Beware door-to-door salesmen in Hong Kong selling dubious water purifiers, watchdog says
Consumer Council believes uptick in complaints linked to growing demand for such devices after city’s tainted water scare of 2015
Hongkongers should watch out for shady door-to-door salesmen peddling expensive water purifiers bearing dubious promises such as disease prevention and hair smoothening, the city’s consumer watchdog warned.
The Consumer Council said it had received a string of complaints involving such sales in recent years, with at least one case involving a customer conned into buying a HK$33,000 (US$4,200) “electrolyte water apparatus” capable of ridding vegetables of pesticides.
The watchdog believed the uptick was most probably linked to the growing demand for purification devices in light of the 2015 lead-in-water scare.
“Often, unscrupulous salesmen, on the pretext of undertaking water quality tests for the household, gain entry to the premises,” the council’s Clement Chan Kam-wing said.
“Once inside, [they] begin to peddle their wares to these unwary tenants with exaggerated and inaccurate sales persuasion.”
