Amplifying Consumers’ Voice: The Federal Trade Commission’s Report Fraud Website Redesign

We examine a website redesign in which the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) made consumer complaints easier to file. Using a regression discontinuity approach, we find that complaints to the FTC jumped by 28%, driven by increases in complaint completion rates, and that consumers submitted more detailed information. We find relatively small differences in this increase across demographic groups. Complaints after the redesign were shorter and easier to read, which may indicate that the redesign induced less sophisticated consumers to complain. Finally, complaints induced by the redesign were more likely to report telemarketing and imposter scams, categories in which consumers are less likely to report losing money.