Three mobile traders plead guilty to Commission charges

Three mobile traders plead guilty to Commission charges

Three mobile traders, commonly referred to as truck shops, have pleaded guilty to charges brought by the Commerce Commission relating to their lending practices.

Goodring Company Limited (Goodring), Betterlife Corporation Limited (Betterlife), and Ace Marketing Limited (Ace Marketing) will be sentenced in the next few months.

They are the first businesses to be prosecuted by the Commission under tightened Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act 2003 (CCCFA) laws for lenders which were introduced last year.

The charges come following the Commission’s year-long mobile trader project, which revealed wide-spread non-compliance issues in the industry.

Goodring will be sentenced on 30 charges relating to the CCCFA, while Betterlife and Ace Marketing face six and nine charges respectively under the same law. All three mobile traders failed to provide their customers with the legally required credit contract information in a clear and concise way.

Goodring faces two other charges under the Financial Service Providers (Registration and Dispute Resolution) Act 2008.

Ace Marketing also faces 19 charges under the Fair Trading Act 1986 (FTA) for misleading borrowers about their rights.

Betterlife, Goodring and Ace Marketing usually operate from a truck or through using door- to- door sales staff.

The three businesses sell consumer goods on credit (such as clothes, shoes and electrical items) at significantly higher prices than mainstream stores. For example, Goodring routinely sells branded hoodies to customers for $159, well in excess of in-store prices and one Betterlife customer purchased an iPhone 5C for $2,401 to pay off in instalments when these phones typically retail for around $600.

As these matters are now before the Court, the Commission is unable to comment further at this time.

ends

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