MADISON, WI (WTAQ) – The Wisconsin Department of Ag, Trade, and Consumer Protection is looking at what kind of complaints and consumer issues were most prevalent across the state in 2020.
DATCP received over 11,000 complaints last year. The top three issues remained the same: Telemarketing, Landlord/Tenant conflicts, and Telecommunications.
A new federal trades act has been put into place to combat telemarketing calls, especially spoof phone calls. That might lead to consumers seeing something like ‘Warning: Spam Risk’ pop up under a caller’s identification.
“So that, I think, is helping reduce the number of these telemarketing complaints. And that number has dropped from last year, so that’s positive,” said Director for the Bureau of Consumer Protection, Tricia Collins.
If you do get calls, you can fill out a complaint with DATCP by using a simple form on their website. Collins says they’ll research the number and attempt to contact the business to figure out what’s going on.
“Once those complaints come in, we’ll reach out to the business and try to mediate the issue and see if we can resolve it,” Collins told WTAQ News. “Lots of times, the businesses will work with us and we’re able to reach a resolution. If not, sometimes we do a little bit more investigation and may reach a settlement agreement with the company or have to refer it on for further enforcement possible prosecution.”
Meanwhile, issues between landlords and tenants rose slightly over what was seen in 2019.
“A lot of times, we gets calls and complaints regarding return of security deposits, maybe unauthorized access, and evictions. We certainly have resources and contacts and referral agencies that we can help direct people to, that need any assistance in that area,” Collins explained. “We encourage landlords and tenants to reach out to us if they have questions regarding their rights and responsibilities. We have great resources on our web page too, with a nice fact sheet that lays out what the law is in regards to that.”
There were also some fresh faces in the top ten consumer complaints for 2020. Many issues reported were related to entertainment, recreation, and travel and tourism.
“Complaints often related to ticket refunds or adjustments, maybe misleading and untrue information that people were concerned that they received, those are new complaint categories to the list this year,” Collins said.
Some of those issues were related to COVID cancellations. A recent case with Voyageurs International saw hundreds of complaints after people tried to withdraw from their 2020 European tour.
“We had over 300 consumers that were not able to get a refund of the amount that they paid for that, and we were able to reach a settlement agreement with them and return over $600,000 back to those consumers,” Collins said.
The pandemic and ensuing shutdowns may have also contributed to a rise in reports of identity theft. That complaint jumped two spots to 4th-highest in the DATCP rankings for 2020.
“A number of those complaints relate to false filings for unemployment benefits. We encourage any consumer that may have experienced that to reach out to us, because we can provide resources and information on how to recover from that identity theft,” Collins said.
To learn more about DATCP or to file a report, click here.
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