70 % have the opinion that the marketers are giving only moderate consideration on the consumers right to safety.

Table 6

Level of Satisfaction on the Right to Consumer Education

Scale	No. of Respondents	Percentage
High	05	10
Somewhat	38	76
Not at all	07	14
Total	50	100

                          Source: primary data

Table 6, shows that only 10% of the respondents feel that the consumer education on their right is highly satisfactory. 76% feel that the consumer education system is not satisfactory and that is why majority are not aware of their rights.

Table 7

Level of Knowledge on Redressal Mechanism

Scale	No. of Respondents	Percentage
High	02	04
Moderate	29	58
Low	19	38
Total	50	100

             Source: primary data

Likewise table 7 records the fact that 38% are totally unaware of the consumer redressal mechanism so available in the State. Only 4% is having a good knowledge on the existence of such forums.

            54% expressed that there were cases of exploitation from the marketers. Of  which only 29% had made their complaint. But their level of complaint ends at seller or shopkeeper level and only some of them could have their remedy.

Conclusion     

From the analysis it is evidential that the majority of the consumers are totally ignorant of their rights. Equally they are unaware of the availability of redressal mechanism. That is the reason why most of them neither apply their rights nor complaint to the right forum for seeking remedy. This demand for a rethinking on the field of consumer education on their rights ; when, where and how to complaint. Otherwise the lack of awareness may take away the good fruits of law and redressal forums

 Reference

Principles of marketing- philip Kotler and Gary Armstrong

Fundamentals of Marketing- William J stanton

Modern Marketing- RSN Pillai, Bagavathi

Marketing Management- Ramaswamy and Nama Kumari

Websites  

www.indlaw.com/guest/news

www.consumerisking.in