The General Directorate of Consumer Affairs has resolved with agreement 47.8% of the 6,759 claims it has processed in 2020
The General Directorate of Consumer Affairs has resolved with agreement 47.8% of the 6,759 complaints it processed in 2020. This was one of the most important points that were explained during the first Consumer Council this year.
The Minister of Health and Consumer Affairs, Patricia Gómez, together with the General Director of Consumer Affairs, Félix Alonso, chaired today the meeting of the Consumer Council, in which the report of activities for the year 2020 was presented to the representatives of consumer associations of business organizations and administrations that make up the Council.
In this document, it is detailed that during the past year sanctions were imposed for an amount of 1.86 million euros. This amount comes from the processing of 299 sanctioning files resolved in 2020 (107 correspond to actions of the Consumer Inspection Service, and 192 to complaints from consumers and users).
Also, in 2020 the Consumer Inspection Service immobilized 2,261,497 products. In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic; highlights the withdrawal of 2,242,053 masks. The document warns of the withdrawal from the market of 16,293 toys.
Customer service
Last year, the Consumer Care Service served 15,781 consumers and users who requested individualized information. By island, the offices responded to 11,697 face-to-face inquiries; in Mallorca 7,731, in Ibiza 1,855 and Menorca 2,111. The Consumer telephone number (900 166 000) answered 4,084 inquiries.
Of these inquiries, the Service received 8,974 complaints. The majority related to the telecommunications sector (1,739), consumer goods (1,714), transport (1,600), recreation and leisure services (1,290) and other services (696). By island, 7,144 were processed in Mallorca, 954 in Ibiza and 876 in Menorca.
24.68% of the claims submitted ended up with the inhibition of other bodies due to competition (Bank of Spain, Air Safety Agency, DG Energy, etc.); another 23.49% were referred to the Consumer Arbitration Board. Of those processed by the Service, in approximately 50% an agreement was reached between the parties and in 30% not.
The Consumer Arbitration Board, for its part, registered a total of 1,279 arbitration requests, especially for claims in the telephone and internet sector (985), energy (95), furniture (71), Post office (29) and home repairs (43). Of the total number of cases processed by this body, 1,279 could be resolved: 456 through the mediation of the Board, and 823 through the award of consumer arbitrators. In addition, last year 27 new companies joined this mediation system, and as of December 31, it already had 1,331 member companies.
Because of all this, of the 8,974 claims submitted to the General Directorate of Consumer Affairs, 6,759 had to be processed and of these, 3,233 were resolved through mediation or arbitration, that is to say, 47.8%. Therefore, the extrajudicial conflict resolution tools that Consum makes available to consumers and companies are effective, given that they are voluntary tools: consumer mediation and arbitration.
Web visits
One of the newest sections of the report is the renewal of the Consumer Portal. The aim is to facilitate access to the different services offered by Consum to citizens.
For this reason, information on administrative procedures, consumer guides, consumer news have been updated and the website has been simplified, making it more accessible.
The result of these changes can be seen in an increase in annual visits, reaching 168,557 in 2020, with a monthly average of 14,046 and a daily average of 462 visits by consumers and users.
CyberConsumer
The report of the General Directorate of Consumption also takes stock of the activity of the Education, Training and Institutional Relations Service, which during the past year provided permanent online training to the staff of the Directorate. In this sense, 770 students participated in the Consumópolis school competition, distributed in 154 teams from 14 educational centers.
As a novelty, this year the General Directorate agreed to give special recognition to the 5 teams in each of the levels that obtained a better score in phase 1. The cartoonist Álex Fito created a comic book hero called CiberConsum, who offers advice for win the battle against COVID-19.
From Consum, the figure of CiberConsum was spread and its advice has reached the educational centers of the Islands and also the hospitals. The success of the character has crossed our borders and all the autonomous communities have requested to use it in their education and consumption programs.
Finally, the report refers to the number of professionals working in the different services: a total of 52 people including inspectors, consumer informants, technicians and administrators.
The report can be downloaded from the website of the General Directorate of Consumer Affairs www.portalconsum.caib.es.