Don’t ever open your wallet to door-to-door sellers before reading this.

This week the ‘boiler-room’ and commission-hungry sales tactics of dodgy insurance salesmen were back in the news, with scams beginning with a knock on the door. 

Only last week Origin Energy was fined a record $2 million  for illegal sales tricks,  including multiple breaches of the very laws designed to protect us from dodgy doorknockers.

The Federal Court has just ordered Energy Australia to pay $1.2 million in fines for false and misleading representations to consumers.

And late last year Australian Power and Gas paid a $1.1 million penalty for pushing door-to-door practices way outside the law.

So it’s timely to wise up on the protections we have from the fast dealing of those selling everything from financial services to energy door-to-door.

The cowboys do count on consumers NOT being aware of their rights. Knowing a little about the Australian Consumer Law - and it’s hardly complicated - can be your best defence against these so-called unsolicited consumer agreements.

Your rights include:

• To remain undisturbed outside reasonable hours and not to be hassled or hurried into buying.
• Doorknockers can’t visit on public holidays or Sundays and only between 9am-6pm on weekdays or until 5pm on Saturdays.
• To see a clear ID, offer and plain English sales agreements and to have generous cooling-off periods explained to you.
• And if you ask the seller to leave they must go at once and not return for 30 days. These protections also largely apply to approaches over the phone or in public places.

If you don’t want to welcome such people, put a ‘Do Not Knock’ sticker on your gate which has some legal clout as well as saying ‘ get lost.’  They’re easily obtainable at www.donotknock.org.au

There is also more information at the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission website https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/sales-delivery/telemarketing-door-to-door-sales

Sometimes an electricity, insurance or solar panel retailer may have a good offer for you, but it’s nigh impossible to make an informed choice in your slippers.

This is why there are very handy cooling-off periods in which you can change your mind with no penalty in the cold light of day. The silver-tongued shonky salesmen hate this one the most.

You have ten days after you get the agreement document to call it off and get a full refund. It can be three months if they called outside the permitted times and didn’t comply with the rules.

And it can go up to six months if they didn’t provide you with any information about the cooling-off period in the first place!

It’s a miracle any of these guys are still in business but as we’ve said they rely on us not knowing or enforcing our hard-won rights.