The National Consumer Commission (NCC) has warned South African consumers to steer clear of 110 untraceable companies in the country, saying that they risk losing money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The group updated its list of untraceable suppliers this week, adding 20 new companies to the 90 previously listed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A full list of the 110 companies flagged by the NCC can be found here<\/a><\/strong> (via the NCC<\/strong><\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Untraceable suppliers are businesses that typically accept orders and payments for goods and services but fail to deliver and then disappear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The NCC noted that the suppliers it has flagged and assessed operate across various industries, but all follow the same modus operandi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “These suppliers accept orders and payments but fail to deliver, then disappear or shut down their websites or change their known addresses without notice,” the NCC said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The suppliers have also been flagged by consumers for providing defective products with no way to return or replace them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As a result, consumers are left with no recourse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In previous updates, the NCC noted that some suppliers were impersonating legitimate businesses to defraud consumers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The industries include auto parts, furniture, renewable energy, car dealerships, auto insurance, marketing and advertising, tobacco products, interior design, clothing, construction and truck repair services. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The 20 newly identified suppliers are based in Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal, and the Western Cape, with some operating entirely online, making it even harder for consumers and authorities to track them, it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “The NCC warns consumers to exercise extra caution when dealing with these suppliers, as they may lose their hard-earned cash,” it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Consumers are further encouraged to verify suppliers before making payments, be cautious of deals that seem too good to be true and report any suspicious activity.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n The NCC said that suppliers of goods and services must comply with the provisions of the Consumer Protection Act (CPA) by providing accurate information, including physical address and contact details.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It previously warned that e-commerce is increasingly becoming a prime hunting ground for these kinds of operations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The National Consumer Commission (NCC) has warned South African consumers to steer clear of 110 untraceable companies in the country, saying that they risk losing money.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":855991,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9876],"tags":[2787,25400],"class_list":["post-860291","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle","tag-ncc","tag-untraceable"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/860291","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=860291"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/860291\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":860357,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/860291\/revisions\/860357"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/855991"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=860291"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=860291"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=860291"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}