Counterfeit goods: your rights explained Your rights

It's not just DVDs, CDs and designer clothes and watches that are faked. A wide variety of goods are faked these days: car parts, electrical goods, medicines, batteries, children's toys – even food, drink, cleaning products, razor blades and toothpaste.

Reasons not to buy

Counterfeit items are not tested for safety or quality and many can be dangerous. For example, you might buy sunglasses with no UV protection, toys painted with toxic chemicals or containing small parts that toddlers can choke on, or power tools that can electrocute.

There are other reasons not to buy fakes. Producing and selling counterfeit goods is against the law and evidence shows that profits often fund organised crime, terrorism and drug dealing. On top of that, you lose many of your consumer rights with fakes.

How to avoid fakes

You can usually spot fake goods by minding your 'P's and 'Q's:

• Quality -counterfeit products usually have dodgy packing and the quality of goods may be substandard - words may be wrongly spelt, logos badly reproduced, colours faded or labels missing.
• Place - fake goods are more likely to be sold online, at car boot sales, markets, street corners or one-day sales - places where it is difficult to trace the sellers
• Price - the price will usually be suspiciously cheap for what you are buying

If you spot goods that you think are fake, don't buy them. Report the trader to your local trading standards department.

Your rights if you buy counterfeit goods

You cannot be prosecuted for buying fakes - only making or selling fakes is against the law.

If you buy fake goods from a trader you have, in theory, all the same rights as you would when buying normal goods. That is, goods should be 'as described', 'fit for the purpose' and 'of satisfactory quality' under the Sale of Goods Act. But if you buy from an individual your only right is that goods should be 'as described'.

In practice though, these rights are virtually impossible to enforce as sellers of counterfeit goods can be difficult to trace.

If goods are faulty or turn out to be not what you thought you were buying it's unlikely that you'll be able to assert your rights against the seller.

All you can do is report them to the local trading standards department – if it can track down guilty sellers, they can be prosecuted.

If the item or service you're buying  is over £100 but not more than £30,000, it's worth paying by credit card as you'll have additional protection from your credit provider should something go wrong.

Penalties for selling fake goods

Traders found to be selling counterfeit goods can be fined up to £5,000 and/or given up to 6 months in prison. The court can also order that all of their fake goods are seized and destroyed.

The police and trading standards will try to trace the manufacturers, particularly if goods are harmful, but again, this can be difficult.