Overview of the Australian Commission on Competition and Consumer Protection (ACCC)
The Australian Commission on Competition and Consumer Protection (ACCC) is an independent agency of the Government of Australia. Its mandate is to protect consumers' rights, business rights and obligations in the regulation of industry, price monitoring and prevention of illegal anticompetitive behaviour (Australian Competition and Consumer Commission 2002).
The Commission is authorized to take legal action against companies that violate the Trade Practices Act. Penalties for non-compliance can be severe.
At companies that do not meet the restrictive trade practice provisions of the Trade Practices Act may be assessed a penalty in the Federal Court. There are three ways in which the maximum penalty may be assessed. The maximum possible penalty exceeds $ 10 million, or three times the value of the illegal gains, or (if the damage can not be found) 10% of turnover for the previous 12 months. Individuals can be fined up to $ 500,000 (Australian Competition and Consumer Commission 2002).
The main activity of the regulatory authorise in the industry is to protect the rights of individuals and legal persons in court and help with the pre-order promotion to the rights of consumers to purchase goods (services) of good quality, the safety of their lives and health, as well as for information about goods (works, services) and producer (executor, salesperson) for creating awareness in the field of consumer protection. However, in the consumer protection it creates awareness about harm to life, health or property of consumers, violate the rights of consumers caused by the dangerous goods (works, services), and inform public authorities exercising control over the security of goods (works, services), take the necessary measures to protect consumers (Australian Competition and Consumer Commission 2002).
Main characteristics of corporate governance for the Australian Commission on Competition and Consumer Protection (ACCC)
The term corporate governance refers broadly to rules, regulations, or the law with which the business is operated, controlled and regulated. The term refers to internal and external environment; officers, stakeholders' and staff come under internal environment, whereas consumer groups, government regulation and clients come under the tree of external environment (Australia & Steinwall 2007, p. 800-1400).
The corporate governance of the Australian Commission on Competition and Consumer Protection (ACCC) is to regulate codes of conduct of the organisations and to enforce competition rules; eventually contributing to raising the level of consumer protection and users through access to effective systems of court settlement of claims meeting the requirements established by the legislation. The Australian Commission on Competition and Consumer Protection files complaints against public employers adhere to codes of conduct that violate the obligations freely undertaken or committed acts of unfair competition and against those responsible for these codes when they promote unfair acts (Australia & Steinwall 2007, p. 450-670).
As a general proposition, legislation governing the Australian Commission on Competition and Consumer Protection states that where there is enough evidence of unprofessional business practice that is linked to a breach of a code of conduct of the commitments made ??in the code ...