Eurobarometer 73.2+73.3 (FEB-MAR 2010)

Since the early 1970s the European Commission´s Standard & Special Eurobarometer are regularly monitoring the public opinion in the European Union member countries. Principal investigators are the Directorate-General Communication and on occasion other departments of the European Commission or the European Parliament. Over time, candidate and accession countries were included in the Standard Eurobarometer Series. Selected questions or modules may not have been surveyed in each sample. Please consult the basic questionnaire for more information on country filter instructions or other questionnaire routing filters. In this study the following modules are included: 1. Consumer empowerment.<br>Topics: 1. Consumer empowerment: computer skills; recent internet use; frequency of internet use; place of use; internet use to compare prices and quality; purchases made by post, phone or the internet; knowledge about having the right to return goods without giving a reason and to have it repaired or replaced for free; knowledge test: the legality of the advertisement of expensive hotlines, on the right of withdrawal for new insurance contracts, on the right of return for purchases at the door, the obligation to pay for unsolicited goods; online purchase of an airline ticket; knowledge test of the rule for the advertisement of the pricing of airline tickets; reading the contract provisions at the last contract; reason for cursory reading of the contract; designation of consumer organizations in the own country; preferred medium when comparing prices; frequency of price comparison; online shopping: last online shopping; reason for abandoning an online purchase; reading the conditions of sale when shopping online; reason for inaccurate reading of the conditions of sale; location (own country, EU or rest of the world) of the online retailer; knowledge test on the consumer protection laws for online purchases from another European country; number of persons whom the respondent reported a problem as well as a positive experience when purchasing goods; own complaint in the last year; frequency of complaints; extent of the financial loss; frequency of complaints to private business and to public institutions; reason for the absence of a customer complaint; satisfaction with the handling of the problem by a public authority; reason for waiver of judicial and non-judicial procedure; amount of financial loss or the amount in out- of- court disputes and the court proceedings; weekly time budget for purchases; frequency of reception of consumer rights in the media; looking for information on consumer rights; knowledge test with percentage calculation; test on the calculation of interest rate and interest rate of credit; test of the correct interpretation of the fat content, and the expiration date shown on a picture; awareness of the right meaning for logos: e.g. organic farming, correspondences with EU directives, ensures environmental standards, recyclable paper, damage to health if used improperly; feeling confident as a consumer, knowledgeable, and well protected by consumer laws; mother tongue differs from the official language in the own country; residential status; difficulties to make ends meet (e.g. payment difficulties in mortgage or rent); affordability of a meal with meat every second day; type of residential property; problems with the current home (leaking roof, damp walls or floors, rot in window frames or floor); decision maker in the relationship concerning everyday shopping and expensive purchases of consumer durables.

Demography: nationality; age; marital status and family situation; age at end of education; sex; occupation; professional position; full-time or part-time job; temporary job or permanent job; type of community; national provenance of the respondent; household composition and household size; own a mobile phone and fixed (landline) phone; possession of durable goods (entertainment electronics, internet connection, possession of a car, a flat/a house have finished paying for or still paying for); financial difficulties during the last year; self-rated social position (scale); internet use (at home, at work, at school).

Also encoded was: date of interview; beginning of interview; duration of interview; persons present during the interview; willingness to cooperate; language of interview (only in LU, BE; ES, FI, EE, LV, and MT); city size; region; weighting factor.