FTC Announces Top National Consumer Complaints for 2013

Commission’s Annual Report Shows Identity Theft Continues to Top List of Complaints; American Consumers Report Losing Over $1.6 Billion to Fraud Overall

For Release February 27, 2014

Identity theft continues to top the Federal Trade Commission’s national ranking of consumer complaints, and American consumers reported losing over $1.6 billion to fraud overall in 2013, according to the FTC’s annual report on consumer complaints released today.

“Americans of all ages are vulnerable to identity theft, and it remains the most common consumer complaint to the Commission,” said Jessica Rich, director, Bureau of Consumer Protection. “We urge consumers to visit FTC.gov/idtheft for tips to prevent and mitigate the damage from identity theft.”

The Commission received more than two million complaints overall, as reported in the agency’s Consumer Sentinel Network Data Book 2013, of which 290,056, or 14 percent, were identity theft related. Thirty percent of these incidents were tax- or wage-related, which continues to be the largest category within identity theft complaints.

The highest reported age group for identity theft is 20-29, with 20 percent of complaints. Rich says that educating consumers on this topic is a top priority for the agency. Some of the FTC resources include Signs of Identity Theft, Immediate Steps to Repair Identity Theft, and How to Keep Your Personal Information Secure.

Of the more than 1.1 million fraud complaints (classified separately from identity theft) the Commission received, 61 percent of consumers reported an amount of money they had paid, which collectively added up to more than $1.6 billion.

The top 10 complaint categories include:

Category	Number of Complaints	Percentages
Identity Theft	290,056	14%
Debt Collection	204,644	10%
Banks and Lenders	152,707	7%
Imposter Scams	121,720	6%
Telephone and Mobile Services	116,261	6%
Prizes, Sweepstakes, and Lotteries	89,944	4%
Auto Related Complaints	82,701	4%
Shop-at-Home and Catalog Sales	66,024	3%
Television and Electronic Media	53,087	3%
Advance Payment for Credit Services	50,422	2%

The report details national data, as well as a state-by-state accounting of top complaint categories and a listing of the metropolitan areas that generated the most complaints. This includes the top 50 metropolitan areas for both fraud complaints and identity theft complaints. Florida is the state with the highest per capita rate of reported identity theft and fraud complaints, followed by Georgia and California for identity theft complaints, and Nevada and Georgia for fraud and other complaints.

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Download the Consumer Sentinel Network Data Book 2013 (104 pp)

Download the National Do Not Call Registry Data Book FY 2013 (22pp)

Basic economics escapes Washington minds

It’s enlightening to note that, among John Ninfo’s “Top 20 Mistakes Made by People Who Have Filed for Bankruptcy,” 16 are regularly practiced by politicians.

In 2006 when arguing whether to raise the national debt limit to about $9 trillion, then Sen. Barack Obama addressed the president and blamed the unsustainable debt on “leadership failure.”  He rightfully noted the opportunity costs of our debt and warned that foreign-held debt is a threat to our national security; then Sen. Joe Biden agreed.  He lamented the abandonment of the “common sense budgeting principle of balancing expenses and revenues.” Nevertheless, today our debt is twice the amount, having increased $6.65 trillion during the past five years alone.

For decades, voters have rewarded those politicians who promise us the most, regardless of the impossibility of carrying out the promises.  We’re particularly susceptible to emotional appeals, and poverty has grown tremendously since war on it was declared.  Yet as far back as the 1980s, Walter Williams and others have repeatedly demonstrated how government programs keep people down; today’s second-generation welfare recipient knows no other way to survive.

My wife and I are just a few hundred million shy of being wealthy.  But we are old enough to have witnessed a strong America, and we cannot turn our backs to our children and grandchildren who have not.

Congress must finally create a balanced federal budget, with realistic projections, that includes a 30- to 50-year payoff of our insane national debt.

Further, as demonstrated by the income tax code, decades of tinkering by pandering politicians will not fix the Affordable Care Act. Like the 16th Amendment, it must be repealed.

Appeared (sans links) as letter to the editor in the Journal & Courier, February 18, 2014