What are We Complaining about?

The Federal Trade Commission yesterday released its annual report (click here to download the report) on top consumer complaints for 2006. The report found that for the seventh year in a row, “identity theft tops the list, accounting for 36 percent of the 674,354 complaints received between January 1 and December 31, 2006.” And consumers paid heavy price for fraud related losses. According to FTC data, consumers reported fraud losses of more than $1.1 billion in 2006, with a median loss of $500. The breakdown of 2006 complaints into 16 categories looks like this:

Rank	Top Categories	Complaints	%
1	Identity Theft	246,035	36%
2	Shop-at-Home/Catalog Sales	46,995	7%
3	Prizes/Sweepstakes and Lotteries	45,587	7%
4	Internet Services and Computer Complaints	41,243	6%
5	Internet Auctions	2,832	5%
6	Foreign Money Offers	20,411	3%
7	Advance-Fee Loans and Credit Protection/Repair	10,857	2%
8	Magazines and Buyers Clubs	8,924	1%
9	Telephone Services	8,165	1%
10	Health Care	7,467	1%
11	Business Opportunities and Work-at-Home Plans	7,460	1%
12	Travel, Vacations, and Timeshare	6,712	1%
13	Office Supplies and Services	5,723	1%
14	Grants: Scholarships/Educational & Non-Educational	5,310	1%
15	Employment Agencies/Job Counselors/Overseas Work	4,485	1%
16	Investments	630	1%
	Other Coded Complaints	12,399	2%

For ID theft, the 18 to 39 age group is especially vulnerable, accounting for 52% of all the ID theft complaints in 2006:

One way to fight ID theft is to stay on top of your credit information by checking your credit reports regularly for FREE, but make sure you get them from the ONLY authorized source, annualcreditreport.com. To prevent mis-spelling that could lead to places like freecreditreport.com (if you Google “free credit report,” you will find freecreditreport.com tops the search returns), go directly to FTC website, ftc.gov, and find the blue FREE Annual Credit Reports button on the left side. I order a report for both of us every four months from one of the three credit agencies instead of getting them all at once to maximize the benefit.

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