Better Business Bureau Services now available in Montana

Wyoming has it. North and South Dakota have it. Most areas of Canada even have it.

By JAN FALSTAD – Billings Gazette

http://helenair.com/articles/2003/12/20/montana/c03122003_01.txt

Until this month, 49 of the 50 states had a Better Business Bureau. The lone holdout was Montana.

Now, the Better Business Bureau in Spokane, Wash., http://www.spokane.bbb.org/ is stepping in to fill the void.

No sooner was the news out than the telephone started ringing in Spokane.

‘‘We’ve had contacts from Montana already. That’s very quick,” said Jan Quintrall, president and chief executive of the BBB serving Eastern Washington, northern Idaho and Montana. ‘‘We wondered if this was an indication of a real logjam.”

The bureau is a nonprofit organization that helps customers with complaints against a business or a business arguing with a consumer or another business. The main focus is to prevent disputes by educating consumers before they buy a product or service.

The Spokane bureau won’t open an office in Montana. It will serve the state the way it serves Idaho and Washington.

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BBB Serving Eastern Washington, North Idaho & Montana, Inc.

508 W. Sixth Avenue; Suite 401, Spokane, WA 99204

Send your request via E-Mail:

Call us at: (509) 455-4200 24-Hours-a-day

Or Toll Free at: 800-356-1007

http://www.spokane.bbb.org/

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‘‘Basically, what we have is a virtual office, 24 hours, seven days a week, a 1-800 telephone line and then the Web site,” Quintrall said.

The calls from Montana included one from a Billings customer dissatisfied with a used car. A caller from Arizona complained about a reservations company in Red Lodge, and a Missoula caller complained about buying bad meat from the back of a truck.

Last year, the Spokane office handled more than 79,000 phone calls and resolved 2,000 disputes. Hits on the office’s Web site average 355,000 per month.

However, the service is geared more toward educating people and preventing problems.

The Spokane bureau gets between 12,000 and 15,000 requests for reports each month. The office also issues fraud alerts to warn seniors of scams.

Marsha Costin, the office’s director of operations, said the staff investigates all complaints.

‘‘We take complaints seriously. We name names,” Costin said.

Once a month, the bureau publishes a Top 10 Hit List of businesses found using less than honorable business practices. In November, auto dealers, Internet service providers and credit collection agencies topped the list.

By joining the Better Business Bureau, businesses receive help resolving disputes with customers, information about unscrupulous businesses-to-business scams and the bureau’s logo to display to customers.

‘‘They get to display that torch logo, meaning they are a company that measures up to our higher standards,” Quintrall said.

Quintrall, who has headed the Spokane office for five years, said she had just taken the job when she got an interesting call.

‘‘I had been on the job for just three weeks when the FTC regional director in Seattle said, ‘When are

you going to take over Montana?’ ” Quintrall said.

Montana also is the last state in the union to offer another form of consumer protection.

Attorney General Mike McGrath said he is happy to hear the BBB is coming and he wants to get authority over most consumer complaints, too.

‘‘I’m the only attorney general in the country who does not have a consumer protection unit, No. 1., so I think anything that improves service to consumers is good,” McGrath said.

He said during the last legislative session, law students at the University of Montana Law School drafted a bill to move the consumer protection office from the administration department to the attorney general’s office.

It passed overwhelmingly — 97 to 3 — in the House, but failed to pass the Senate.

McGrath said he’s going to try again.

Complaints about stock and bonds and insurance are handled by the state auditor, which wouldn’t change, McGrath said.

The Better Business Bureau in Spokane, one of about 120 around the U.S. and Canada, is supported by 3,000 member businesses. These businesses pay $400 and up per month based on the number of employees. The Spokane office employs 19 people.

Quintrall emphasized that the BBB is neither anti-business nor pro-consumer: It’s pro-fair deal.

‘‘There are more bad consumers out there than there are bad businesses, especially this time of year,” Quintrall said. ‘‘The pushing and the shoving. Merry Christmas!”

In any case, she said the demand for the bureau’s service is growing.

‘‘In this day and age, promoting ethics in the marketplace is a real hot button,” Quintrall said.

Jan Falstad can be contacted at (406) 657-1306 or at [email protected]