The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has successfully stopped claims by a company that claimed its magnetic jewellery could offer pain relief and reduce swelling.

Magna Jewellery Limited had suggested that magnetic therapy could help with a variety of medical conditions and that scientific research backed up their claims. Another company Magno Pulse is shortly to meet the OFT in the High Court having refused to co-operate with their requests to change their advertising of magnetic therapy products.

The mail order clothing company Damart has been criticised by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) for a mailing that was misleading and untruthful.

The mailing from Damart apologised for the customer not receiving a £3 cheque, which Damart knew full well had never been sent. It told the customer that on this occasion the Managing Director had personally intervened to approve a £5 cheque as compensation. Quite obviously the Managing Director could not have intervened as there was no cheque sent in the first place. The "cheques" too were not what they seemed - in fact they were simply discount vouchers.

A flower delivery company that operates from Jersey has been told not to rely upon guarantees made by their carrier Parcelforce when offering a guaranteed day of delivery to their customers.

Flying Flowers is a popular and well known flower delivery service. Whilst most of its flowers are sent by first class mail, its flagship product, the Ultimate Collection, is sent by the courier, Parcelforce.

The company states that the "day of delivery is guaranteed". Whilst this may appear to offer a service that will ensure that delivery actually happens on the right day, what it actually comes down to is the customer just getting a refund of the delivery charge if the flowers arrive late.

The travel and booking company Lastminute.com has been rapped by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) for a tasteless email sent to members drawing a connection between children and sex offenders.

The email in question was supposed to advertising children's theatre and plays, but carried the unfortunate tagline:

"Like Gary Glitter in a sweet shop, you too can have your pick of kiddy treats in London's theatre world. If you don't know what to do with your lovely sprogs, get them off the X-Box and into the theatre. These shows will definitely be their cup of Ribena ..."

The new telephone number for the public to secure advice and action on community safety and anti-social behaviour issues was today confirmed as 101.

The service is designed to improve the delivery of non-emergency services by ensuring a better co-ordinated response by local agencies, while freeing up the 999 service to handle emergency incidents.

It will be provided by local authorities and police forces working together to deliver services and handle calls. The new three-digit number will initially be launched in five 'Wave 1' areas this summer and will be rolled out across England and Wales by 2008.

The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has issued a warning about a group of Dutch salesmen who are denying consumers their rights in their sales of kitchenware on consumers' doorsteps.

The salesmen target consumers at their homes or places of business, claiming that they are passing through the local area having attended a trade fair, and are trying to sell the remains of their unsold stock of allegedly 'high quality' knives and saucepans to avoid paying duty or because of problems with border security. In fact, the OFT has obtained evidence that well presented salesmen are visiting the UK for weeks at a time, renting out space in caravan parks to use as a base then driving out to target consumers in affluent and rural areas across the country.

Call centres who plague customers with automated silent calls will face stiff new fines of up to £50,000 following an announcement by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI).

Silent calls occur when automated calling systems used by call centres generate more calls than the available centre staff can deal with. This results in silence on the line when the call is answered and these abandoned calls can cause significant anxiety and annoyance to consumers. BT currently handles about 80,000 complaints a month about nuisance calls.

A company distributing misleading premium rate scratchcard promotions which charged consumers up to £9 to discover what they had 'won' has been stopped by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT).

Cheshire-based Gr8 Games Limited distributed in total over 20 million scratchcards for a premium rate prize competition informing consumers that they could 'Win £50,000 Cash' or other high value prizes. The scratchcards were distributed to customers in various forms, including by mail and through magazines.

Customers were urged to claim their prize by calling or texting a premium rate number. Calls were charged at £1.50 per minute and lasted up to 5 minutes 50 seconds. The total cost of each call was up to £8.75. Texts cost £9. Nearly 45,000 people responded.

The Office of Fair Trading is to consider new legislation to try to protect consumers from difficulties associated with credit card cheques.

Credit card cheques allow consumers to draw money from an existing credit card account using a cheque, but purchases with a credit card cheque can attract a higher interest rate than those made by card and there is often no interest free period as interest is charged as soon as the cheque is processed. Additional fees are also often charged for using a credit card cheque, typically 2% of the value of the transaction.

A motor dealer based in Corsham, Wiltshire has been refused a Consumer Credit Licence by the Office of Fair Trading because one of its directors and a business associate has a series of serious convictions.

Devizes Motor Company Limited, which trades under the name of Pickwick Car Centre, was refused a licence because a director and business associate of the applicant had been convicted of a number of offences including fraud, common assault, criminal damage, possession of drugs with intent to supply, theft and threatening and abusive behaviour.

An associated company had also been convicted of an offence under the Trade Descriptions Act. When making its application for a licence, the applicant failed to declare details of these convictions and consequently gave false information to the OFT.