According to our newspaper (Reporter Tao Wen), when I placed an order for waterproofing and leak repair for 10 yuan, I was charged 7,300 yuan at checkout. The 50 yuan mentioned on the phone for door-to-door unlocking ended up costing nearly 1,000 yuan... Around the Spring Festival, high-priced repairs frequently occur. What I thought was an ordinary repair, why is it so expensive? How can consumers avoid "stepping into pitfalls"?
Before the Spring Festival, Mr. Yuan in Wuhan had a leak in the bathroom at his home, and he immediately contacted a repair shop through an e-commerce platform. The merchant said that it could be quickly repaired by injecting glue, so Mr. Yuan placed an order according to the price of 10 yuan on the merchant's store page.
At about 4 o'clock in the afternoon that day, two maintenance personnel came to Mr. Yuan's home. After a brief inspection, they began to drill holes and inject glue. To Mr. Yuan's surprise, he thought it was just a simple repair that wouldn't cost much, but when he checked out, the other party actually asked for 7,300 yuan.
"The maintenance staff did not tell them what kind of glue was used or how much. They only said that it was more than 200 yuan per catty." Since he did not know the specific market price, Mr. Yuan had to pay according to the price. However, the water leakage problem was not solved, and Mr. Yuan later hired a professional waterproofing and leak repair company to perform repairs, which cost more than 2,000 yuan.
Recently, Mr. Huang from Zhengzhou also encountered high-priced repairs. On the evening of January 23, Mr. Huang contacted a door-to-door locksmith through a life service platform. "The other party said on the phone that the unlocking fee only costs about 50 yuan. But when he came to the door, he said that the anti-theft lock could not be opened and that it needed to be violently removed. The specific price was never stated clearly. The last set of services cost 960 yuan." Mr. Huang said .
The phenomenon of "repair assassins" appears frequently in life, and many consumers report that they have had similar experiences: when they placed an order online to replace a lamp, the page showed that it only cost 30 yuan, but in the end they charged 370 yuan; when they made an appointment for an electrician to come to repair, they were "fooled" into replacing it. The charge for wires and switches is 9,000 yuan... The reporter saw on the Black Cat complaint platform that there were more than 3,000 complaints related to "home maintenance", most of which were related to unreasonable charges.
Liao Jianxun, a lawyer at Guangzhou Guoding Law Firm, told reporters that there are generally two situations for high-priced repairs: one is that the repair process is more complicated and the cost is higher, such as waterproofing and leakage prevention. In order to attract business, some businesses deliberately offer low prices on the platform. The other is that the maintenance service fee itself is not high, and the merchant exaggerates the difficulty of repair and charges high fees.
"Consumers do not have the ability to make professional judgments, maintenance personnel do not inform specific costs in advance, and prices are not transparent. This not only violates consumers' right to know, but is also suspected of fraud." Liao Jianxun said.
Liao Jianxun believes that to solve the problem of high-priced repairs, on the one hand, the platform needs to take responsibility, be open and transparent in terms of prices, and respect consumers' right to know. On the other hand, management departments should intensify investigation and punishment efforts to effectively safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of consumers.
For consumers, Liao Jianxun suggested that before repair, they can learn and compare from multiple parties, try to negotiate the price before repair, and keep text, voice or picture evidence. If they encounter being deceived, consumers can negotiate and communicate with merchants and platforms in a timely manner, or they can lodge complaints with market supervision and management departments, consumer rights protection units, etc.
(Worker Daily)