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Consumer Protection and Financial Literacy : Lessons from Nine Country StudiesThe recent turmoil in financial markets
 worldwide has emphasized the need for adequate consumer
 protection and financial literacy for long-term stability of
 the financial sector. This Working Paper aims to summarize
 key lessons from reviews of consumer protection and
 financial literacy in nine middle-income countries of Europe
 and Central Asia (Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech
 Republic, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, the Russian Federation
 and Slovakia). All the country assessments used a systematic
 common approach, based on a set of Good Practices for
 Consumer Protection and Financial Literacy developed by the
 World Bank's Europe and Central Asia Region. The
 objective of the Working Paper is to contribute to the
 international dialog on strengthening financial consumer
 protection and financial literacy in emerging markets.A
 financial consumer protection regime should meet three
 objectives. First, consumers should receive accurate,
 simple, comparable information of a financial service or
 product, before and after buying it. Second, consumers
 should have access to expedient, inexpensive and efficient
 mechanisms for dispute resolution with financial
 institutions. Third, consumers should be able to receive
 financial education when and how they want it. A common
 challenge among the nine countries is the need of an
 adequate institutional structure for financial consumer
 protection. However independent of the specific
 institutional structures, financial consumers should have
 one single agency where to submit complaints and inquiries.
 Financial institutions should be required to apply fair,
 non-coercive and reasonable practices when selling and
 advertising financial products and services to consumers.
 Personal data should also be carefully protected.
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Armenia : Diagnostic Review of Consumer Protection and Financial Literacy, Volume 1. Key Findings and RecommendationsThe objectives of the diagnostic review
 of consumer protection and financial literacy for Armenia
 are: (i) to assess the existing financial consumer
 protection framework, by reviewing laws, regulations and
 practices in Armenia compared to international good
 practices; and (ii) to provide recommendations on ways to
 improve consumer protection and financial literacy in
 Armenia. The review provides a detailed assessment of the
 institutional, legal and regulatory framework in four
 financial segments, namely banking, non-bank credit
 institutions, securities, and insurance. Many key steps have
 already been taken in financial consumer protection,
 especially at the regulatory and institutional levels.
 Regarding the institutional framework, adequate resources
 need to be allocated to the consumer protection team and
 modern supervisory tools should be made available. Consumer
 organizations should be strengthened and motivated to assist
 the Central Bank of Armenia (CBA) in market monitoring. In
 terms of consumer disclosure, the CBA should issue
 regulations that require financial institutions to provide
 clear, understandable, timely, comparable and standardized
 information to consumers. In the area of regulation of
 business practices, the CBA should require that sales agents
 are well trained and should test them regularly. All
 financial institutions should regularly analyze the
 complaints received and the analysis should be provided to
 the CBA. The Steering Committee for the National Strategy of
 Financial Education should become the key body to manage
 financial education in Armenia.
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Slovakia : Technical Note on Consumer Protection in Financial Services, Volume 1. Main ReportAs financial markets develop and deepen,
 one of the key issues for the fair, open and efficient
 operation of the markets is the protection of consumers 
 rights in financial services. Be they bank depositors or
 borrowers or investors in insurance policies, securities or
 investment or pension funds, financial consumers need the
 ability to accurately understand the terms and conditions of
 their contracts and take action if the terms of contracts
 have been violated. The Note is the second report in a pilot
 program to analyze consumer protection in
 financialservices.The objectives of the Note are
 three-fold, to: (1) present a set of draft good practices
 for assessing consumer protection in financial services; (2)
 conduct a review of the existing rules and practices in
 Slovakia compared to the draft practices; and (3) provide
 recommendations on ways to improve consumer protection in
 financial services in Slovakia. The Technical Note
 wasprepared at the request of the Slovak Ministry
 of Finance, with the valuable support of the National Bank
 of Slovakia and other government agencies, ministries, and
 non-government organizations. In the past the World Bank has
 also prepared governance reviews of the Slovak financial
 sector for banking and private pension funds. Few guidelines
 are available for consumer protection in financial services.
 Consumer protection in financial services remains a new and
 developing area for which no consensus has developed on the
 broad parameters against which a specific country might be
 analyzed. This Note relied on the EU Directives related to
 consumer protection and the reports of European
 financialregulatory and supervisory agencies.
 Other sources were also used. In the United States, the
 Federal Trade Commission, the Securities and Exchange
 Commission and other state, federal and self-regulatory
 agencies have developed laws, rules and guidelines to
 protect financial consumers. In addition, the 2003 OECD
 Guidelines for Protecting Consumers from Fraudulent and
 DeceptiveCommercial Practices across Borders and
 the 1999 United Nations Guidelines for Consumer Protection
 served as useful reference points for general consumer
 protection not related to the financial sector. The
 recommendations in the Note go beyond the provisions of the
 EU Directives currently in force. As described in the EU
 Consumer Protection strategy announced in March 2007 and the
 April 2007 Green Paper on Retail Financial Services,
 European financial consumers wouldbenefit from
 stronger legal and institutional protections than are
 currently in place. Both in Europe and elsewhere,
 contemporary thinking on consumer protection is rapidly
 evolving. The Technical Note takes into account the
 international discussion on financial consumer protection
 and evolving good practices in financial consumer
 protection. Thus, the Note presents recommendations that are
 applicable to the Slovak financial sector, but in some cases
 go beyondthe minimum requirements set by EU legislation.