NEW YORK – New York Attorney General Letitia James kicked off National Consumer Protection Week by releasing a list of the top 10 consumer complaints received by the Office of the Attorney General (OAG) in 2022. The top complaints range from price gouging of infant formula and children’s medication, flight cancellations, and the dramatic increase in gasoline prices.
“My office receives thousands of consumer complaints every year, and we take each one seriously to stop fraudsters from hurting New Yorkers,” said Attorney General James. “From predatory debt collection to price gouging, scammers tried to take advantage of consumers for personal gain, and we took appropriate action to stop it. As always, I urge New Yorkers to stay vigilant and to keep my office informed about potential scams, price gouging, or violations of consumer protection laws.”
Topping the list of consumer complaints with 5,240 was retail sales. These included price gouging, online purchases, defective merchandise, poor customer service, pet stores, and animal breeders. Coming in second were landlord/tenant complaints at 3,014. Rounding out the top three at 2,834 were complaints about credit, mortgage, and banking institutions. These included debt collection, credit card billing, debt settlement, payday loans, credit repair, credit reporting agencies, identity theft, banking, loan modification scams, mortgage lending and servicing.
The remainder of the top 10 list included complaints on consumer services, automobiles, internet service, utility companies, home repair & improvement contractors, travel, and gasoline prices.
Attorney General James reminds New Yorkers that complaints can be filed by completing and submitting a Consumer Frauds and Protection Bureau online complaint form or by calling (800) 771-7755.
