Copier firm's shares hit by OFT probe call
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Your support makes all the difference.SHARES in Southern Business Group, the photocopier leaser, tumbled 34p to 79p yesterday after a consumer group called on the Office of Fair Trading to investigate the company. It followed a 17p fall to 113p on Monday after it emerged that a subsidiary had been overcharging customers.
Roger Limpenny, Southern's finance director, said: 'We would welcome any investigation because our standards are superb. It would clear up the undercurrents in the industry.'
The call for an inquiry came from the Campaign to Clean up Copier Contracts, a lobby group that claims the support of more than 100 politicians, the Confederation of British Industry and the Federation of Small Businesses.
The OFT, which last year conducted an inquiry into the rival photocopier group Eurocopy, said it was considering the request.
The campaign, which says it has received 3,000 complaints about the industry since last February, wants any investigation to focus on cost-per-copy contracts. These have been widely criticised for tying customers into expensive, inflexible agreements.
Southern's longest contract, marketed as being cheap on a per-copy basis, commits customers to paying for agreed minimum numbers of photocopies for nine years. In order to break the contract customers can be obliged to pay 49 per cent of the remaining liability, which can run into hundreds of thousands of pounds.
Concerns about copier leasing include the use of more powerful - and therefore more expensive - machines than customers need and rolling contracts, whereby replacement of a machine restarts the agreement at day one.
Other photocopier companies suffered from OFT worries yesterday. Erskine House slipped 4p to 50p and Gestetner 11.5p to 131p.
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