Many businesses across the country are receiving what appears to be notices for ad space in the familiar, locally distributed, yellow pages directories. The notices request the business to correct and add any additional information for their records.

The Better Business Bureau warns that these notices are actually solicitations for listings in alternative business directories that differ from the well-known Yellow Pages Group™. In fact, the alternative directories may not be that widely distributed, can be of little or no value to advertisers, or may never be published at all.

These notices may look like a legitimate “update form,” but they are actually attempting to solicit your business. It may feature the name "Yellow Page" or include the familiar "walking fingers" logo and imply that they are affiliated with the publisher of the local telephone company or another bona fide yellow pages publisher. However, there is no connection between publishers of alternative directories and those of the well-known Yellow Pages Group™.

Businesses can protect themselves by alerting their accounting department or bill-payers to be on the lookout for disguised solicitations and carefully check suspicious bills from companies with which they do not normally do business. To check the reliability of the company that is sending the solicitation, businesses may contact the BBB where the company is located or search www.bbb.org.

Businesses and consumers who believe they have been misled should contact the Competition Bureau's Information Centre at 1-800-348-5358, or visit the Competition Bureau’s Web site at www.competitionbureau.gc.ca to file a complaint.