I confess to having something of a fascination with top ten lists, as pointless as so many of them are. No doubt it stems from all those late nights I spend laughing at David Letterman&39;s topics and quips. But the latest top ten list, released today by the Federal Trade Commission, is no laughing matter. It&39;s the top ten consumer complaints of 2006, and it couldn&39;t have come out at a better time – right smack in the middle of National Consumer Protection Week!

Identity theft tops the list...for the seventh year in a row. Thirty-six percent of the 674,354 complaints the FTC received in 2006 fell into the identity theft category. That should be no surprise to folks who regularly read CreditBloggers, where Emily Davidson and Adam Levin keep us on top of the problems and risks caused by each major security breach and hacking success. The advice they share with us here on how we can protect our identities is priceless.

I was simply going to present the whole FTC top ten list in all it&39;s glory here, but  decided that&39;s not enough – certainly not this week. So I decided to share the FTC&39;s top ten list in a way it might actually be of some use to you! I added in links to key FTC documents (and a few others) that will help you contend with these frequent consumer complaints if they should happen to plague you:

Runners-up include:

• Business Opportunities & Work-at-Home Plans
• Travel, Vacations, & Timeshares
• Office Supplies and Services
• Grants: Scholarships/Educational & Non-Educational
• Employment Agencies/Job Counselors / Overseas Work
• Investments

COMPLAIN!
Taken together, the 674,354 complaints from 2006 cost consumers over $1.1 billion. That seems like a drop in the bucket to me – especially when compared to estimates I&39;ve seen for the cost of some specific scams. For example, it&39;s well known that we lose over $40 billion a year to telemarketing fraud alone.

And as for the number of complaints...compare the 674,354 the FTC received to the 580 million votes that were cast during last year&39;s American Idol season. There is something wrong with this picture!

The FTC is encouraging us to let it know when we have something to complain about. Every complaint that&39;s filed will be put into a secure database that over 1,600 law enforcement agencies can access. You can register your complaint online or via a toll-free number: 877-FTC-HELP.

Let&39;s tell the FTC about every fraud and consumer rip-off we see. Let&39;s make how we&39;re treated as important as who the next American Idol is.