The worst rip offs examined

The technology might be new, but for consumers it's the same old story - buyer beware. The high street and internet are swarming with companies that will sell you phones you don't need, computers that don't work and unlimited internet access that is nothing of the kind.

Ever feel as if you've been ripped off ? You probably have been. And the Office of Fair Trading thinks so too. Its new trouble-shooting department is investigating computer companies and electrical retailers, and there are plenty of other targets to go after, too.

PCs

Naive consumers expect a computer to work as easily as a TV or microwave, but it doesn't. More than half of 42,000 computer-related complaints received by the OFT in 2000 involved defective or sub-standard goods.

And that's just the start of it. Discussion forums on sites such as PC Advisor and Ciao.com are packed with PC owners' bitter complaints about bad after-sales service, indifferent staff, sale bargains not available as advertised, next-day delivery that takes weeks and long delays in securing refunds for faulty equipment.

Technical support is often limited and provided at a price. Some, like Tiny Computers, charge 60p a minute for telephone support but calls are limited to 15 minutes. If your problem is not fixed in the time, it's back to the end of the queue. PC-maker Mesh has twice been forced to change its advertising after the Advertising Standards Authority ruled its warranty and technical support were misrepresented in adverts.

ISPs

Trading Standards received more than 3,500 complaints about internet service providers last year. Flat-rate ISPs and always-on broad-band services have oversold themselves, promising subscribers unlimited flat-rate surfing - then kicking off heavy users.

Advertisements for BT's £14.99 a month Anytime ISP promised users the chance to "surf whenever you like, as often as you like". But thousands of subscribers have been warned to reduce the amount of time they spend online, just days after BT changed the terms and conditions to make it easier to kick people off.

BT was recently forced to pull an advert that claimed Anytime was "fast and reliable", after users success-fully complained to the ASA that the service was anything but. The telecom behe-moth isn't the only offender, though. The ISP Review web-site exposes the failings of numerous ISPs, including Freeserve, Clara.Net and 08002Go.

Mobile phones

It's impossible to work out how much a new phone will cost. The confusion of talk-plans, hand-sets and networks is either deliberately baffling or plain dishonest. Headline-grabbing free phone and trade-in offers tie customers into unsuitable expensive contracts. "You might get a cool phone, but you'll be stuck paying £30 a month for a year," warns David Chow of What Mobile? magazine.

And when your supplier has sold you an expensive contract, it will do anything to stop you leaving. A month-long campaign in The Guardian has exposed sharp practices at Singlepoint. It is accused of bullying customers into keeping contracts for a second year and arbitrarily extending contracts. Others have been found guilty of over-billing for calls and continuing to charge for phone rental even after contracts have been cancelled. In the worst cases, customers have been charged for calls on phones that have been returned to the supplier without ever being used.

Extended warranties

Extended warranties are a gravy train for electrical and PC retailers, providing as much as 30 percent of stores' profits. The British Retail Consortium has a code of practice for selling warranties, but the OFT found that it isn't observed in a massive 75 per cent of stores.

Ken Fowler suffered a hard sell when buying a Sony monitor at PC World. "The salesman would not accept that I did not want to buy the two years' extra warranty," he complains. "When I opened the box at home I found it came with a three year Sony warranty anyway."

These glorified insurance policies are bad news for consumers. Some cost almost as much as the goods themselves. Comet sells a £9.99 breakdown-and-repair warranty on a £13.50 travel kettle.

Maintenance contracts are likely to cost more than buying and fitting replacement parts for PCs. Consumers who want an extended warranty can save money by buying one direct from an insurer rather than through the retailer.

Rip-off Britain

Britain's consumers are still paying more than the rest of the world for high-tech goods. Microsoft's new X-Box videogame console will go on sale in the US on 8 November for $299 (£208). In the UK, it will cost £299 when it's launched on 14 March next year - £50 too much, says the Consumers' Association. After taking into account handling and import costs, a fair UK price should have been £249, it claims.

Movie buffs continue to get a bad deal from DVD. Region-encoding restrictions stop US DVDs being played on unmodified UK players. UK Region 2 releases lag behind Region 1 releases, are more expensive and can have fewer extras. Web-based DVD retailer Play247.com sells the Simpsons Series 1 box-set for just £17.99 on Region 1. On Region 2, it costs a whopping £31.99. Welcome to Britain.

Useful Websites
PC Association, ( pcauk.org ) - Code of practice for computer retailers and advice for consumers.
PC Advisor, ( pcadvisor.co.uk ) - Discuss problems with other PC owners.
ISP Review, ( ipsreview.co.uk ) - Keeps track of ISP complaints and provides ratings of the different services.