Interesting story on the BBC website about the Carphone Warehouse in Britain misleading customers about the implications of not taking out insurance on their new iPhones. Viewers contacted the excellent Watchdog after being told by Carphone Warehouse staff that if they lost their precious iPhones, they’d have to buy an new 18 month contract - at a minimum cost of £630. This is untrue and while customers would have to buy a new handset their contracts would be unaffected. In three out of five stores visited by Watchdog, undercover researchers were told the same thing, a fact the store attributed to “some element of confusion among an isolated number of sales consultants”. It said it did not believe that the “small number of complaints” were “a fair reflection of the experience of thousands of iPhone customers who have received insurance advice in our stores”.

A reader from Dublin 3 recently bought an organic chicken in Marks & Spencer; while it was absolutely fine, paying for it left a bitter taste in her mouth because of what she calls its “blatantly misleading” price tag. The chicken in question had a large red label on the packaging proudly announcing that there was 25 per cent off per kg; underneath the outsized red sticker, in finer print, shoppers were advised to “see price ticket for details” The price ticket had the usual use by date, weight and price which was €9.36.

“At the till I was charged the €9.36,” writes our reader. “I queried this with a staff member, who said that the reduction was already included in the price.” She reasoned that “then there wasn’t 25 per cent off the price as stated; he agreed that it was misleading but that was the way it came in to them and there was nothing he could or would do for me. I went ahead with the purchase, as how else do you really complain about these things?

“Surely this is blatantly misleading: there is no 25 per cent off the stated item. A number of people came up to me on the way out and said they had similar incidents with M&S and got nowhere either,” she says.

We contacted the store ourselves to find out more and received the following statement: “The product was reduced from €9.99 per kilo to €7.49, ie less 25 per cent. The product had a shelf ticket stating that reduction with a slash ticket. Whole chickens are a catch weight line, therefore the customer pays for the weight of the chicken multiplied by the price per kilo.

“M&S don’t show a slash price on each individual product as they are all different weights but they do on the shelf ticket. The price on the chicken is the total price the customer pays, which is calculated on the actual chicken weight multiplied by the discounted price per kilo.” Hmmm.

The response was almost as confusing to Pricewatch as the in-store labelling was to our reader and did not address at all the central complaint she was making, which was that having a large red 25 per cent off sticker emblazoned on the packaging has the potential to, at the very least, create the impression amongst shoppers not inclined to study the fine print on the shelf ticket that there is 25 per cent off the marked price of the item.

We contacted the store seeking further clarification but no one was available to elaborate on the original response.

Farmers’ markets are big business in Ireland and growing bigger each year as more small towns and suburbs seek to cash in on the trend which sees artisan cheese-makers set out their stalls alongside the posh pesto man and the butcher who sells organic beef and homemade sausages.

And it’s hard not to like them, despite the fact that they are often cold and frequently wet and never cheap. Moseying through the higgledy-piggledy aisles, soaking up the atmosphere - and the samples - and buying the occasional dirt-encrusted root vegetable is a pleasing way to pass an hour.

The concept supports small businesses, is environmentally friendly and the quality of the food on offer is considerably better than what you might expect to find stored under the harsh fluorescent lights in your local supermarket. Or at least that’s what we have been led to believe.

Last week the reputation of at least some of Ireland’s farmers’ markets took a knock when RTÉ’s widely respected and long-running farming show Ear to the Ground forcefully made the point that some stallholders in some markets might be taking advantage of gullible consumers - or “yummy mummies in SUVs”, as one cynic Pricewatch spoke to described them - by flogging mass-produced stock flown in from all over the world and tarted up to look like organically-produced local produce.

The programme pulled no punches in pointing out that while equivalent markets in France are rigorously controlled, the rules in Ireland are relaxed and no clear definition of a farmers’ market even exists.

THERE ARE CURRENTLY 129 self-styled farmers’ markets of various sizes dotted throughout the State - two years ago there were just 80 - and the sector is worth approximately €28 million annually. At present it is regulated by multiple government departments: the Department of Agriculture has responsibility for food production and the granting of organic status; the Department of Health has responsibility for food safety issues; Fisheries looks after seafood stalls; and the Department of the Environment is responsible for permits and planning.

Trevor Sargent, the Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture and Food, has plans to bring some order to the markets and will kick-start that process in the new year with meetings with local authority managers, aimed at devising rules to boost standards. He has described farmers’ markets as a huge growth area and says he wants to establish the remit of local authorities in improving facilities across the country.

Critics say that the move is long overdue and point out that in some markets the farmers are outnumbered by traders who import produce and sell it at vastly inflated prices. Consequently local farmers can’t get a look-in because rents are too high - the cost of renting a stall in some Dublin markets is €70 a week (a not-insubstantial sum for a small producer) while in parts of rural Ireland it is a far more manageable €20 per week.

One of the critics of the high prices and imported produce is Consumers Association of Ireland CEO Dermott Jewell. He believes buyers run the risk of being ripped off. “We are quite concerned and have been for some time,” he says.

“In many cases people are not able to buy proper farm produce at farmers’ markets and they are not even getting locally-produced food. We are hearing examples of markets selling products of questionable quality and of questionable origin. It is becoming ludicrous.” He believes the sector should be policed with more rigour and all stallholders should be properly licenced before being allowed to trade.

“Consumers place a lot of trust in our farmers’ markets and I am afraid that trust is being breached. I am certain that in many cases the markets are not about helping local farmers bring their produce to market but are being used primarily as a vehicle to make money and that prices are being unjustifiably inflated and consumers are being fleeced.”

It is within Bord Bia’s remit to promote farmers’ markets as a means to provide producers with direct access to the public, and promote the development of local and regional speciality foods. The food board’s Emer O’Donnellan does not accept there is a serious problem with people being misled at farmer’s markets, claiming it is “not something that has come onto our radar. We are not being told that there is an overwhelming number of imports being sold in our markets.”

SHE DOES ACCEPT that the sector is in a “start-up phase” and says that “the place where we want to be will take time. We certainly do need to be looking at whether legislation is needed to more completely regulate the sector.” She believes Trevor Sargent has taken the appropriate first steps in arranging to meet city and county managers to discuss the organisation of farmers’ markets throughout the State and to devise rules to boost standards early in the new year.

The chairperson of the Irish Food Market Traders Association, Caroline Robinson, echoes some of Jewell’s concerns, although perhaps not as vociferously. She is not overly keen on stricter regulation but would like to see the public playing a more active role in ensuring that farmers’ markets do not become little more than outdoor supermarkets selling unseasonal fruit and vegetables from anywhere but here.

“I would like customers to be aware that if they are being offered strawberries in December then they are obviously not locally grown. The genuine farmers’ stalls will change seasonally and it is up to shoppers to watch out for those changes and shop accordingly.”

A more typical complaint comes from Maeve Townsend. The rising price of baby formula prompted her to contact us. “Until two months ago Aptamil Formula retailed at approximately €11.54. In September the packaging changed and it increased to €12.89.” She has also seen it selling it for as much as €13.99. “The hike seems unreasonable,” she says, and she’s not the first person to have sent us a mail about the price rise either.

On a recent 9.25am Ryanair flight from Faro to Dublin, a reader says she was charged €2 for a copy of the Irish Independent , 30 cent above its normal retail price of €1.70. She also says the copy of the paper she paid €2 for looked like it had been “recycled copy from the earlier Dublin to Faro flight”. She asks whether it is legal to charge more than the cover price and the short answer is yes. The cover price on newspapers and magazines is no more than a recommended retail price.

We contacted Ryanair to see whether it was actually charging €2 for the paper and if did “recycle” copies left behind by passengers on the outward journey and sell them to those on the inbound journey. We received the following statement: “Once again this is a baseless complaint. It was made perfectly clear to this passenger before they chose to buy the newspaper that the on-board cost is €2 and they chose to buy it.”

Recently, in the Galway branch of Easons, Dolores Gillan bought The Irish Times, Le Figaro and a magazine called Point de Vue . She was charged €2 for Le Figaro , the price marked on the newspaper as the price for Ireland, but paid €4.33 for Point de Vue which, she says, sells in France for €2, and has an Irish price tag of €3.60. “When I queried why I was being charged 73 cent more than the marked price, I was told it was VAT. This is rubbish and I feel that every time we purchase a magazine which is not produced in Ireland we are being ripped off. Needless to say, I will not be purchasing Point de Vue from Easons again.”

Giving has never been so easy, and if you choose carefully next time you go shopping for breakfast cereals, nappies or washing-up liquid, to name just three items, substantial charitable donations to worthy causes will be made on your behalf in the run-up to Christmas.

There was a time when the tokens clipped from the side of a cornflakes box could only be exchanged for a leather football or an inevitably disappointing superhero costume, but not any more - tokens from Kellogg’s Corn Flakes can currently be swapped for trees to be planted in the poorest countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

The Give the Gift of Trees campaign currently being run by Kellogg’s Ireland and Bóthar - the charity that specialises in livestock-based development programmes - aims to plant 150,000 trees in disadvantaged communities in Tanzania, Malawi, Rwanda, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Burkina Faso and Uganda to help develop sustainable farming practices.

Four tokens, found on special boxes, plus €5 will provide 10 saplings for the farmers, and for every 10 donations made, Kellogg’s will fund a further 10 trees. As of the middle of last week, 7,620 donations had been made, so there is a long way to go before the magic 150,000 is reached.

Meanwhile, Pampers and Unicef Ireland have, for the second year, launched a joint campaign to provide one million tetanus vaccinations to vulnerable mothers and their new babies in the developing world.
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Ryanair’s 2008 calendar features ladies from from its cabin crew in various states of undress. I haven’t seen it but according to the back page of Business This Week in today’s Irish Times, “some of the snaps are quite steamy”. In April Nicola from Stansted wears little more than a life jacket while cowboy boots are enough for Magda in Charleroi in June. There is also a pic of a Ryanair imagined calendar from Aer Lingus. It stars a frumpy woman of advancing years by the name of Bridget pouring tea. She’s wearing a twee, all-in-one bathing suit decorated in shamrocks. The calendar goes on sale tomorrow on board Ryanair flights. It costs £5/€7 and the proceeds go to Angels Quest, which provides respite care for children with special needs.

The good people at the National Consumer Agency have objected to plans to charge motorists almost 60 per cent extra to cross the M50 when barrier-free tolling is introduced next August. The NCA has called the charge “excessive” and has accused the NRA (that’s the national roads authority and not the national rifle association for any understandably confused Americans reading this) of imposing hidden toll charges in the form of administration charges, top-up thresholds and minimum top-up amounts.

A reader from Castlebar got in touch following a dispute with the Carphone Warehouse over phone insurance. In 2005, he bought a Samsung phone from the Carphone Warehouse and was convinced to take out insurance at a cost of €8.99 a month. He was very pleased with his purchase, and had no problems with it until last May when it got wet and shut itself down permanently.
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The benefits of organic food have long been disputed, with advocates claiming that not only does it taste better, but it is better for you, and better for the environment. This, they claim makes its higher price - at least 20 per cent more expensive than non-organic food - more palatable.

For their part, disbelievers say that a huge question mark still hangs over organically grown foods, with some sceptics going so far as to suggest the whole concept is little more than a fad for people with more money than sense.

The organic movement received a significant boost at the end of last month with reports of a major study appearing to go some way towards proving that food grown to organic standards is more nutritious than food grown using chemicals and pesticides.
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A New York restaurant called Serendipty 3 has put a new dessert on its menu. It is apparently bulging with top-grade cocoa, edible gold leaf and shavings of truffle. It’s a frozen, slushy mix of 28 cocoas from 14 countries, milk and 5 grams of 24-carat gold (which you’re supposed to eat) topped with whip cream and shavings from a La Madeline au Truffle (no, I’d never heard of it either). It comes in a goblet and is eaten with a golden spoon which diners can take home. Here’s a picture of it. At $25,000 a throw, the Guinness Book of World Records has declared the Frrrozen Haute Chocolate to be the most expensive dessert in the world. Pricewatch has declared it the most stupid dessert in the world and anyone who eats it should go straight to hell. It comes in the same week that a New York chef at the Westin unveiled a $1,000 bagel, topped with white truffle cream cheese and goji berry infused Riesling jelly with golden leaves. Goji berries!!! Reisling jelly! It sounds revolting to me.

A Dublin graduate has won the first prize of €2,000 in the Dyson Student Design Award with her computer shaped like a tree. Laura Cauldwell (22), from Knocklyon, won for her creation entitled “Cultivate - the Sustainable Living Computer.” The branches on the tree hold the mouse, speakers, the memory bank, the central processor, the battery and an ambient light. Ms Cauldwell said the components can be plucked from the tree and sent back to the supplier for upgrade, recycling or remanufacture. The Cultivate computer also has silver aluminum “leaves” that help to cool down each unit. I’m off to try and find a pic of it now…

Nearly two thirds of those who downloaded Radiohead’s “In Rainbows” last month chose to pay nothing, according to a study by a consumer research firm. Some 62 per cent of the people who downloaded “In Rainbows” in a four-week period last month opted not to pay the band a bean. The remaining 38 per cent voluntarily paid an average of €4.12, according to the study.

Jesus wept! Mattel are recalling more toys!

I’d never used a bluetooth headset so came this totally cold. The challenge was to find a headset which didn’t make me look like an eejit - well, any more of an eejit than I look at the best of times. Not sure if I succeeded but I was pretty impressed by the cheapest and the dearest options…
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Tesco has opened its first store in the US and will follow it up with five more openings in California later this week. The stores are all to be branded Nice & Easy and the retailling giant plans to take on the likes of Seven Eleven and small mom n’ pop style stores rather than the even bigger retailing giant that is Walmart. It is estimated that within three years Tesco’s US sales could reach €1 billion.

Over the coming weeks, there will be much talk of people jetting off to US discount malls and coming home with armfuls of Timberland, Hilfiger and endless tales of the bargains that they found in the Thanksgiving sales. These bargains will be made ever sweeter because of the widespread tax evasion that is at the core of the US shopping experience.

Last year, over one-quarter of a million Irish people went to the United States in search of cheaper clothes, spending on average between €2,000 and €3,500 each. However, according to the Comptroller and Auditor General, only four passengers were stopped at customs and were found to be carrying goods in excess of the maximum value of €175 allowed.

The Revenue insists that the law is being upheld and denies people are being waved through the green channel at Dublin airport with suitcases bursting at the seams with newly acquired designer clobber. A spokesman for the Revenue told Pricewatch last week that internal studies have been carried out over recent years that don’t “seem to indicate” that there were a lot of people spending in excess of their allowance.
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Who would have thought there’d be so much variety. The best was hideously expensive, the cheapest was just hideous.
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