It’s time for The Consumerist 2nd Annual Worst Company in America contest.
We’ll round up the baddies and make a phat sexy tournament ladder. Then we’ll tie their wrists with a handkerchief, and give ‘em daggers. Each one of your votes will represent a stab.
The CEO of the “winning” company receives a giant golden shit! And probably a certificate of completion or something.
Last year, Consumerist readers voted Halliburton the Worst Company in America, with Choicepoint as the second. The contest landed us in the New York Times (twice) and on the APM radio show Marketplace. Let’s see what we can do this year with nearly quadrupled readership (and a better polling system).
Nominate which company you think is absolutely abhorrent, and why, in the comments or at tips at consumerist dot com.
Next week, we’ll put the ladder together and let the festivities commence. — BEN POPKEN
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Monsanto, McDonalds, Fox News
I nominate the Bush administration. They have lost trillions of dollars and not a single thing has ever been accomplished. What other company could you think of that could lose a trillion dollars and still be a company?
I second WalMart (for treating employees like shit, mostly), Monsanto (for patenting seeds and sneaking GMOs into the marketplace), the U.S. Government / Administration (for abandoning New Orleans and uninsured America in favor of miring the country in an immoral and politically motivated war), Sony (for haxoring their customers) and the RIAA (for abusing the legal system for their own financial ends). I know the RIAA & Government aren’t strictly companies, but they have all the major components & social effects of corporations, so I say we count ‘em.
I’d also like to nominate H&R Block, for providing the world’s crappiest non-service as a whole, and then lying egregiously to their consumers whenever possible on top of it. I tried to use them last tax season, got screwed for $200 when they messed up my return, spent months on the phone trying to get a refund, and ended up with nothing more than a lower opinion of telephone customer-service-people in general. Oh, and they were more expensive than a REAL CPA!
Can we just say Cell phone companies, all of them as one big dickhole of a business. I guess if I had to pick, Cingular.
Choicepoint should remain in the running, because they’re so scary.
Apple, for foisting DRM-laded technology on poor hipsters that don’t know any better. They’ve done more to advance the acceptance of DRM than the RIAA, MPAA, and Sony put togeher.
Sony, for just not having a goddamn clue about who keeps them in business.
Walmart, for having the best PR people in the world!
AT&T, for horrific customer service.
Walmart would have made my list, but I like porn.
Sony rootkit
riaa media companies in general, drm, hdcp, etc.
Haliburton They haven’t gotten any better
Time Warner Cable Switched Digital channels (won’t work with cable cards)
Clearchannel for buying up every radio station and making them sanitized suck.
AT&T My #1. They allowed the government to secretly wiretap everyone. Now we essentially have MaBell back. Also see net neutrality.
I second Verizon, because of what they do to cripple decent phones, because they can’t do math, and because of the crappy way they treat their workers (hostile to their CWA members). And I’m a Verizon customer.
I also think that until you’ve run up against however much memory you have on your voicemail, you should have a way to automatically skip to the newest message without being compelled to go through all the old messages again. It shouldn’t matter how old a message is, along as you’re not running up against that allotment.
How about Cingular, too, for all the crap they give people about getting out of their contract when THEY raise the rates?
I also second Clear Channel. They’re trying to introduce LED billboards here in Minneapolis/St. Paul, encountering a lot of resistance, and recently made the sleazy move of offering to advertise Amber Alerts on their boards–good free publicity to promote the boards, right after they lost a lawsuit in Minnetonka and after the City of St. Paul placed a moratorium on the signs.
How about Real Networks? Their players are full of ads, never completely shut down until you close the ad window after you shut down the ap, the updates are buggy, and customer service almost nonexistent.
Finally, Sony should win an award for DRMing CDs (including CDs sent out by BMG)–and using anti-piracy as an excuse to digitally monitor consumers’ listening habits to–wait for it–send consumers marketing messages. As reported here on “Consumerist.”
Just my thoughts.
exxon price gouging
The IRS for fooling amerians into paying income taxes that are unconstiturional and not supported by any law. Then, turning around and using 100% of our money to pay the interest on our national debt to the “Federal” Reserve.
Watch “America: Freedom to Fascism”, then sign the petition to shut down the federal reserve. Or, you know, get in line for your RFID implant.
Oh, they’re giving away RFID implants? In for 2.
Sallie Mae and UPS
UHaul
Walmart
Cingular
What, no love for Bank Of America???
I vote Apple Inc and Verizon.
Obviously since Best Buy was created by the Devil and run by his minions, they should automatically win.
Or Time Warner Cable. They’re pretty awful too.
Will writes:
“Cingular (now AT&T) – for managing to make an Apple product (the iPhone) look unappealing to me.
Boston Police Department – for wasting hundreds of thousands of dollars to blow up a glorified lite-brite.”
I’ll vote for U-Haul. We had a bad experience with them TWENTY years ago and have never forgotten it. It involved my just-married (to me) husband, a barely working truck with no gas, the south side of Chicago and everything I owned. He lived to tell the tale and just thinking about it TWENTY years later still raises my blood pressure.
Jeesh I’m sure glad I cancelled my cable and cell phone services last year, haven’t missed ‘em a bit…
I vote for the RIAA too.
As Jesse in Japan said
“Ruining thousands of people’s lives to protect their already dead and buried business model is just plain evil.”
Bush administration is a very close second.
Baby Einstein, for marketing a product to parents that is detrimental to their children and getting the president to hold them up as an example of entrepreneurship in his State of the Union address.
United Health Care for its recent scandal involving Bill McGuire.
Uhaul!! Uhaul!! Uhaul!! Uhaul!! Uhaul!! This is the most diabolically evil company in the world. They have made an art form out of bad customer service. Every interaction I have ever had with them has been nothing less than horrific. The final straw was being charged for having a truck for an extra week because they refused to pick it up after the brakes failed completely (they wanted me to drive it back to their location).
Worst Company in America?
Family Dollar Stores and Earl Scheib!!
Definitely Bank of America!! (in my case, the credit card company)
Where do I begin?? They cheat their customers out of money, then do not correct it after they say they will, and they have the WORST customer service. They are rude & unhelpful when- and IF-you ever get a rep on the phone! I was just on hold for 35 minutes, and gave up! I have had this happen several times.