A toothless watchdog, in regard to its protection of consumers.
I have lived in the D.C. area for decades. In that amount of time, you learn which businesses are thoroughly rotten / corrupt, and thus to be avoided. You go on the Better Business Bureau (BBB) website, and some of those "gems" are listed with A+ ratings. Some of the businesses are very obviously groups of marauding monsters, yet this is what we get in the way of "protection." A business may have hundreds of negative customer reviews, but never mind, that fact doesn't appear to factor into the BBB's rating. You'll also find the BBB has zero enforcement authority -- and the business raping you will often just ignore whatever conclusions the BBB reaches.
I did business with a bunch of miscreants who used historic scam techniques. "You need to have this repair done immediately, or you will be in danger of injury." (There was no immediate danger of any kind.) "You need to accept this incredibly great estimate for the work, or I'll get up and walk away from the offer we've made to you." (This is an old tactic, to get you to accept an exorbitant estimate.) "I'll call the boss and see if he'll lower the total of the exorbitant estimate we've given to you"....(the tech then pretends to make a phone call)....."The boss says he can't really reduce the estimate we've given to you, except by a token, miniscule amount." (This trick has probably been around for millennia.) "We're going to gouge you this massive amount of money, but we're throwing in these two free valves and this coupling pin, to sweeten the deal." (This is called a "pretend freebie," to get you on the hook; you're not really getting anything from them for "free.") "You need this protection plan to get a discounted estimate total today." (Usually the "protection plan" is an automatically renewing monthly or annual expense that is a rip-off. It will continue to renew itself until you cancel it.) "You need to sign this contract immediately, or I can no longer offer you this special price." (This is called "a hustle.") Etc., etc., etc.
Anyway, this business used these scam techniques on me, and others, and it had hundreds of angry customer reviews for these and sundry other reasons.
What was its BBB rating?
You guessed it -- an A+. read more