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The Consumer Protection Act - Part 1

Fred had been stuck on a desert island for many years, and was becoming quite desperate to get back home. One day, as he was walking along the beach, looking for anything useful that may have washed up, he saw a bottle. Now, this was a red-letter event in more ways than one. Practically, a bottle meant that he could store and carry water more easily. However, what really made his heart race were the questions, the possibilities that sprang to mind. This was the very first manufactured article that had washed up on the beach in all his years on the island. Was he closer to human settlement than he'd thought? Was there a ship close by?

Forcing himself to move, he bent and carefully picked up the bottle. His heart sank. This bottle had obviously been lost at sea for even longer than he had. It would still be useful, but it was no herald of imminent rescue. Beating back an onslaught of depression following in the wake of this momentary elation and crashing disappointment, he carefully stored the bottle and continued his unending, daily quest for survival.

Later, back at his meagre shelter, he took out the bottle and examined it more closely. It was old, very old. Back in civilisation it may have fetched a decent price from an antique dealer, but here, it was just an old bottle. It was encrusted with barnacles, and the glass that remained clear was so dirty that it was almost impossible to discern its deep emerald-green colouring. The bottle was stoppered with some unidentifiable material that was, in places, seemingly welded to the glass by means of dirt and marine organisms, and resisted any casual attempt at removal.

“This will need quite a bit of cleaning if its to be useful.”, Fred muttered to himself, giving a patch of relatively unencrusted, grime-hazed glass a rub with his thumb.

The effect of this passing nod in the general direction of attempted bottle renovation surpassed any and all possible expectation. Barnacles, salt rime, and accumulated dirt explosively vacated the surface of the bottle, stinging his exposed skin, and initiating the bottle's precipitate descent to the fortunately soft sand at his feet. From his prone, foetal position on the sand, ears filled with a cacophony fit to drown out a hurricane, Fred peered fearfully through his fingers. The now-pristine bottle stood upright on the sand emitting a bright emerald glow, and seemingly unaffected by the mystical vortex of sound, light and wind, of which it was the centre.

Suddenly, silence ... all the more intense in the shadow of the maelstrom of noise that it replaced. The bottle stood cleanly, greenly, innocently on the sand, and then … pop; the smallest, gentlest pop.

“Yes, Master. How may I serve you?” …  “Master … Master …?” … The usual response is that you ask for three wishes and I grant them. You get three wishes … only three, so choose wisely; and I'd appreciate it if you could be quick, I've got a cake in the oven.”

During this unusual discourse, Fred slowly, regained awareness, until finally, with a snap like an elastic band, he was stung back into awareness. “Three wishes. Any three wishes? Anything at all?”, he asked desperately.

“Yes, any three wishes. But only three!”, boomed the genie.
“I don't need to think too hard about the first wish,” he said, “I've been dreaming of it for years. My first wish is that I want to go home.”

POOF!! He was home.

After allowing himself a short celebration and a moment's thought, he said, “For my second wish, I want to always be able to put my hand in my pocket and have exactly the right amount of money for any item that I am buying, no matter how big or small.”

“A wise choice.”, said the genie, and POOF!!, it was so.

Fred thought hard for a few more minutes, and finally said, “OK, I've decided on my last wish. I wish to be irresistible to women.”
POOF!! He turned into a bar of chocolate.

While I certainly hope this little story has amused you, I also hope that it has reminded you of the double-edged quality of wishes. Almost every mythology in the world tells stories that warn of the dangers involved in wish-fulfilment. One of the more creative visions of Hell speaks of all the wondrous foods one could wish for, but accessible only with forks that are too long to convey food to one's mouth – torture indeed.
At one time or another, every one of us has, as a consumer, wished for a better deal; some kind of recourse or protection. However, what we may have over-looked when making that wish, is that many of us are not only consumers, but also suppliers. Has our wish as consumers cut us, as suppliers, with an unexpected sharp edge?

All of us that are suppliers of goods and/or services in any way, are simultaneously consumers. In other words, in this context, we have dual-personae; we are simultaneously supplier and consumer. For the most part these personae support each other symbiotically. After all, consumption requires a supplier, and suppliers cannot exist without consumers.

The wishes of suppliers are relatively few and simple. As suppliers, we wish for better cost to earning ratios. As suppliers, we firstly wish for more consumers. Secondly, we wish for consumers who will be faithful to their source of supply, and therefore increase their consumption, and provide word-of-mouth advertising. I know that this is simplifying things quite a lot, but if we boil down all that we want as suppliers, then these two wishes would pretty much suffice.

As consumers, our list of wishes, while slightly longer, is also fairly straight-forward. As consumers, we wish for suppliers that don't misrepresent their products or services, but rather supply us with what we actually want. As consumers, we wish for high quality, value-for-money goods and services. As consumers, we wish that after-sales service was as enthusiastic as the sales pitch. As consumers, we want advertising to more accurately portray goods and services. To put it in a nutshell, as consumers, we are looking for a fair deal.

If I compare these two wish-lists in this manner, it seems to me that there shouldn't be any problems. On the surface, these wish-lists look highly complimentary. Supply me, the consumer, with good products (goods or services), that you haven't “lied” about, along with proper after-sales service, and I'll continue to buy your product. In fact, I'll also be inclined to buy any other of your products that fulfil a need. Additionally, I'll probably provide free, positive advertising when my friends need what you're selling. As a supplier, this immediately fulfils one of your two primary wishes – a solid, committed, growing consumer-base. It also begins to fulfil your wish of better cost to earning ratios. If your consumer-base is growing and providing you with free, word-of-mouth advertising, then your costs drop, and your earnings increase. If you have fewer consumer complaints, product replacements, and even law suits, then your costs drop, and your consumer-image becomes more positive, thus potentially increasing earnings. So, if the supplier fulfils the consumer's wish-list, theirs is also largely fulfilled.

If its all so simple, why are there so many problems between suppliers and consumers? As a small business owner, and someone who mixes with other business owners, I seldom hear anyone speaking positively about their clients. As a consumer, it is just as rare to hear my fellow-consumers speaking positively of their suppliers.

In general, I find that most suppliers seem to perceive their clients in much the same way as an old, rich man might see his beautiful, much younger, trophy wife; as potentially unfaithful, always wanting more (not in a good way), with an eye for the next, best thing, and only yours until something better comes along. In many cases, for old men and suppliers alike, there may well be a large helping of truth in this scenario. However, while I have no personal experience of trophy wives, I do think there's more to this story as it relates to consumers. Why is it that consumers have become so unfaithful, jaded, and disenchanted?

I would like to put it to you that suppliers have created the consumers of today in much the same way as Dr. Frankenstein's blind ambition created the monster that ultimately destroyed him. Just as unmet needs, and bad experiences may help to create a money-grubbing trophy wife, today's consumers have, to a large extent, been created by the actions of their suppliers. Consumers have, in effect, been trained to distrust suppliers. Consumers have learned that the burger you get is not even second-cousin by marriage to the burger in the picture above the till. Consumers have learned that suppliers are only interested in them until the sale is made,  the contract signed, and your money becomes theirs. Consumers have learned that physical products are not designed to last, but to be replaced, or possibly repaired at great cost. Consumers have learned that no matter how well one reads the small print, there is always something that will come back to bite them in the butt. Consumers have learned that nine times out of ten, the great service or product that is promised, only exists in the imaginary world of advertising.

So here, in brief, is the situation. Consumers are unhappy because they feel they are being cheated, or at least taken advantage of, by suppliers, and are effectively wasting their hard-earned money. Even when they try a new supplier who promises more, they often find that its just more of the same. Suppliers are unhappy because their production, marketing, transport, and customer-support costs are constantly rising. Market pressure is constantly increasing, and the concept of brand-loyalty no longer seems to exist.

Oh, what a vicious circle trapped in a catch-22 situation. Consumers won't increase their loyalty while they feel that suppliers of undeserving of it. Suppliers are so caught up in the pressures of the market place that they battle to see a solution beyond advertising and charging more for less. Is there a way out of this tangled web? Will this double-edged problem be solved by the new Consumer Protection Act (CPA)? What does the CPA mean to suppliers? Is the CPA detrimental to suppliers, and biased toward consumers? (remember I am both a supplier and a consumer)

In my next couple of articles in this series, I will look at some specific areas of interest that are impacted by the CPA, such as property rental, legal agreements, Consumer Affairs Tribunals, and so on. However we, as suppliers, may feel about the Consumer Protection Act, it is now something with which we have to live, and that we need to learn how to use to our benefit. I will attempt to answer some of these questions (above) in light of the inescapably symbiotic relationship between supplier and consumer.

Author: Robin Bownes.