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Back in primary school, when I was around 10 years old, we did a month-long history project on Greek mythology. I was completely obsessed. Among the gods and heroes, there was one guy who stood out to me… Sisyphus. For the uninitiated, Sisyphus was the rock guy. As punishment for numerous crimes, Sisyphus was sent to the underworld and forced to push an extremely oversized rock up a very steep hill. I think about Sisyphus every single time I fold laundry Worse still, Hades, the god of the underworld, cast a spell on the rock. When Sisyphus finally made it to the top, the rock rolled all the way back down to the bottom and he had to start all over again. Brilliant. I think about Sisyphus a lot. I…
CHOICE has a new super power – what do you think we should do with it? We’ve been appointed as a designated complainant to the ACCC, which grants us the ability to make a small number of fast-tracked, priority ‘super’ complaints to the consumer watchdog about significant and widespread issues harming consumers. The ACCC will be required to respond to these complaints publicly and within 90 days. This new power is similar to the UK’s ‘super complaints’ function, which has shed light on a range of consumer issues such as loyalty taxes, scams and grocery prices. Only a handful of organisations representing consumers and small businesses have been given this power for the next three years, making it a rare opportunity to draw the attention of decision-makers to the biggest…
Polling from Essential Media has found Australians expect banks to do more to protect them from scams. It showed 75% of people expect the federal government to force banks to refund customers if their money hasn’t been kept safe. The polling also found 76% of people think that if banks were forced to reimburse scam victims, they would be incentivised to prevent scams. The majority of Australians also fear the increasing sophistication of scams, with 88% of people believing any of us could fall victim to one. Banks aren’t doing enough to protect consumers, says Stephanie Tonkin, CEO of the Consumer Action Law Centre. “The onus continues to be on the customer to avoid being scammed against malignant forces over which they have no control, and it’s exasperating that banks…
A first-of-its-kind review by the corporate watchdog ASIC has found four major banks systematically charged high fees to First Nations consumers who could least afford them. Customers will be refunded a total of $28 million after ANZ, CBA, Westpac, Bendigo and Adelaide Bank kept at least two million Australians in high-fee accounts. Many of those affected had low incomes or relied on Centrelink payments. ASIC Commissioner Alan Kirkland says the banks caused financial distress through avoidable high fees, complicated bank processes, and barriers for regional and remote consumers. “Banks knew that many of these customers on low incomes were in inappropriate high-fee accounts, and it has taken ASIC’s intervention to force them to act,” he says. “Before our review, most banks only provided their customers with difficult ‘opt-in’ processes for…
New academic research has found Australians at both ends of the socioeconomic spectrum are vulnerable to cryptocurrency scams, and more online financial educationis needed to combat them. The study, led by the University of Queensland (UQ), found that two distinct groups were most at risk of losing money to crypto scams. “The first were more likely to be female, Indigenous, casual or part-time workers, renters, with a high school or below education, or English as a second language – so with a lot of features we associate with socioeconomic disadvantage,” says UQ associate professor Levon Blue. Australians lost over $171m worth of cryptocurrency to scams last year “The other vulnerable group could be seen as having more socioeconomic advantage, such as a university education, full-time work, being non-Indigenous or owning…
Telstra has been fined $1.5 million for not meeting obligations to protect consumers from SIM-swap scams, following an investigation by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA). SIM-swap scams occur when scammers trick telco providers into switching a victim’s SIM card to one controlled by them. “SIM-swap scams can be particularly devastating, as victims can lose life savings as well as control of their phone number and other personal information,” says ACMA member Samantha Yorke. Customer ID authentication rules introduced in 2022 require telcos to use multi-factor authentication before customers are allowed to perform transactions that could compromise their account. The ACMA found Telstra hadn’t followed the new rules for 168,000 high-risk customer interactions. Yorke says Telstra’s conduct put thousands of customers at risk of harm. “It is unacceptable that…
