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January 2018 January 2018
DORSET TRADING STANDARDS twenty years of innovative volunteering to the community project, which has
b e e n a h e a d o f i t s t i m e i n p r o v i d i n g s u p p o r t t o
Dorset County Council Trading Standards Service check and young mothers and the elderly.”
approve businesses so you don’t have to.
For more information visit www.buywithconfidence.gov.uk or
call 08454 040506.
To report or seek advice about problems you have AUTUMN LEAVES
experienced when dealing with a trader call 08454 040506. OVER 50’S CLUB

Subscription Traps We hope that our members enjoyed their last meeting in
December featuring Christmas entertainment.
Locked into a subscription for an offer you didn’t sign up for?
The New Year starts with the meeting at the Scout Hut on Wednesday 10th
You are not alone. Millions of people across the UK have experienced issues
cancelling recurring payments for subscriptions without their apparent January at the usual time of 2.30pm when Alex Betts will sing and play
encouraging us all to join in.
authorisation.
Subscription traps are deliberately misleading practices, where the company After tea there will be the usual raffle in aid of club funds.
involved uses deceptive language and deceptive terms and conditions. With New members are always very welcome. Enquiries to Sylvia 472697 or Kath
traps, products are usually advertised as free samples, where consumers are 471175.
asked to pay for postage and packaging. The consumer will then typically find
that much larger amounts are routinely taken from their bank account, using the
Continuous Payment Authority (CPA) which the consumer believed was only
established to pay their postage and packing on the original item. Products with BERE REGIS AND DISTRICT
traps are often substandard or don’t turn up at all.
TWINNING ASSOCIATION
People should be wary of free trials or low price offers for products such as
slimming pills, health foods, anti-ageing products or medicines. Make sure you
read the small print and don’t get conned into a longer term financial agreement This year was the 20 Anniversary of our Twinning with
th
through a continuous payment authority – a subscription trap! They will cost you Cerences in Normandy, France. More than 40
MUCH more than you think. Ask yourself why you are giving over your credit or members visited Cerences to celebrate this
debit card details. Check the full price and duration of the offer before signing occasion. We presented our French friends with a
up. beautiful quilt, generously made to mark the 20
th
Anniversary by the Bere Regis Quilters, depicting
If you have fallen into a subscription trap though, remember that banks and other
financial institutions have a duty to protect their customers. When a customer various parts of Bere Regis.
complains that they have been trapped by a subscription, the bank should Cerences will be visiting Bere Regis in the Autumn.
cancel it. They have a legal duty to stop continuous payment authorities when
th
customers ask them to, and they may have to give you a refund if you have been We will be holding our Annual General Meeting on 12 February 2018 at 7.30 a.m
misled or defrauded. in the Drax Arms skittle alley hall. All welcome.
For advise on this, or to report something to Trading Standards, call the Citizens We are also planning a card night (Whist Drive) in March and a walking treasure
Advice consumer helpline on 03454 04 05 06. hunt in May. Look out for more information nearer the time.

If you are interested in joining the Twinning Association please email Jackie Ahern
at jackie.ahern@hotmail.co.uk for further information.

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