Consumer watchdog brought to heel ACCC deputy chairman Michael Schaper. Picture: Kym Smith Source: National Features FRANCHISING abuses have been ignored by the competition watchdog for a lack of resources, submissions to the Federal Parliament claim. A former senior officer of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, Michael Terceiro, and the Law Society of South Australia are raising concerns that the ACCC has cut the number of franchising investigations it is running. Terceiro, now of Terceiro Legal Consulting, says in his submission that the ACCC has pursued only 17 noteworthy franchising cases over the past nine years - and none over the past two years. While he acknowledges the ACCC has increased its educative role, Terceiro says the lack of investigation plays havoc with complainant franchisees. The personal cost in franchising cases are the things that make it harder to run. You have got to get cases up, find out their personal story, how it has affected them, distil that into a statement and manage their emotions," he says. Terceiro has called for a dedicated franchising investigations team to replace the current set-up, where teams cover all cases - and may be tempted to leave the more complex issues of franchising for the "quick wins" offered by general business investigations. The Law Society provides a similar analysis. "Anecdotal evidence suggests that the ACCC (due to lack of resources) will generally only action 'high profile' matters and not the complaints of aggrieved persons who have had unfortunate experiences with entities that do not have a high profile," it says. ACCC deputy chairman Michael Schaper says the investigation figures do not reflect issues such as misrepresentation that are probed under the broader Act or take into account analysis of complaints by the agency before they reach the "investigation" stage. He says the ACCC employs franchising specialists to assess initial claims before they are handed off to investigators. "It wouldn't be efficient to have specialists investigating franchising, specialists who are investigating water trading, and so on," Schaper says. I think we have a better arrangement because we have a specialist team to assess matters and skilled investigators.