The state should draw attention to the business sector and traders that citizens are not obligated to have in their possession a fiscal account for the purpose of realizing their consumers rights, said the Executive Director of Centre for Monitoring and Research CeMI, Nikoleta Đukanović.

She said, visiting the „Boje jutra“ on TV Vijesti on the occasion Of the World Consumer Day, that in the previous year, since the mobile and the web application www.potrosaci.me has stared working, has been reported a lot of consumers rights violations and that, as she pointed out, citizens must endeavor to protect their rights.

„The reports were mostly related to public services, water suppliy, electricity and utilities in the part of the account reforming or the supply quality. On the other hand, concrete violations of consumer rights, especially in shopping facilities, service activities, but also some other examples such as financial services, food quality, electronic commerce”, Đukanović said.

She said that consumers should be informed about their rights, in order to prevent possible misuse.

“Consumers have a little knowledge about their rights, they are not informed and educated, and on the other hand they are not responsible. They do not believe in the system institutions or in the law, or for some other reason they just don’t want to be active, to realize their rights if they are violated.”, stated Đukanović.

She said that sometimes consumers find difficult to realize their rights and that the reason is, as she stated, that traders do not want to cooperate or there is no possibility to realize their rights in certain segments.

“All merchants are asking for your account. The reason is to reduce the chance to return this product, to make a complaint for it and to return your money, and all this for the greater profit of these trading operations.”, Đukanović explained.

According to her, CeMI had, within the application, a lot of reports for the different prices on the shelves and prices on the cash register.

“We had a lot of cases when the citizens reported this, and we forwarded to the competent Inspection Office, after which these facilities were punished,” Đukanović said.

As she stated, consumers often do not have the motivation to react and report, in the case of a small amount, which leaves a lot of space for misuse.

“The state should draw the attention of the business sector and traders that the ultimate claim is not the account possession and they should not ask citizens for it. Different prices on the shelves, asking for fiscal account, a lot of other segments are large areas where there is a lot of misuse and there are many examples of the impossibility of realizing our rights”, said Đukanović.

You can watch the broadcast on the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxvW5EVl_GM