TALLAHASSEE – Following Hurricane Irma, some companies are alleged to have illegally inflated prices of items that are non-negotiable when it comes to preparing for a massive storm.
In August 2017, Hurricane Irma devastated many parts of the Florida with its Category 4 winds. With any large hurricane, residents and visitors alike stressed and scrambled as they tried to assess the threat and take necessary actions to protect their family and home, and Irma was no exception.
But what residents weren't prepared for was the illegal acts that thousands of business allegedly committed as they took advantage of the desperate need of individuals and heightened demand statewide: price gouging.
"This unlawful occurrence is very common because people's greed and the nonexistence of an adequate penalty seems to be in a nature of incentive to price gouge. It should be a felony with forfeiture of all profits and remand to prison for five years to be effective," Peter Vujin, a Miami-based attorney, told the Florida Record.
Individuals reported paying as much as $100 for one night of parking during Irma, when it would have normally been a third of that price, 7 News Miami reported. Another example is that of Amazon.com charging $99 for a case of water, according to CNN Money.
While the legal ramifications are to pay a $25,000 fee, there are no more serious consequences.
"I do not know how much help the people of the state of Florida may expect due to the rather lax and ineffective laws," Vujin said.
Because companies are often not found out for their crimes until after a hurricane, it can be difficult to avoid corrupt companies, though choosing tried-and-true businesses is one good place to start.
"How can consumers avoid this? My best advice is to be well prepared for nature's most destructive calamity (a hurricane): fill the bathtub with water, freeze 3-gallon plastic water bottles, and then use them in the fridge as an icebox," Vujin said.
Bill Newton, deputy director of the Florida Consumer Action Network, explained the situation and how the response to the crimes fell short.
Pam Bondi, Florida's attorney general, stated during the Irma incident in an interview that "during a state of emergency, you cannot inflate prices and go after our Floridians, or I’m going to go after you," according to Fox 4.
"The Pam Bondi ads were incessant before, during, and after the storm. As I heard them over and over, I realized that they sounded more like campaign ads than ads designed to help consumers," Newton told the Florida Record.
Newton did find a fundamental issue with Bondi's ads, however, as they seemed to exhibit more of a pro-Bondi environment than they did show consumers how to file complaints and get the information needed to bring the wrong-doers to justice.
"What struck me was how many times Pam Bondi's name was repeated. That was what made them sound like campaign ads. There were so many. Her name was prominent and repeated, and it seemed more like the idea was promoting her rather than helping consumers," Newton said. "Further, there was never any information for consumers telling us what information to gather. My recollection was that it simply said if you think you were a victim of price gouging, call Pam Bondi."
There were 14,000 calls made during and after Hurricane Irma to report instances of price gouging, but the execution fell short, Newton said, of what Bondi had promised to do.
"The ads didn't say anything about collecting receipts, taking photos, or getting witness names. Why wasn't that info given out if they were going to run that many ads?" Newton said.
Despite the initial thousands of complaints that were issued following the Hurricane Irma price gouging wave, 7,500 to be exact, Pam Bondi's office has only resolved one case that was for the settlement of $25,000 as of December 2017, a far cry from her initial promise to punish perpetrators and damage their reputations as businesses and business owners.
"Bondi should have known her ads would generate tons of calls that they couldn't do anything with, and they could have done better," Newton said.