Issue Date:  -  Friday, 20 August 2004

190 porsche competition that drove consumers mad offer Refunds

Eastern states companies Voiceburst Holdings Pty Ltd and Tesi Investments Pty Ltd along with their 190 Win a Porsche Competition, last week had WA consumers seeing red and saw four national television networks broadcast warnings from the Consumer Watchdog about throwing away money into the scheme.

Consumer Protection’s investigation into the companies resulted in them offering to refund all WA consumers who participated by calling the 190 service. Consumer Protection investigators will monitor and audit this undertaking to ensure compliance.

Home telephones around the state started ringing late last week with a recorded message informing whoever answered the phone, that they could win a Porsche Boxster by calling a 190-premium rate telephone service number.

“Hundreds of consumers rightfully responded to this intrusion by contacting us, as well as radio talkback shows, warning that $5.50 per minute calls were being promoted”, Consumer Protection Commissioner Patrick Walker said.

“We had a number of concerns about this competition including the duration of the 190 call stated by the operators.

“Another alarming fact was that thousands of calls were being made at a time when children were arriving home from school and answering the incoming recorded message informing them of being able to win a sports car.

“Although it appears that the operators met minimum requirements under federal communication laws, I requested an investigation to ascertain if any of the competition’s claims were misleading”, Commissioner Walker said.

“Of high concern to us is the intrusive nature of this new tactic of telemarketing which ‘line-locks’ the telephone it calls until its message is completed”, Mr Walker said.

“Although not strictly within state Consumer Protection jurisdiction, I intend to take the matter up with my counterparts around Australia to make sure that the message is, that intrusive telemarketing is unwelcome”, he said.

Consumer law enforcement agencies around the country issue regular warnings about 190- premium rate telephone and fax services to combat the instances of consumers falling victim to information schemes and competitions, which offer little or no value for the huge telephone bills they run up.

“Lemonade diets, government disposals, surveys about war and mystery shopping employment are just a few of the rorts for which 190-premium rate telephone services have been used in the recent past.

“Most of the information or so-called opportunities available through these services is available elsewhere much cheaper or even free.

“Sports and entertainment shows often have ‘phone in’ type competitions which have prices fixed at around 50 cents per call.

“Consumers can justifiably ask themselves why they should be paying $5.50 per minute for something similar”, the Commissioner said.

190-premium rate telephone services must by law disclose the cost of the call per minute, the name of the service, the action required to proceed such as dial ‘0’ and state that calls from mobile or public phones will cost extra.

Since Consumer Protection rained on the Win a Porsche parade last week, Tesi has in addition to offering refunds, agreed to modify its preamble message, website information and competition blurb during the timed call, in order to make participation and charges clearer to those who choose to call the 190 number.

Consumer Protection can be contacted on telephone 1300 30 40 54.