is a United Kingdom brand name that promotes informed consumer choice in the purchase of goods and services by testing products, highlighting inferior products or services, raising awareness of consumer rights, and offering independent advice.

The brand name is used by the Consumers' Association, a registered charity and company limited by guarantee that owns several businesses, including Which?

The vast majority of the association's income comes from the profit it makes on its trading businesses, for instance subscriptions to Which?

magazine, which are donated to the campaigning part of the organisation to fund advocacy activity and inform the public about consumer issues.

magazine maintains its independence by not accepting advertising, and the organisation receives no government funding.

[3] Until 2006, the association used prize draws similar to those of Reader's Digest to attract subscribers, but following criticism they were discontinued.

[13] Its central aim was to improve the standard of goods and services available to the public in the UK.

Under the editorship of Eirlys Roberts,[14] the publication started as a small 32-page magazine that included reports on electric kettles, sunglasses, aspirin, cake-mixes, scouring powders, no-iron cottons and British cars.

taking a greater campaigning role, and it began to adopt a more aggressive stance on issues such as lead poisoning and aircraft noise.

launched another satellite publication, this one aimed at youngsters aged 11–15, called Check It Out!, but it failed to take off and closed in June 1994.

carries out systematic testing of consumer products and financial services, the results of which are published in reports in Which?

Testing covers reliability, performance, safety, energy efficiency and value-for-money, as relevant in different cases.

The magazine reports on consumer issues of the day, publishes product testing results and findings of original research and investigations.

Examples of such discussions include an exposé into solar panel heating installation companies,[27] an undercover enquiry with the RNID revealing serious problems at shops selling hearing aids[28] and an investigation into electronics shop staffs' knowledge of the products that they sell.

The Consumers' Association experienced sharply increased income up to 2014, and since then has shown steady figures.

regularly briefs and lobbies MPs, Peers, MSPs, MSs, and MLAs on national and international consumer issues.

successfully lobbied to put an end to the '65-day rule' that allowed energy companies to wait 65 days before informing their customers of a price change.

The Consumers' Association was among the first groups granted these new powers, and was among the first to have them regranted when the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) was replaced by the FCA.

[34] It later made complaints about care homes, the Northern Ireland banking sector and credit card interest calculation methods.

filed a super-complaint against banks that routinely refused to reimburse victims who had been scammed into transferring money into fraudsters' accounts.

said banks should "shoulder more responsibility" for such fraud, much as they already reimburse customers who lose money through scams involving fraudulent account activity, or debit or credit cards.

People cannot be expected to detect complex scams pressuring them to transfer money immediately, or lookalike bills from their solicitor or builder" that are copied from genuine bills but have had the bank account number and sort code changed.

was granted legal powers to bring rogue traders to account for their actions under Part 8 of the Enterprise Act 2002.

launched its first representative action on behalf of consumers unlawfully overcharged for football shirts due to price fixing.

Since 2012, it is governed by a Council of nine elected and up-to six co-opted members who can serve a maximum of nine years at any one time.

It also means they will receive Annual Accounts, AGM Minutes, and be able to vote on Resolutions that change the governing Articles.

None of the council or Board members is paid[citation needed], other than the employees, although they are entitled to claim reasonable expenses.

Sam Younger became Chairman on 1 January 2020,[39] replacing Tim Gardam who had held the role since 2015.