Trading Standards - Advice to Consumers
Have you bought some shoddy counterfeit clothes, or have you been overcharged at your local supermarket? If you have, we would like to hear from you.
Consumer Direct - Consumer advice and complaints
Advice and support for consumers in Lambeth is now provided by Consumer Direct London.
What is Consumer Direct?
Consumer Direct is a telephone and online consumer advice service, which is supported by local authorities nationally, and by the Department of Trade and Industry.
Consumer Direct provides clear, practical advice to help consumers sort out problems and disagreements with suppliers of goods or services. From overcharging to faulty goods, and dodgy workmanship to reporting dishonest traders and scams, the trained advisers at Consumer Direct are ready to offer individual solutions for individual problems.
Consumer Direct works in partnership with Local Authority Trading Standards Advice Services providing first level advice and information on a wide range of consumer problems. More complex problems, or complaints requiring further investigation or assistance are referred to Trading Standards or other advice services.
Contacting Consumer Direct
A wide range of consumer information and advice is also available online from Consumer Direct website.
What we do
Working in conjunction with others we aim to promote the health, economic and social well being of residents, businesses and visitors to Lambeth.
More particularly, we work with consumers and traders to ensure fair business practices are used and that the risks from unsafe goods is reduced.
How we can help
We can respond to your complaints if, for example, you:
- have seen children being sold tobacco, alcohol, fireworks or knives;
- know of elderly or otherwise vulnerable people being pressurised into unwanted purchases;
- know where counterfeit products are being sold;
- have been misled by poor labelling or pricing displays;
- have been charged more than the marked price;
- have bought potentially dangerous goods or toys;
- have bought a car with a false mileage and history; or
- have bought short weight or short measure goods.
We will investigate your complaint to find out what the problems and issues are.
We'll take all appropriate action if consumer protection laws have been violated, which may include prosecuting the offender.
Consumer self-help advice sheets
We provide self-help advice sheets on a range of topics.
These pages are linked to the National Trading Standards Organisation site which contains regularly updated information on recent cases and trends.
Our services
- Investigate 100% of complaints that have a criminal element.
- Protect vulnerable consumers especially the elderly.
- Tackle rogue traders.
- Support reputable businesses.
- Reduce the incidence of underage sales.
- Provide an immediate service for dangerous products.
What you can do to help
- Support us by reporting businesses that flout the law.
- Tell us what you think about our services and how we might improve them.
Our service standards
- We will respond to all consumer complaints within five working days.
- We will provide a written reply to all recorded consumer complaints within 10 working days explaining what we have done.
- We will provide you with a full explanation if we cannot help you and try to refer you to an agency that can.
- We will answer our public contact telephone numbers within 15 seconds during office hours (9-5).
Who to contact
See Trading Standards - who to contact.