The OFT and TSS

How the OFT and Trading Standards Services are working together to benefit consumers and businesses.

Local Authority Trading Standards Services (TSS) are our key partners in implementing the consumer law regime, which lies at the heart of UK economic policy. We share enforcement powers and work closely with them to provide an efficient and effective service for both consumers and businesses.

TSS are funded by and accountable to local authorities. They are required to work to national priorities set by government departments and agencies, as well as local priorities set by elected councillors which focus on the particular needs of the local community. They also enforce a far broader range of legislation than the OFT and often have responsibility for animal health, food safety and underage sales of tobacco, alcohol, knives and fireworks.

With the introduction of the Enterprise Act, the OFT was given the responsibility to coordinate enforcement activity across legislation enforced by both the OFT and TSS. This has led to greater collaborative working and we have established a better understanding of our respective priorities and ways of working.

We are working with TSS to establish a UK-wide network of Regional Intelligence Officers, whose responsibility will be to pull together information and intelligence on issues affecting consumers across the country. This will enable us to build a comprehensive picture that will inform the priorities of both TSS and the OFT.

Since December 2005, the OFT has also had a role in providing strategic leadership and support to TSS in relation to the fair trading remit that the OFT and TSS share. One outcome of that role is work that the OFT has undertaken in partnership with TSS to assess the impact of TSS fair trading work.

Trading standards impact

In June 2009, the OFT published the findings of work carried out in partnership with TSS to estimate the consumer savings that are delivered by the fair trading work of TSS across the UK.

The research found that the fair trading work carried out by TSS across the UK delivers direct consumer savings of at least £347m a year with an average benefit-cost ratio of at least 6:1.

The work also produced robust and practical methodologies that allow individual TSS to estimate the consumer savings delivered by their fair trading work. Among other things, TSS will be able to use the results to raise the profile and understanding of their work and to improve their performance and build capacity by better informing planning and prioritisation decisions.

The methodologies are set out in detail in the OFT's 'Trading Standards Impact' report. The OFT also published a Fair Trading Impact Calculator which provides individual TSS with a simple means of using the methodologies to estimate the consumer savings delivered by their fair trading work.

Download Trading Standards Impact report (pdf 701 kb)
Download Fair Trading Impact calculator (Excel 131 kb) 
See Press release 65-09

In March 2010 the OFT carried out a short online survey to evaluate take-up by TSS of the outputs of the Trading Standards impact work.

The results of the survey indicated that:

• Almost half of TSS had used the national impact figures for one or more purposes and more planned to do so in the future.
• Two-thirds of TSS had evaluated, or planned to evaluate, their own impact using the OFT evaluation tools.
• Direct benefits reported by TSS included better senior management and councillor engagement, avoidance of budget cuts, and even increased resources.

Download a summary of the survey results (pdf 56kb).

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