A Dedicated Consumer Protection Lawyer

The basic principles of consumer protection law are mandated honesty and required disclosures to individuals or family consumers in the marketplace, so to create an informed public while protecting honest businesses. In 1962, the idea of a “Consumer Bill of Rights” was first proposed by President Kennedy to Congress. President Kennedy proposed four consumer rights.

1. The right to safety – to be protected against the marketing of goods that are hazardous to health or life.

2. The right to be informed – to be protected against fraudulent, deceitful, or grossly misleading information, advertising, labeling, or other practices, and to be given the facts needed to make an informed choice.

3. The right to choose – to be assured, wherever possible, access to a variety of products and services at competitive prices; and in those industries in which competition is not workable and Government regulation is substituted, an assurance of satisfactory quality and service at fair prices.

4. The right to be heard – to be assured that consumer interests will receive full and sympathetic consideration in the formulation of Government policy, and fair and expeditious treatment in its administrative tribunals. In 1969, President Nixon in a message to Congress on consumer protection proposed a fifth consumer right for a “Consumer Bill of Rights.”

5. The right to register dissatisfaction – to have one’s complaint heard and weighed when the consumer’s interests are badly served.

Sarah M. Timmers was introduced to the practice of consumer protection law as a newly barred attorney employed with a Legal Aid Society in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

As a legal aid attorney, Ms. Timmers represented low-income individuals and families who were victims of used car dealers’ unfair acts or deceptive sales’ practices such as selling a used car with a tampered odometer misrepresenting the actual mileage, or selling a used car without disclosing past damage from an accident, undervaluing or underpaying a consumer’s trade-in vehicle, misrepresenting a consumer’s credit score to obtain favorable financing for the auto dealer, or selling the consumer a service contract while misrepresenting it as a warranty.