Consumer Protection Plan Installed for Summer Vacation

(Acapulco, AN 8 July) Just in time for the summer school holidays, PROFECO, the federal consumer protection agency has announced a special operation to ensure that persons providing tourism services do not overcharge or otherwise abuse the visitors. The increased vigilance will include the deployment of ten mobile units with inspectors and support personnel. The areas of operation will be Acapulco, Zihuatanejo and Taxco. A few areas have been identified as critical zones because of the number of complaints lodged with the agency in prior seasons. Puerto Marqués was named as an example of a trouble spot last year. The inspectors plan to visit bars, discos, restuarants and shopping centers to ensure that sellers do not change their prices arbitrarily to gouge visitors, especially foreigners.

Meanwhile, other areas of Acapulco that do not serve tourists will continue to be monitored by the consumer protection officials, especially as concerns seasonal items placed for sale at this time, when schools are in recess. Shortly the local office of Profeco will announce the results of its recent inspection operation in private schools, where they checked to see if the sale of uniforms and school supplies was conditioned on payment of registration fees or tuition.