CCTV News:It’s the annual March 15 Consumer Rights Protection Day. Last year, CCTV’s March 15 gala exposed the untrustworthy phenomenon in 14 fields such as online food ordering and used car online trading platforms. Ele.me, Che Yi Pai and other companies were named. As an ordinary consumer, when seeing the exposure, what matters more is "curative effect". So how has the rectification of these named companies been in the past year? Let’s take a look.
What happened to the companies that were exposed on March 15 last year?
Ele.me: Still playing "cat and mouse game" with illegal restaurants
At the 2016 CCTV 3.15 gala, the first to be exposed was the online ordering platform "Ele.me". The reporter’s investigation found that some restaurants were glamorous online, but in fact did not have a business license at all, belonging to black workshops. The "Ele.me" platform not only defaults to partners entering, but also guides merchants to make up addresses and upload fake physical photos.
On the day "Ele.me" was exposed, it responded that it attached great importance to the problem and had urgently set up a special project team to remove all the illegal restaurants involved, and deployed overnight to check the qualifications of restaurants nationwide.
Since then, "Ele.me" has indeed carried out a series of actions. These include publicly participating in the back kitchen of Mingchu Liangzao Restaurant to the whole network in the form of live broadcast, establishing an independent food safety department, jointly verifying the restaurant’s situation with a third party, and carrying out "Food Safety Month" self-inspection and self-correction work…
However, the effect of these actions does not seem to satisfy consumers, and "Ele.me" still makes headlines many times. For example, in July 2016, Legal Network reported that "Ele.me orders takeout and eats insects. Lawyers remind: preserve evidence"; in August 2016, Beijing News reported that "315 offline black stores have returned to Ele.me to apply for false certificates and squeeze into Baidu Meituan recommendation"; in September 2016, CCTV exposed "Ele.me" platform ghost restaurants… A series of reports all pointed to "Ele.me" having security problems such as unqualified merchants and poor service.
The "safety on the tip of the tongue" will not be achieved overnight, and this protracted battle may continue.
Car Easy Shooting: Losing the "Leading" Position in the Used Car Industry
"Individuals sell to individuals, no middlemen make the price difference" This advertising slogan has been familiar, and the used car O2O platform used to be in the limelight all the way. However, the leading "car easy to shoot" to make the price difference was named by CCTV 3.15 party. Reporters pointed out through a large number of undercover interviews that "car easy to shoot" has two sets of price difference scams with different prices.
That night, Che Yi Pai immediately issued an official statement saying that "what the buyer sees is the car model plus the service fee, which is a common charging rule for used car e-commerce platforms." As soon as this statement came out, it immediately caused a strong backlash from public opinion, believing that it was not sincere. It clearly promoted "no price difference" and threw the blame on the used car industry.
Afterwards, Che Yi Pai issued an official statement again on the morning of March 16. This time, the statement also solemnly apologized, and the details of Che Yi Pai’s charges were announced on the homepage of the website overnight. The charging standards and charging principles were also made public.
On March 19, the Che Yi Pai platform also made further product upgrades, publicizing the fees that should be charged on both the seller and the buyer. Both parties can see all the fees paid and charged by each other and their details. At the same time, during the transaction, Che Yi Pai charges the buyer a 3% transaction service fee.
Unfortunately, the crisis of consumer confidence in "Che Yi Pai" broke out, and the used car business shrank seriously. As a result, "Che Yi Pai" not only lost its halo of being a "leader" in the industry, but also stopped updating its official Weibo. The last Weibo post was posted on January 6, 2017. But from time to time, there are still fans who leave messages under Weibo: "Are you still there?"
Dao Youdao: Penalized 260,000 suspended so far
The company that was exposed below is a company listed on the New Third Board – Dao Youdao. CCTV reporters discovered that Dao Youdao used advertising pop-ups containing malicious programs to maliciously deduct fees from a large number of mobile phone users.
After being exposed, Daoyoudao carried out an emergency suspension of trading, and responded on Weibo: "From now on, we will severely crack down on the use of the Daoyoudao platform to promote products that harm the interests of users. For users who suffer losses, the company will pay compensation first. According to the investigation results, the company reserves the right to pursue the responsibility of relevant product parties." Meaning that its platform was used, and he was also a victim.
On March 18, Dao Youdao released an announcement in response, saying that Dao Youdao removed video and game software products from the shelves at the first time, and screened them one by one to ensure that user interests were no longer damaged. It also established a special team to strengthen the control of product promotion and listing. It is also negotiating with industry associations to incorporate malicious fees into the green marketing supervision system.
However, the company is clearly not as innocent as it claims. In the following year, the company received three fines for illegal advertising and other acts, and the total amount of fines was 260,000 yuan.
In addition, since the first suspension announcement was issued on March 16, 2016, Dao Youdao has issued 19 consecutive suspension progress announcements, which have been suspended for nearly a year.
70% of consumers have suffered infringement, and 36% have given up their rights protection
On March 15, 2014, the newly revised "Consumer Rights Protection Law" was officially promulgated and implemented. China’s consumer rights protection system is making progress, and the consumer environment is also constantly improving. However, there are still many problems. Recently, the results of the 3.15 Consumer Rights Protection Questionnaire survey published by Consumer Reports magazine showed that 70% of respondents have encountered consumer infringement, and less than half of the infringed people have engaged in consumer rights protection.
The main reasons why consumers do not protect their rights are the low amount involved and the lack of knowledge of which channels to use to protect their rights.
The survey results also revealed that online transaction infringement occurs more frequently, and the main problem that constitutes consumer infringement is product quality.
Remote shopping complaints have increased by 50% in three years.
With the gradual popularity of online shopping and telephone shopping, the number of remote shopping complaints has shown an upward trend. From 20,135 in 2014 to 29,856 in 2016, an increase of nearly 50%.
"Remote shopping complaints have become a common complaint encountered by the Consumers Association." The China Consumers Association reported that quality problems such as defects, unfulfilled guarantees, and inconsistent publicity with the actual product have always accounted for the leading proportion; at the same time, the provisions of the new Consumer Law on "online shopping seven days without reason" have encountered difficulties in implementation, and e-commerce platforms and settled merchants have shirked and bounced, or expanded the scope of inapplicability without authorization. Problems such as non-fulfillment of promises and delayed resolution by merchants when returning goods have been repeatedly criticized by consumers.
Zhang Mao, director of the State Administration for Industry and Commerce, recently said that the development momentum of online shopping is now very good, but there are also many problems. "First of all, it is clear that the online platform should take the first responsibility, and the Internet is not an extrajudicial place. The most important thing is to strengthen the legal protection of online shopping, and some legal protection measures are still being explored."
Quality remains a "big issue" to encourage social supervision
In fact, the problem of quality not only exists in the products purchased by consumers online, but also in the omni-channel consumer complaint data of the China Consumers Association.
The report of the China Consumers Association shows that in 2016, the National Consumers Association received a total of 653,505 consumer complaints, accounting for the top three in the nature classification, with quality problems accounting for 41.47%, after-sales services accounting for 22.73%, and contract problems accounting for 12.23%.
It is worth noting that the new Consumer Law also explicitly encourages and supports all organizations and individuals to conduct social supervision over acts that harm the legitimate rights and interests of consumers. In disputes between consumers and business operators, the objective voice of social appraisal agencies or organizations is still weak.
