Consumer organization

Consumer organizations are advocacy groups that seek to protect people from corporate abuse. Unsafe products, predatory lending, false advertising, astroturfing and pollution are all examples of corporate abuse.

Consumer organizations may operate via protests, campaigning or lobbying. They may engage in single-issue advocacy (e.g., the British Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA), which campaigned with great success against keg beer and for cask ale). or they may set themselves up as more general consumer watchdogs, such as the Consumers' Association in the UK.

One common means of providing consumers useful information is the independent comparative survey or test of products or services, involving different manufacturers or companies (e.g., Which?, Consumer Reports, etc.).

Another arena where consumer organizations have operated is food safety. The needs for campaigning in this area are less easy to reconcile with their traditional methods, since the scientific, dietary or medical evidence is normally more complex than in other arenas, such as the electric safety of white goods. The current standards on mandatory labelling, in developed countries, have in part been shaped by past lobbying by consumer groups.

The aim of consumer organizations may be to establish and to attempt to enforce consumer rights. Effective work has also been done, however, simply by using the threat of bad publicity to keep companies' focus on the consumers' point of view.

Consumer organizations may attempt to serve consumer interests by relatively direct actions such as creating and/or disseminating market information, and prohibiting specific acts or practices,or by promoting competitive forces in the markets which directly or indirectly affect consumers (such as transport, electricity, communications, etc.).

Consumer organizations in various countries

• Consumers International - International NGO

Australia

• Consumers' Federation of Australia
• Australian Consumers Association

Belgium

• Test-Aankoop[1] / Test-Achats[2]

Botswana

• Consumer Watchdog

Brazil

• Proteste [3]

Germany

• Stiftung Warentest
• Öko-Test

Italy

• AltroConsumo[4]

Portugal

• DECO.ProTeste [5]

Republic of Ireland

• The National consumer agency (NCA) is a statutory body that defends consumer interests in the Republic of Ireland

Spain

• [Organización de Consumidores y Usuarios (OCU)][6]

United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom, the Enterprise Act 2002 allows consumer bodies that have been approved by the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry to be designated as "super-complainants" to the Office of Fair Trading. These super-complainants are intended to, "strengthen the voice of consumers," who are "unlikely to have access individually to the kind of information necessary to judge whether markets are failing for them." Eight have been designated as of 2007:

• Which? - formerly the Consumers Association - a consumer advocacy organisation which has substantial powers (for example to take representative actions under the Competition Act 1998) but which is primarily a lobbying organisation funded entirely by subscriptions to its regular consumer information magazine.
• National Consumer Council
• The Citizen's Advice Bureau, a free service that provides legal advice, practical help and information on consumer rights across the country.
• Postwatch
• CAMRA - a lobbying group concerned with the tradition and quality of beer.
• General Consumer Council of Northern Ireland
• Consumer Direct

United States

• American Consumer Institute
• Better Business Bureau
• Consumer Action (http://www.consumer-action.org)
• Consumers Union, publishers of Consumer Reports
• Public Citizen
• Consumer Federation of America
• Center for Science in the Public Interest (food/nutrition)
• National Consumers League
• U.S. Public Interest Research Group
• Consumer Complaint Form, Federal Trade Commission

See also

• Actor analysis
• Astroturfing
• Transparency (market)
• Cost the limit of price