When consumers have complaints, they typically don’t suffer in silence. And across the country, the office of a state’s attorney general often will be a go-to complaint line for such issues, according to Christopher Allen and Chris Tampio on Dickstein Shapiro’s State AG Monitor. The authors recently compiled consumer problems reported to attorneys general around the country and found that “a number of commonalities transcend both geographic and demographic differences” of the various states.
Here are some of the biggest consumer issues of 2013, which also provide a glimpse into what AGs may be focusing on this year:
- Debt Collection: At the top of most lists was debt collection. It ranked in the top three for almost every state and was the No. 1 complaint in Colorado, Illinois and Michigan.
- Mortgages: Consumer and mortgage lending was another leading issue, the authors note, which they say is not surprising due to the increased scrutiny in this area in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis.
- E-Commerce: Internet sales and marketing and identity theft were big issues, “a reflection of the continued growth of e-commerce as an integral party of daily life,” say Allen and Tampio.
- Health Care: Health services and providers were on many of the states’ lists, say the authors. They predict this trend is “a harbinger of things to come as implementation of the Affordable Care Act allows an increasing number of consumers to use health services they may have previously forgone.”
