Congratulations to the government and M Kayveas for finally taking a strong stand on the current Ctos saga.

While people condemn Ctos, everyone must understand and accept the fact that credit reporting agencies play an important role in assisting the relevant agencies in assessing the credit worthiness on an individual or a company.

It is a false perception that credit reporting in Malaysia equals to Ctos. Ctos has been the target because it is the leading company on credit reporting in Malaysia.

Credit reporting has existed in the United States since 1970 and it has since developed into an integral part of the financial system. It has even been well accepted in developed economies such as United Kingdom, Australia many others. Strict regulations are already in place so that these agencies operate fairly. Laws like Fair Credit Reporting Act in the US, Consumer Credit Act in the UK, Privacy Act in Australia has been in place for a long time now.

The guiding principles within which any credit reporting should operate are privacy, accuracy and fairness. Credit reporting businesses in Malaysia has lacked all these very basic elements, therefore subjecting them to condemnation. Currently the public has developed hatred toward Ctos specifically because the majority of them have had their names listed on its database and this has affected their financial credentials. These people would have in some point of time gone into trouble with their creditors.

They must remember that by prosecuting Ctos, it does not mean that there will be no more credit reporting agencies in Malaysia. Their names might still appear but this time on a strictly regulated basis. Currently while the government looks into regulating the operations of credit reporting agencies, it is vital that they also re-visit the consumer credit policies. If these policies are not re-assessed now, probably there would be another outcry against the operations of these would-be regulated credit reporting agencies in the near future.

Credit cards are issued easily to graduates and hefty interest rates are charged, car loans are approved without a 10 percent down payment and loans extended to nine years, easy payment schemes are easily available to purchase household items even though it is beyond the affordability of an individual, personal loans are easily issued by certain financial institutions and service memberships are purchased by individuals even if they can't afford it. All these has been the major contributor towards an individual’s name appearing on a credit report list. People must understand that credit reporting can operate both ways.

To a consumer it can save him from further debts and for the financial institutions it could help them in assessing the credit worthiness of a person. Consumers must understand that spending beyond their means would be detrimental to them and it is important that the government tightens rules on consumer credit and continue to educate consumers on best financial practices. The writer is director National Consumer Complaints Center (NCCC).

Credit Reporting Agencies Must Be Regulated

Issue of CTOS had been actively debated in the local media for the past few days. For the records, this issue has been brought up on a number of occasions and it has also been debated in Parliament but it has never gathered momentum until Datuk Kayeas took interest in it. For this The NCCC would congratulate the said Deputy Minister. CTOS has always claimed that they are merely providing a tipp off service to the financial institutions on which these financial institutions heavily rely upon before even considering financial services to a consumer. It has even sapped the role played by CCRIS which is maintained by Bank Negara. The mere appearance of a consumers name on the so called CTOS list would warrant an immediate rejection of any application. This has put consumers in a difficult position as they are not able to obtain any loan facility. The question which arises here is, how perfect is the list maintained by CTOS? It must be understood that CTOS is a company and the prime motive of a company is to make profits and consumer interest will always be neglected. The NCCC has even received calls which claims that names can even be remoned with an 'undertable fee'. Information on the CTOS system is merely collected from public sources without any verification and when records are disputed the burden is shifted to the consumer to prove otherwise. The NCCC would agree that credit reporting agencies play an important role in assisting financil institutions is assesing the credit risk of a person but the operation of such agencies should be heavily regulated as they store private data of individuals. The risk of information being abused is always high. In the UK there is the Consumer Credit Act, the USA has the Fair Credit Reporting Act, the New Zealand operates Credit Reporting Code and the Australian has the Privacy Act. All these Acts regulate's the bussiness of credit reporting but in Malaysia we are struggling with our Data Protection Act which is still at the draft stage. The operation of all Credit Reporting Agencies in Malaysia should be suspended until some form of regulations are put in place.

ASSERTS YOUR RIGHTS, CONSUMERS URGED

KUALA LUMPUR, June 26 (Bernama) -- There is certainly absolute truth in the saying that `the only thing constant is change'. Take the consumer movement for instance, at one time the complaints chronicled around rotten fish or dented food cans, today the grouses revolve around the high cost of living.In short, consumer issues have become complex and with the waves of globalisation hitting hard, there is no doubt that the grievances affecting consumers are bound to `evolve'. Consumers of the 21st century are more concerned with the quality of living at their disposal."The biggest challenge in raising consumerism awareness is in generating interest. Malaysians are not interested in consumer-related issues. They are just not bothered. When we hold public talks, it is so difficult to pull in the crowd. Even if we get the crowd, 98 percent will comprise senior citizens," lamented Darshan Singh, the director of the National Consumer Complaints Center (NCCC).The NCCC, which comes under the Selangor and Federal Territory Consumer Association, was set up by Era Consumer in 2004.

YOUNGSTERS MUST TAKE INTEREST

Darshan told Bernama the involvement of younger generation was paramount and until and unless that was done the consumer movement in Malaysia would be getting nowhere."Another reason is funding. There are many things that we want to do to enhance consumer protection in this country but are unable to do so because of the financial constraints."We do not receive any grant from the Government. Consumer protection is one of the most important aspects of civil society and this crucial point has been overlooked by the Government. So we are left to make do with whatever resources we have," he said.

COMPLAINTS GET NOWHERE

Darshan said `complaining' is not a way of life for Malaysians and one reason for this was due to the ineffectiveness of the way the complaints were handled by the Government agencies."There is no proper information on how to go about highlighting grievances concerning a thing bought or service received. Majority of the consumers shy away because they feel their complaint will get nowhere and it will just be a waste of time for them."A big number of people expect others to fight their battles for them and are not willing to do anything themselves. That is why NCCC was established. We want to provide independent avenues for consumers to lodge their complaints. We try and teach consumers how to assert their rights and take up their cause when they fail to find any resolution."He said the current situation was such that if consumer advocates like NCCC did not intervene, the likelihood for the potential complainant to drop the case was great.Darshan said the NCCC receives an average of 90 telephone calls per day. Not all however are complaints. Some call to either provide or seek information."We have also created an online complaints form at www.nccc.org.my and we encourage people to use it to lodge complaints. In a month, we log in 1,000 complaints. These are the type of consumers we hope to see more, who take the trouble to defend their consumer rights."

EDUCATION SYSTEM'S ROLE CRUCIAL

Lamenting that the education system has failed miserably in creating prudent and well-informed consumers, Darshan said the pro-industry government policies did not take into account consumer protection."We do not have any subject in school that deals with consumerism. The efforts seem to be focussed on creating Consumer Clubs in secondary schools. I believe that consumer education should begin in primary schools and the Government should engage consumer bodies to assist. A comprehensive consumer curriculum has to be developed. This will definitely instil knowledge among the young at an early age.

3 "E"

Darshan said NCCC has always advocated the 3 "E" i.e. education, ethics and enforcement in its efforts at strengthening consumer protection in the country."If consumers are equipped with knowledge, they will be able to effectively assert their rights and this will force the traders to be more ethical in conducting their business as they would know that they can no longer short-change customers."And finally enforcement should step in to weed out errant traders who blatantly disregard consumer interest. Once these three are in place I believe we can achieve a positive result in protecting consumers. At the moment all these three areas are out of sync."When it comes to complaining, Darshan said there is no such thing as a petty complaint. A complaint is a complaint."We want to cultivate the habit of complaining among Malaysians. Each and every complaint filed with NCCC is investigated, the issue identified and addressed. If we find there is no case then the complainant is informed of that. But from my three years' with NCCC there is always an issue in every complaint received. From every complaint received we structure our consumer education and advocacy work."

CONSUMER BODIES ARE NOT ADVERSARIES

Traditionally consumer education or empowerment programmes and complaints handling is left to consumer organisations but that is not so in Malaysia."Here consumer organisations are seen as adversaries. They are branded akin to opposition parties when the truth is that consumer organisations are non-religious, non-racial and non-political entities."We want to work with the Government, not for the Government. The same sentiment goes to the industry players. We should not be seen as enemies. It is heartening to see the industry opening up and accepting us as an avenue to solve consumer disputes," he added.Darshan also suggested that the Consumer Affairs function of the Ministry of Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs be transferred to the Prime Minister's Department."This has to be done because at present there is a conflict of interest here. How is the Ministry of Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs going to protect the consumers when it's also to promote the industry growth?"

Unsolicited SMS Charges

THE National Consumer Complaints Centre (NCCC) , questions the transparency of the complaints handling procedure undertaken by MCMC. Its director Darshan Singh said most of the time, the telco will seek to offer a refund to the complainant. "Whether refund actually happens is quite questionable. But a more pressingissue here is that there is no deterrent action against repeated offenders,"he said.

To address the issue effectively, NCCC is calling for the issuance ofitemised billing for pre-paid users. "There should be no more subscription-based service for rich contentslike wallpaper, song download, games or ringtones. Only allow pay perdownload for these type of services. They may allow subscription for text-based services. This will eliminate a lot of problems," Darshan said. The regulator should revoke the application service provider licence ofcontent providers who commit offence repeatedly - perhaps when caught forthe third time.

"MCMC should enhance complaints handling by dealingdirectly with complainants instead of asking telcos to communicate withthem. International gateway providers should also be stopped. Currently,there are many fake messages sent to mobile users. For instance, users didnot request for a particular service but are sent a message and charged.When they complain, the telco log will show that they had subscribed tothe service," said Darshan. "Don't issue multiple short codes to companies. Just issue one shortcode. Thus if they are caught spamming, all their services would bebanned. Currently, many short codes are issued to one company. Onceaction is taken against a particular shortcode, they will migrate toanother shortcode. Therefore, suspension is pointless," he added.

On making services available, Darshan said the "opt out" method shouldcease. "It should be `opt in' instead. If I want something, I should beable to take it. I don't want contents that I have to say no to. Even byjust saying no, telcos will charge 15 sen. Multiply that with the numberof mobile phone subscribers and you will see the picture." Darshan also urged all subscribers to check their monthly bills and makea police report under commercial crime if they have been victimised. Theycan lodge complaints with NCCC at 03-78779000 or log on to our Web site'se-aduan form at www.nccc.org.my.

Guys, please lodge complaints if you find unsolicitesd SMS charges in your bills. Make sure that you always check your bills.

Errant Lawyers

The issue of errant lawyers has been widely debated for the past few weeks since the publishing of the names of errant lawyers in the newspapers. We at the The National Consumer Complaints Center (NCCC) ourselves had continued to receive complaints from the public on negligent lawyers. Common area of complaint includes delay in completing sale and purchase transactions. Many consumers end up paying interest to developers for delay which is at no fault of theirs. In most of the cases the lawyers and banks will not take the responsibility over such cases and the blame game would start. The common time limit allowed to complete a normal house purchase transaction is 2+1 and if this timing is inadequate, the Bar ouncil must seek avenues to have it extended. Until now we don't see and effords from the Bar Council. The Bar Council should look into this matter immediately as consumers are not allowed to choose their own lawyers.

The other common area of greviance is the charging of excessibve contingency fee. It is well known fact that there are lawyer's who charge as high as 40% in contingency fee and this is excluding the 10% which is paid by the insurance company as cost. The Legal Profession Etique Rules clearly forbids the charging of contingency fees but this has been going on right under the nose of the Bar Council and poor consumers are being abused. The NCCC agree's that the charging of contingency help's poor consumers in obtaining legal representation and therefore the Bar Council should legalise and regulate the charging of contingency fee so that consumers are not shortchanged. If they can control discounts on fee's, then why can't the Bar Council regulate this area as well.

We see that the Bar Council is more interested in issues which does not need urgent attention and by doing so it neglegts bread and butter issues. He NCCC hopes that the Bar Council is more pro-active is adressing issues which affects the consumers at large.

COMPENSATE TRADERS HIT BY FLOOD

Joyce Tagal Jun 13, 07 6:09pm

Consumers associations have called on the government to compensate traders who were affected in Sunday’s flash flood in Kuala Lumpur. National Consumer Complaints Center (NCCC) director Darshan Singh said the traders who suffered were all tax-paying citizens and therefore should be compensated for the damages incurred. He argued that the flood was not a natural disaster and could have been averted."This is not the first time, such floods have occurred in the area before." he said. "The government has failed in its duty to provide a safe environment to live and carry out business." Selangor and Wilayah Persekutuan Consumer's Association (SWPCA) president Mohd Yusof Abdul Rahman said he hoped that government agencies like development banks would offer aid to the traders. "DBKL (Kuala Lumpur City Hall) has to investigate the sources of Sunday's floods and fix the problems so that it does not happen again." he said. "We are worried that if the city centre keeps flooding, the traders will give up their businesses and move elsewhere." Yusof also said he had high hopes for the flood management portion of the Smart tunnel, but hoped that the government would prioritise flood investigations over toll collection. Ahead of schedule Yesterday, Irrigation and Drainage Department (DID) director-general Keizrul Abdullah announced yesterday that the Smart floodwater channel would be ready by June 23, a week ahead of schedule. According to Bernama, Keizrul said that the department was speeding up all flood mitigation measures. Other efforts will include the installation of pump systems in low-lying areas and construction of flood bypasses. "We will also upgrade the flood forecast and alert system. We've started sending flood warnings to Shah Alam residents by SMS (short messaging service)," he was quoted as saying. Malaysiakini