Tag Archives: Consumer Sentinel Network

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

The Top 10 Consumer Complaints of 2012

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By Selena Maranjian

The top complaints in America

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If you’re fed up with hearing people complain, imagine being the Consumer Sentinel Network. This online database for law enforcement compiled and categorized more than 2 million complaints in 2012 — instances of fraud, scams, schemes, and violations consumers reported to everyone from the FTC to the Better Business Bureau to the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.

So which industries or groups of people cause us the most grief? Here are the CSN‘s findings for the top 10 complaint categories and the percentage of the total complaints that each represents:

1. Identity theft (18 percent)
2. Debt collection (10 percent)
3. Banks and lenders (6 percent)
4. Shop-at-home and catalog sales (6 percent)
5. Prizes, sweepstakes, and lotteries (5 percent)
6. Impostor scams (4 percent)
7. Internet services (4 percent)
8. Auto-related complaints (4 percent)
9. Telephone and mobile services (4 percent)
10. Credit cards (3 percent)

Stolen identities
It makes sense that identity theft tops the list. Detecting, uncovering and correcting the fallout from identity theft is a long, labyrinthine process. Sure, it’s terrible if you lose, say, $500 or $1,000. But with identity theft, some people have not only lost a lot of money but have spent years trying to undo the damage done, encountering many frustrations along the way.

Most of us know to shred documents containing personal information before discarding them, and to be careful to whom we divulge personal information. It can be easy to imagine that identity theft won’t happen to us. But according to the CSN, nearly one-fifth of all complaints — a whopping 369,132 — were about identity theft.

Military variations
The distribution of complaints was different among military personnel than other Americans. For example, while their top two complaints were the same as the overall results, their No. 6 complaint category was mortgage foreclosure relief and debt management, while it was just 15th for the overall nation.

Foreclosures and debt problems have been major issues for many service members. That’s because they often receive orders to pick up and move to a new location and assignment, but with our economy struggling and home prices depressed, they can end up owing more than their homes are worth. Worse still, hundreds have had their homes illegally foreclosed upon by big banks — JPMorgan Chase (JPM), Wells Fargo (WFC), Bank of America (BAC), and Citigroup (C) — as has been reported by The New York Times. Military members should know that settlements have been struck with big banks to address these and other wrongs, and that entities such as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau are looking out for their interests.

Fraud
This wonderful digital age has ushered in new ways for scammers to scam us. The most common method …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Business, Finance, Occupation & Industry

Less Than One Quarter of Taxpayers Very Concerned about Identity Theft when Filing Returns

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By Business Wirevia The Motley Fool

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Less Than One Quarter of Taxpayers Very Concerned about Identity Theft when Filing Returns


LifeLock Study Shows Consumers Need Education on Identity Theft

TEMPE, Ariz.–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Despite recent reports showing increases in identity theft, consumers’ knowledge on identity theft is not keeping pace with the crime. According to the new 2013 LifeLock Tax Fraud Survey, conducted online by Harris Interactive on behalf of LifeLock in February, among 2,090 U.S. adults age 18 and older, less than one quarter (24 percent) of taxpayers selected the top 2 points of concern on a 5 point scale about identity theft when filing their returns. Additionally, 70 percent of Americans think it is possible for a fraudster to use their name and Social Security Number (SSN) to file a return before they do, blocking the actual taxpayer’s refund from the IRS. Yet despite this concern, 38% of those who have previous years’ returns saved on their computer do not have password protection for these files.

In February 2013 the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) released their annual “Consumer Sentinel Network Data Book” that looked at consumer complaints from January 1 through December 21, 2012. Identity theft was the number one complaint category in the Consumer Sentinel Network, and of those more than 369,000 complaints, Government Documents and Benefits fraud accounted for 46% of all complaints. As noted by the FTC, identity theft related to Government Documents and Benefits includes Tax or Wage Related Fraud, accounting for 43% of the complaints.

“As a company that sees identity theft threats 24/7, we are concerned about the large disconnect between this growing threat and consumer education. This is really playing into the hands of identity thieves,” said LifeLock President Hilary Schneider.

The survey examined Americans’ identity fraud concerns and tax return filing behavior for tax season.

The 2013 LifeLock Tax Fraud Survey highlights include:

  • No Password = No Protection – Nearly three in ten (29 percent) Americans keep copies of previous years’ tax returns on their computer, but 38 percent of this group do not protect their returns with a password. This makes these returns more vulnerable to criminals through peer-to-peer file sharing programs or lost devices.

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    Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance

Computers

The FTC says identity theft retains its throne as No.1 consumer scourge

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The Federal Trade Commission’s annual look at its Consumer Sentinel Network database of complaints found that 2012 was the first year the agency got more than 2 million complaints overall.

And, has been true for the past 13 years, Identity theft was the top consumer complaint the commission received. Eighteen percent or 369,132 of 2012’s complaints were related to identity theft. Of those, more than 43% related to tax- or wage-related fraud, the agency stated.

A closer look at the identity theft trend finds:

  • Government documents/benefits fraud (46%) was the most common form of reported identity theft, followed by credit card fraud (13%), phone or utilities fraud (10%), and bank fraud (6%). Other significant categories of identity theft reported by victims were employment-related fraud (5%) and loan fraud (2%).
  • Complaints about government documents/benefits fraud increased 27 percentage points since calendar year 2010; tax or wage-related fraud accounted for the growth in this area, with 43.4% of identity theft victims reporting this problem in 2012. Employment-related fraud complaints, in contrast, have declined 6 percentage points since calendar year 2010.
  • Forty-two percent of identity theft complainants reported whether they contacted law enforcement. Of those victims, 68% notified a police department. Fifty-four percent of these indicated a report was taken.
  • Florida is the state with the highest per capita rate of reported identity theft complaints, followed by Georgia and California.

Rounding out the Top 10 most complained about activities are:

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Source: FULL ARTICLE at PCWorld