Nine companies have been named by the Consumer Council for their dishonest methods when selling set-top boxes for reception of high-definition television door to door.
The action comes after complaints received by the council about unscrupulous companies more than doubled this year.
The companies' salespeople falsely represented themselves as appointed agents to carry out HDTV reception installations, the vice-chairman of the council's trade practices committee, William Chan Che-kwong, said. They claimed they were sales agents appointed by the Housing Department, a TV station or the owners' committee of the residential building to do installations.
Some of them tricked people into believing they would not be able to continue receiving free TV broadcasts without the conversion, despite the government stressing there was no need to rush and the fact it had yet to set a date for the end of analogue TV broadcasting.
Victims were charged HK$2,200 to HK$3,000 for one set-top box, considerably higher than the market price of about HK$1,200.
Four of the named companies - Wilson Digital Technology, Hong Kong Digital Terrestrial Television, Hong Kong High Definition Technology Company and Hong Kong Interactive Digital Engineering Company - are no longer on the government's Companies Registry.