Consumer Protection and Investigations - Business Pages

Consumer Protection and Investigations exists for the benefit of consumers and businesses within Cheshire. The aim of the Service is to promote a fair trading environment that enables honest businesses to succeed. This is achieved through a variety of activities including the provision of advice and education for businesses and through the detection and investigation of criminal offences.

Providing advice to Cheshire Businesses

If your business is based in Cheshire you may wish to develop a ‘Home Authority’ relationship with us. There are benefits in having such a relationship, for example we can appoint a named Officer to respond to your queries. This Officer can also act as a contact point for other Trading Standard authorities so reducing the need for them to contact you direct when they have a complaint or enquiry about your business. Learn more about the ‘Home Authority’ principle. If you would like to talk to one of our Officers about having a Home Authority relationship please contact the Business Support Team.

What do Consumer Protection and Investigations do when a complaint is made about a business?

When a complaint is made about a business we take into account a number of factors when deciding what action to take. For example we assess the potential harm the business’ behaviour might be having on consumers. We will also consider the possible detriment the business’ actions is having on other businesses. The action that we will take includes providing advice to help the business to comply with the law and where the seriousness and level of complaints warrants it we will prosecute the offending business.

To learn more about our approach please refer to our Enforcement Policy.

What can you expect from Consumer Protection and Investigations?

Find out about our Concordat on Good Enforcement.