Consumer Protection System in Australia

“The consumer is the king of the market.” This statement is rightly said in the context of any business that operates to gain the consumer confidence and run in a longer run. To make the statement flourish it is required that the consumers feel protected and not cheated. Some business houses nowadays have found several methods to cheat consumers and gain profits out of this practice. This method might help in obtaining profits for a certain period of time but can hamper the image of the business in such a bad manner that it can never regain the consumer base. To establish a profit generating business in the longer run, it is required to conduct business in a customer supportive manner (Howells, and Weatherill, 2017).

Different regulations have been set out on the business houses in Australia and relate to areas such as protection of privacy, advertisement, health and safety of employees and consumers, impact on the environments, and etc. Australian regulations have understood the weightage that must be provided to the protection of the consumers. The Australian Consumer Law has come into the picture in the year 2010. This law had been made into force by the Australian competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC). The regulations in this law have been framed keeping the consumers in mind and thinking of how they can be protected from any malpractice that the business houses try to do with them. The consumer protection system of Australia is full of several remarkable features (Howells, and Ramsay, 2018). If these features are adopted by any business house in Australia, then it seems that a guaranteed and satisfied customer base shall sure for the business to generate. The consumer protection system focuses of all kind of consumers of the market irrespective of the method of the sale, i.e. be it online sale, door to door sale, direct market purchases, any sort of business contract, etc. There are certain features embedded in this consumer protection system that is unique to Australia. These features are discussed as follows (Paras, 2016).

• A guarantee which is automatic is attached whenever any product or service is purchased. The guarantee states that any purchase of product or of any service shall satisfy the need for which the same has been purchased. If something that is meant for a certain purpose, but it doesn’t satisfy the same, then the consumer gets a right in that situation. The right may relate to getting the product repaired, refunded, or replaced; asking for loss or damage compensation; or getting the service cancelled (Ndungo, Tobias, and Florence, 2016).
• If a consumer is dissatisfied with the quality or the use of any product or service to the level claimed by the seller, then the consumer has a channel to file a complaint against the same. Other alternative offered is the resolution of the issue that the consumer is facing (Micklitz, Howells, Marques, and Naude, 2018).
• While making the use of any kind of marketing tools to advertise and popularise the product or services, the business houses need to keep many things in their head. The advertisement needs to be in line with the parameters that law have set. The restriction applies on every kind of advertising media i.e. online, newspaper print, social media, e-mail, television advertisement, search engines, and etc. Only precise and correct information and features regarding the goods or services must be passed on to the consumers whenever the product or service is marketed. There must be no false communication (Tonkin, Webb, Coveney, Meyer, and Wilson, 2016).

The claims that have been made by the sellers must relate accurately to the usage and specifications of the product they are selling or the services that they are provisioning. No wrong impression must be intended to be created in the mind of the potential consumer group. Not only the consumers, but the advertisement practices should not be intended to cuckold the competitors even. A fair play must be observed.

• The business houses cannot make false claims regarding the price on which they think to sell the goods or render services. The rules made for the price display need to be followed by every organisation. Genuine sales price must be displayed and the consumer must find it easy to look for the price on the product (Abbott, and Tyler, 2017).
• No unfair methods of sale and product delivery must be followed. For all those products and services against which money has already been taken from the consumer must be supplied to them in time (Howells, and Ramsay, I. 2018).
• As already discussed all the features of the consumer law that apply to offline sale do relate to the online sale practices equally. The advertisement if any done for the online sale through any medium must be genuine and acceptable as per product specifications. The pricing must be fair. After the payment is accepted the product must be delivered or the service must be rendered. The same rights of replacement, refund or any compensation are available for online purchases as are available for offline ones (Riefa, 2016).

Unique Features of Consumer Protection System in Australia

All the above features ask the business to be fair in its dealings in short. A business needs to be fair not only to the consumers but also to the rest of the stakeholders who in a certain manner becomes the consumer in their counterpart. E.g. when tax payments comes into the picture, the government becomes the consumer as the payment is to be made to them; when corporate social responsibility comes into the picture, the society becomes the consumer base; when the share returns are considered, the investors become the consumers, and etc (Hensler, 2018).

The business has to deal with utmost fairness with all of them. It is not just the profit that helps the business houses in gaining success and outperforming the competitors. All the business regulations that have been set by the country’s law in which the business operates are a compulsory and mandated requirement that seeks business attention. As far as Australia is concerned, a well framed consumer protection law has already been put in place and is in operation. It is used to set up strong transiency in the financial reporting frameworks which eventually increase the sustainbitiy of the company and also helps in creating positive brand image of company in long run. However, if other regulations are sought and put up in the shoes of consumer and seller, those features of the consumer protection system seem appropriate. Resultant, the other business regulatory areas could also adopt the unique features that are embedded in the Australian Consumer Protection System. This shall help the business houses to gain utmost confidence (Ferrell, and Fraedrich, 2015). This is the best strategy to strengthen the business outputs and increasing the overall turnover. However, it will ultimately increase the overall return on capital employed throughout the time.

“The problem of low regulatory capacity of governments in developing countries can be addressed by modifying the regulatory strategies used in developed countries.” Discuss.

For any model which works with an economic system, it is required that a proper regulation is maintained for the same. Unless the economic model is regulated, the growth in the economy shall get stagnant and won’t achieve the heights it is expected to achieve. The markets perform with must efficiency and strength when proper guiding regulations are available. If the level of development is to be seen, the properly regulated countries have seen and proved to be way ahead of the poorly regulated ones. The developing countries are tried to incorporate robust regulatory systems in their working to speed up the development process. However, certain weaknesses have been found in the regulatory capacities of the government of these countries. From several years suggestions have been put up to modify the developed countries’ regulatory strategies to improve the regulatory standards of the developed countries (Watkins, Papaioannou, Mugwagwa, and Kale, 2015).

Fair Dealings in Business

First of all it is required to understand the problems of the low regulatory capacities of the developing countries. The developing countries have seen to be lacking in the area of framing sound and credible laws to bring sustainability in the country. The governments have been observed to have a paucity of trained people that can help in development of credible regulations. The government regulatory bodies that have managed to sustain even have lack of trained and skilled personnel to carry the jobs they are appointed for. The problem of internal governance structure also hampers the whole regulatory system. High political interference is adding to the bad government regulatory capabilities (Ferrell, and Fraedrich, 2015).

The situation needs an urgent solution. However, there is no particular best methodology or manner to help in improving the regulatory structure of any country. Different situations prevailing in different nations demand a different scenario of regulation development and practice. The regulatory system that any nation maintains must be one that provides unambiguous and well-timed guidance to the government on how to improve the efficiency of the regulatory standards by bringing an improvement in the design and enforcement practice of these standards. The regulatory strategies that any nation’s government develops should focus upon achievement of not only better economic outcomes, but also on the better environment and social aspects. The interdependence that exists between the different sectors of the economy must also be kept in mind while framing good regulatory strategies (Percival, Schroeder, Miller, and Leape, 2017).

But it is always better to try out the ideas already tested than to experiment the new ideas in case one is risk averse. For developing countries the stress to speed up development is already high (Barnard, 2017). They are in no situation to try and test new experiments, at least for a while. It is best suited for them to try their hands of the regulatory policies that have already proved successful in the history of the developed countries. However, certain modification as per the situations prevalent in the developing countries is required before adopting them. Certain best regulatory strategies that can be adopted by the developing countries on the basis of them being successful in developed countries are listed as follows. These have also been the recommendations that have been set out by OECD to help countries achieve the best regulatory framework (Ferrell, and Fraedrich, 2015).

• The objectives of the regulatory strategies must be clear to the policy makers and the focus must lie equally upon the social, economic and environmental aspects.
• A transparent regulatory approach must be practiced. Public interest must be the superior goal.
• Monitoring of the regulatory strategies must be also made as a strategy itself. It shall ensure that the regulatory practices framed are working at the best of their quality and any deviations can be timely resolved. There should be proper regulatory compliance program which could easily strengthen the business outputs and lower down the business costing.
• The reports of the results that have been affected by the regulatory strategies must be prepared on a periodic basis. These reports after preparation must also be published for public observation. This shall help in securing public faith for the working of the regulatory strategies (Picciotto, and Mayne, 2016).
• The above points provide certain examples of the successful measures in regulatory strategies that have been applied by the developed countries to achieve good regulatory framework for the respective governments of their country. There is requirement to set up proper regulatory legal compliance program which could be used to comply with the all the applicable rules and regulations. (Pridgen, 2018). A complete imitation of these strategies that have helped developed countries attain success shall be a foolish act. A proper modification of the successful regulatory strategies by keeping in mind the conditions of the nation can go a longer way in helping the countries achieve the regulatory result they have a desire for. Moreover, there must be no blind application of the regulations. All the regulatory actors must first interact among themselves the effect that shall be seen at multiple levels of any regulation that will be developed. The outcome of the regulations must be well analysed in advance along with the factors that might affect them. It must be understood that any kind of regulation that is going to be implemented can result in different outcome also owing to changed scenario and situation. All the strategies formulated should be interlinked with the applicable regulatory legislations so that it could be used to avoid the possible penalties on the company (Picciotto, and Mayne, 2016). Therefore, it could be inferred that These reports after preparation must also be published for public observation. This shall help in securing public faith for the working of the regulatory strategies (Picciotto, and Mayne, 2016).

“The dramatic increase in the sophistication and availability of digital technology in recent years is changing the capacities of a range of regulatory actors. Regulatory design should incorporate these new technologies.” Discuss.

The rapid advancement of technology has changed the way things are working. The traditional methods have been swiped out in almost every process now. If company could use proper advance technologies and system process then it could easily strengthen the business output and also helps in creating the core competency in market. The regulatory framework also has seen the impact of the developed technology (Majumdar, (2015).  Traditionally government has been the sole regulatory actor that develops regulation for the whole nation which is mandated for every citizen. But technology has changed the way things are perceived now. The everyday citizens are now having complete opportunities to become the regulatory actors for them (Ivanov, et. al 2016).

Regulatory Strategies for Economic Growth

The era now is of decentralisation. A centralised system though can work but could not reap the results as are present in a decentralised one. The citizens have now got a platform to interact with each other due to the rise in the technologies. There is a need of coordination between the government and citizens for any regulation to work out. The capacity to take decision lies with the interaction that is affected between the regulatory actors. Technology has opened up a new horizon and has made it possible to let the citizens interact and speak up their concerns. They are now the regulatory actors who can interact for their own regulation. When the possibility to inculcate the citizens exists and they all are aware if the same, it shall get enraging if the country’s government snatch the right from their hands (Harring, 2016).

The technology has put forward several interactive platforms. The regulatory design mechanisms should incorporate these systems to improve the framework. The regulations are made for the citizens and it shall be best if the citizens are first considered before any decision is taken for them (Agarwal, 2016).  The framework development process is a full mechanism. The understanding of the regulatory mechanism can be made with the help of a metaphorical example of space, i.e. “regulatory space”. Being it a space it cannot be occupied by a central authority but has to be decentralised. All those who interact in this space are the regulatory actors (Picciotto, and Mayne, 2016).

If the regulatory framework is seen with the perspective of the metaphor above, it gets easier to define it. The regulatory space can be as big as a country or can be as small as a simple business or firm. Using technology the interactions between the government and the citizens as regulatory actors can help in generating a coordinated decision. This can also help in supporting self-regulation by the organisations for their own regulatory space. The citizens have complete skills and potential to regulate their own regulatory spaces. In the time of internet and varied technology it is also completely easy to keep a check upon what these independent regulators are up to in their respective zones.

The trust gap that exists between the government and the citizens can be removed by the use of these technological advances. However, there should be set up program regulatory compliance program and communication set up process which could add value to eliminate the communication gap. Regular reports can be updated to the government on the results that have been attained by these citizens out of their self-regulation. Periodic meetings through video calls can be fixed and conducted. These meetings can provide a platform for constructive deliberations to take place between the parties and help to resolve any doubts that the parties may have in their mind (Picciotto, and Mayne, 2016). The regulators in this era have to utilise the technology in a manner that can help in utilising the innovations along with protecting the citizens also. The citizens now have a complete idea about what the regulators are planning to initiate. The social media has taken over the world and no news can remain in curtains anymore. In such a scenario it is important for the government to do the governance work in a shared manner to help citizens grow and benefit out of the regulation. Overregulating the work can only create chaos. However, company could easily set up social media page and development of the online dashboard mechanism where people and government could easily resolve their issues and problems.

Challenges Faced by Developing Countries in Regulatory Capacity

References

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