Trading Standards

Trading Standards investigations can cover a wide range of potential offences that include copyright, trademarks, trade descriptions, consumer credit, weights and measures and food safety, among others.

We appreciate that it can be a difficult time for a business or an individual subjected to a Trading Standards investigation and the difficulties can be compounded by the investigators having wide-ranging powers enabling them to:

• conduct undercover test purchases from your business posing as customers
• commence an investigation into your business based on a complaint from a customer
• attend at your business premises without notice
• seize your business records including computers, mobile phones and products
• interview people associated with the business
• when accompanied by the police, arrest any person associated with the business who they have reasonable grounds to suspect of committing offences
• issue formal warnings
• review any licences granted to the business
• issue criminal cautions
• interview personnel under caution at the police station or Trading Standards offices
• commence criminal prosecutions in the Magistrates’ Court and Crown Court
• instigate Proceeds of Crime Act (POCA) proceedings to remove any criminal property/profit that may have been acquired as a result of the offences.

If you are subject to a Trading Standards investigation we can be on hand to offer guidance from the initial interview under caution.

In the event of a prosecution, you could receive a caution, a fine, conditions imposed upon licenses or even a revocation of your licence to trade. The last punishment could have particularly significant financial repercussions on you and your business. In some situations, a custodial sentence is possible.

An investigation will begin with an initial complaint against you or your business or as a result of a test purchase made by a Trading Standards official. In taking action to investigate a complaint you will be invited to attend an interview under caution. It is very important that you get legal advice at this stage as any replies you give in the interview may be significant in any subsequent prosecution. It may also be possible in some circumstances to negotiate alternative options to prosecution, such as a written warning or a formal caution.