Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn.
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Two U.S. senators called on the Federal Trade Commission in a letter Thursday to do far more to safeguard American individuals from travel cons.
Responding to experiences that there has been an raise in travel- and tourism-related fraud — these types of as scammers posing as vacation advisors or building bogus airline websites to provide counterfeit tickets — Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., and Sen. Steve Daines, R-Mont., wrote the FTC’s acting chair, Rebecca Slaughter, to question the agency deliver data on any actions it has taken to tackle the issue and how it ideas to prevent this sort of crime going forward.
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“Although the FTC posts advisories pertaining to journey scams, we believe that more need to be finished to protect buyers,” the Senators wrote. “Journey reservations built on fraudulent web sites can be costly and nerve-racking for vacationers, and it is significant to make certain that Individuals fully grasp how to figure out journey scams and their recourse selections must they slide victim to these cons.”
Klobuchar and Daines observe in their letter that as vaccination premiums choose up and limits are lifted nationwide, some 67% of Us residents say they’re scheduling to vacation this summer time. In addition, they cite a the latest FTC report that observed shoppers overall have missing additional than $400 million to fraudsters because the pandemic started additional than a year ago.
Klobuchar, a co-chair of the Senate Travel and Tourism Caucus, has been energetic in advocating for U.S. travelers. In March, she and the other a few caucus members wrote Commerce Division Secretary Gina Raimondo inquiring what actions the department was using to support the vacation and tourism market get better from the pandemic and to encourage the “Model United states” public-personal marketing partnership.
In February, Klobuchar and Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., launched the Safeguarding Tourism in the United States Act “to make improvements to tourism across the place by learning the results of the pandemic on the travel and tourism field and figuring out essential plan recommendations,” according to her workplace.
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