Consumers gripe most about home improvements, which for the first time topped auto service problems as the greatest source of ire from the buying public, but problems with household goods, equity loans, utilities, landlord-tenant issues and mail order concerns also often generate consumers' wrath.

Six home-related issues were among the National Association of Consumer Agency Administrators' (NACAA) and the Consumer Federation of America's (CFA) nine-year old Annual Consumer Complaints List this year.

The survey, which tabulated 1999 data, said complaints about household goods were among the top three most complained about issues for the first time in the survey and Internet complaints grew more than any other type of complaint.

Auto Repair, previously always in the top three, dropped to fourth for the first time, but auto sales complaints was at No. 2.

"The good economy has come with a price. Consumers appear to be making more large purchases, but many of those purchases have come with problems, particularly in the areas of home improvements, auto sales and home appliances and furnishings," said Wendy Weinberg, NACAA’s executive director.

The survey said reports from government consumer agencies indicate vulnerable elderly consumers are often targets of scams including predatory lenders out to siphon off equity and home improvement contractors who disappear with older home owner funds before completing work.

"Elderly consumers are being targeted by scams and crooks," said Jean Ann Fox, CFA's Director of Consumer Protection. "Frauds cheat these vulnerable consumers out of their home equity and life savings through home improvement, sweepstakes, and telemarketing schemes."

The two groups solicited federal consumer agencies nationwide for a list of categories that generated the most complaints in 1999. NACAA is a trade group of 165 consumer protection agencies at all levels of government. CFA, a non-profit federation of 260 pro-consumer organizations, has worked with NACAA on the survey since it was first initiated in 1992.

The top 10 problem areas for 1999, with the percentage of agencies that listed them as major complaint categories, where, home improvements, 82 percent; auto sales, 75 percent; household goods, 66 percent; auto repair, 64 percent; credit and lending, 57 percent; utilities, 34 percent; mail order, 27 percent; collections, 16 percent; landlord and tenant, 16 percent; and travel and leisure, 14 percent.

As the Internet yielded the greatest increase in complaints, consumers were peeved most often about about on-line retail buys, Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and auctions.

After yielding the greatest level of complaint increases in 1998, home improvements moved to the No. 1 most-complained about service in 1999 because of predatory home improvement deals.

In the household goods category, complaints about computers, appliances, electronic equipment and furniture involved defective products, failure to honor warranties, refund problems and deceptive advertising.

Complaints about telephone, gas and electric service moved from the No. 9 spot in 1998 to No. 6 in 1999, likely because breaking up monopolies left the market opened to inexperienced service providers.

In general, the consumer complaint caseloads grew faster than state and local governments' budgets in 1999, with government agencies' one percent budget growth, compared to two percent more complaints. The small jump does, however, reflect a leveling of consumer complaints. Over the past four years, the cumulative growth in budgets has been three percent, while the cumulative growth in complaints has been 52 percent.

Nevertheless, the survey drew calls from the consumer groups for more education and greater regulations to govern industries that generate the most consumer complaints.

Published: November 30, 2000

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Broderick Perkins parlayed a career in old-school journalism into a contemporary digital news service that really hits home. The award-winning consumer journalist, originally from Wilmington, DE, is founder, publisher and executive editor of the bootstrap DeadlineNews Group, a Silicon Valley-based editorial content and consulting service specializing in residential real estate, consumer news and related editorial consulting services. The DeadlineNews Group includes the website, DeadlineNews.com, offering real estate editorial content and consulting services, and its back shop, the Deadline Newsroom, an open house on news that really hits home. Perkins obtained his formal journalism education from University of Delaware and a journalism boot camp, the Institute of Journalism Education at the University of California-Berkeley. He went on to 20 years of service as a daily newspaper journalist at the Wilmington, DE News Journal and San Jose, CA Mercury News. Perkins covered housing on the San Jose Mercury News reporting team which earned a General News Reporting Pulitzer Prize in 1989 for coverage of the Loma Prieta earthquake. He has also produced real estate, consumer and small business content for the Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, RealtyTimes.com, Nolo.com, Better Homes and Gardens, the National Association of Realtors, Homestore/Move and Intuit/Quicken among more than three dozen publications. In addition to managing the DeadlineNews Group, Perkins most recently served as chief editorial consultant for Nolo's Essential Guide To Buying Your First Home, Nolo, and writes real estate television scripts for RealtyTimes.com.