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Consumer's Telegramm European Edition
If you wish to be informed monthly about European consumer news, just subscribe our free newsletter.JULY-AUGUST 2004
Editorial office: Centro Europeo Consumatori(European Consumer Centre, Italy)
TRAVELLING
Taking your Car to the Island
Those who plan to spend their holidays on the islands Sardegna or Corsica and want to take their car with them should absolutely consider the following facts:According to art. 423 of the Maritime Code the carrier in Italy has only a limited liability (up to 103,29 Euro) for damages on your car which originate from the transportation.
However, there is the possibility to conclude the so called ‘Dichiarazione di valore’ (declaration of excess value) at the time of booking. By that declaration the liability of the carrier increases. But be careful! This declaration of value can be very expensive: sometimes there are asked amounts of more than 200 Euro extra charge in addition to the costs of the ticket and the cabin.
Therefore it is advisable to get as much exact information as possible about the relevant conditions and charges of the different transportation companies. Moreover tourists should consider to ask their own insurance company if it could be cheaper, in their special case, to conclude a fully comprehensive insurance for the time of the holiday.
HEALTH
Healing under Palms?!
Wellness hotels and health resorts are up-to-date: more and more consumers aim at healing all their little aches and pains during their holidays or at preventing them at least. According to this trend there are more and more free offers of health events for tourists in those places and very often untrustworthy sellers make an awful lot of money with panaceas and miracle cures.On of the most used tricks is to tell consumers that they won’t be able to order the presented health product at home, as they are not destined for the B2C market, but only sold to hospitals. The most of the consumers react by buying the products in the fear not to be able to buy them later. The less of them think, that products who are only thought to be used by the hospital’s equips can be very dangerous if used by the consumers alone.
COMPARING PRICES
18 times IKEA
The European Consumer Centre Düsseldorf/Gronau (Germany), associated partner of the ECC Bolzano, compared the prices of 75 products of the world’s largest furniture company IKEA in 18 European countries. Also many South Tyrolean customers buy at IKEA. The results shows: there are price divergences of up to 72% for one and the same product. Therefore: It is (as always) worth comparing the prices!For South Tyrol, which is a kind of ’border country’, the comparison of prices is especially interesting. The IKEA investigation shows clearly that for South Tyrolean consumers it is a special advantage to inform themselves if the product is cheaper in South Tyrol, in the border regions of Italy or in Austria. Let us take a kitchen as an example: the same kitchen costs 141 Euro less at IKEA Innsbruck (Austria) than at IKEA Brescia (Italy). On the other hand for the ’mammut-wardrobe’ you must pay 30 Euro more in Tyrol than in northern Italy. Of all the 75 compared products 32 are cheaper in Italy, 34 in Austria and only 9 are of the same price.
THE CASE OF THE MONTH
A consumer finds a special offer of an Internet seller, orders a digital camera at the click of a mouse and pays the amount due in advance per bank transfer. In spite of repeated promises that the parcel had been sent by courier service the camera has never arrived at the consumer’s home. Suddenly the consumer is not able to contact the seller anymore. After checking the number in the online directory and asking the competent German chamber of commerce he finds out that the company exists at least. The consumer decides to report the case to the police and sends a copy of the document per e-mail to the wrongdoer.And – surprise, surprise: two hours later the "dead" e-mail address seems to work again. And only a few days later the parcel with the purchased camera turns up.
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