In recent weeks, several corporations have been fined for deceptive advertising.

A few days after 2017 began, federal regulators ordered TransUnion and Equifax, both credit-reporting agencies, to pay fines totaling around $23 million for misleading ads. Shortly before that, Moneytree Inc., a Seattle-based payday lender , ended 2016 by agreeing to pay $505,000 to settle charges by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau alleging that customers were duped by deceptive online advertising and collection practices. And in early December, three reverse mortgage companies were fined a total of $790,000 for misleading advertising claiming that consumers couldn't lose their homes if they used their products.

Often, consumers misunderstand what they're buying, thanks to tricky language in everything from advertising and marketing materials to the words coming out of the mouths of professionals. This is just barely scratching the surface when it comes to how you could find yourself being financially fleeced, but if you are leery about spending money on any financial product or service, these are a few phrases you'll want to be wary of.

[See: 10 Ways Consumers Are Often Duped .]

"No fees." Think about the last time you flew (baggage fees), checked into a hotel (resort or room safe fees) or bought a concert ticket (service fees). Fees are everywhere.

At least in those cases, the fees are probably under a hundred bucks. Brannon Lambert, a financial advisor in Raleigh, North Carolina, says many financial advisors are cagey when consumers ask about fees accompanying annuities, or financial products sold by insurance companies that allow you to put money aside that will later produce an income stream for you.

"Annuities don't have any fees – it's a nice thought, but I have yet to understand how any adult can think an insurance company is going to take their money, provide a bunch of promises and guarantees, assume risks and grow their money but won't charge them a thing," Lambert says.

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This doesn't mean you shouldn't get an annuity, if it seems like a good idea for you. But you shouldn't be led, Lambert says, into thinking an annuity doesn't have a fee. Maybe it doesn't have an annual fee, but somewhere, Lambert asserts, there is a fee.

"All annuities have, at the very least, the basic M&E [mortality and expense risk] fee, which most times runs at least .65 percent to 1 percent annually," he says. "And the more bells and whistles you add to the annuity, the more fees are added to the contract. It's not uncommon for internal expenses to exceed 2 or 3 percent annually."

Lambert doesn't want people to get the wrong idea, though. "I think annuities can be an important tool for clients," he says, "but the way they are sold sometimes is almost criminal."

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"We'll get rid of that fee." So you've spoken up about a fee you don't like, and it was dropped. Victory! Or was that kind gesture just a classic bit of misdirection?

Guy Penn, a fiduciary investment advisor in St. Louis, recently sat down with a family who wanted him to sort through myriad accounts.

"When presenting me with an annuity they had purchased a few years back, they commented [on] how the fee had been waived in the contract. After just a few minutes of digging, it was clear this company had a distinguishable $30 annual fee, which the broker gladly waived," Penn says.

But, Penn adds, "The mortality and expense fee, riders and underlying fund fees all remained intact, totaling nearly 3 percent of the account balance. This was in addition to the surrender charge, meaning they were essentially locked into this contract for the time being. They had no idea the fees totaled what they did. All they remembered was how great they felt after the sales rep had waived the fee."

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"No commissions." Watch out for language making such assertions. Lambert says some financial advisors will tell consumers that they aren't getting a commission for selling them an annuity; they're getting paid a commission by the insurance company that's issuing the annuity.

"While technically correct ... what the advisor isn't telling the client is that they will pay for the commission in the form of either high internal expenses over the course of the next several years or they will pay for the commission in the form of surrender charges if they should surrender the contract early."

[See: 11 Expenses Destroying Your Budget .]

"Free trial period." Same deal here. Sure, investments have plenty of fees and tripwires that can cost you, but you really aren't safe purchasing anything. Four years ago, Nathan Sturycz, an attorney in Edwardsville, Illinois, dropped by his local chain bookstore and was offered a free trial of a magazine subscription while he was checking out.

"I really just wanted to pay for my books and leave, but they said it would take less than two minutes to fill out the form that would allow me to get a free magazine of my pick. Sounded harmless enough," Sturycz says.

Right. Well, Sturycz received a few copies of his magazine, but he also began getting other random magazines, and he kept getting varied copies of different titles over the years. He thought it was odd, but being a busy attorney, he didn't give it much more thought. The publications kept coming, but they seemed sporadic and random, and it wasn't as if he was being billed for them.

Or so he thought. About a month ago, he noticed a nondescript postcard mingling with his other junk mail, and on the card was the phrase, "automatically renew your subscription."

Long story made shorter, Sturycz and his wife did what all consumers need to remember to do every once in a while, and especially when making any serious financial commitment to a product or service: question everything. The Sturyczs ultimately discovered that once a quarter, they were being charged $20. It was an innocuous enough looking fee that they hadn't noticed it.

"When I tallied up the total, it turns out that I paid just shy of $400 for what I was led to believe was a free trial that turned into an auto-renewing, not to mention paper-wasting, sham. When I think of how many people were duped just like I was, it makes me a little sick," Sturycz says.

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