Consumer watchdog ACM has taken action against two online debt advice agencies for hiding their charges from potential clients.

One of the websites, Schuldhulpverlening-Nederland.nl, has been taken offline, while the other, www.schuldsanering.help, has amended its site to make clear that customers would have to pay for its services.

Both agencies carried details of how people could apply for debt relief from their local council, which is free, but did not make clear that they would charge a fee for processing applications that were made via their websites.

The ACM began an investigation in June into claims that some commercial debt agencies’ website misled customers into thinking that they were dealing directly with the municipality rather than via a commercial third party.

“People who are in debt have the right to a free debt support package from the municipality,” said Edwin van Houten, consumer affairs manager at the ACM. “Commercial providers who target these people must make it very clear that their services are not free.

“In the case of the companies we have reprimanded, it looked as if people were on the municipality’s website. That meant they could unwittingly end up with a commercial provider and incur costs as a result.

“These misleading practices have now been removed.”