It’s time for Consumerist’s 3rd Annual Worst Company in America Contest! Last year, RIAA won. Before that, Halliburton took the prize. Who will climb to the top of the nadir this year?
Here’s how it works. Name your favorite company to hate in the comments on this post and why (or send it to tips@consumerist.com). Then we will all vote on the nominees to whittle down the field of contenders. After that, we make a big March Madness style bracket. Every day will be a new deathmatch of reader between two companies. The crown winner receives eternal infamy and a lucky golden pile of shit.
New rule this year: we will only accept nominations for companies that makes or sells products or services that consumers actually buy.
Let the bloodletting commence.
More From Consumerist
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There Is Still Time To Submit Your Worst Company In America Nominations
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Worst Company In America Consolation Round: Comcast Vs. Ticketmaster
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Keep Those Worst Company In America Nominations Coming!
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Worst Company In America Semifinals: Bank Of America Vs. Comcast
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Here Are Your Sexiest CEO In America Tournament Finalists!
COMCAST!? Damn! My cable provider (Insight) just gave up my area to Comcast. Guess I’m in for some Fun Times in the future!!
1. Sprint (actually telling their customers to use a competitor!)
2. Best Buy (you apparently need to have a BS in Computer Science to buy a system without a monitor and printer).
Best Buy
for NOT honoring their warranties!
Regions Bank
Best Buy
Suddenlink-They suck!Their cable tv is fine, but their cable internet sucks!
Wal-Mart-I hate that place for far too numerous reasons to ever list here.
Lowes
Ford
Toyota
I was a very loyal Best Buy customer for years and years,but my last experience with the Geek Squad a year ago ticked me off big time. I haven’t stepped foot in a Best Buy since, and I have spent untold thousands of dollars with them. I do have a gift card from there for Christmas,but I haven’t used it yet. It will be an online purchase for sure though.
Live Nation and/or Ticketmaster, for only bringing big “money making” bands to huge venues and adding on ridiculous fees to ticket prices.
Wal-Mart for being a horrible company in general.
Apple.
From shorting people with a too early iPhone price drop, to constantly breaking the jailbreaks, keeping people held to AT&T, Jobs saying the idea of Zune was made by drunk people, crappy, misleading, unfunny ads, a sub-par OS upgrade comparable to a service pack, lack of HDD touches, lack of Wi-Fi in the classic or nano, shorting iPod touch owners of five apps that were already made, unless they paid, a laptop that lacks features like a disc drive or enough ports, and a lackluster tech support, as well as the elitist mac fanboys that don’t know how to keep their mouth shut about how great their Mac is.
Now come and get me Stevedrones.
Comcast – with a close second to the handful of competing companies who pepper our mailbox with offers when they don’t even offer basic service in our neighborhood.
It’s like mailing pictures of steak to the starving.
1) Sears–good company gone bad
2) Countrywide–what housing bubble?
3) RIAA–It’s not downloading killing the music industry, it’s the suck that is today’s music. And 17 bucks for a CD.
4)Microsoft–They must be in cohoots with the RIAA, with the footprint Vista has, who has room to download songs?
5) The Chinese Government–Polution, human rights abuse, profit above all else, and of course the Poison Train. The Chinese government has a stake in most industies so that counts as selling goods and services.
I have no problem with Blackwater. Am I missing something? They are mercinaries, plain and simple. “Contractors” is just another word for hired soldiers. They get paid to kill, guard, or whatever. Yes they are expensive, but that is in the contract the Government signed. Now should the U.S. Government employ mercs is a discussion for another thread, but I don’t think they have commited fraud or not provided a service they were hired for.
And for the record, you can hire Blackwater, if you have the money, and you can find them…oh, wait, that’s the A-Team. My bad…
Count me in for AT&T.
How does Monsanto keep escaping this prize? More than any purveyor of crap you don’t need, they’re the ones that can kill us all.
Ikea
Crappy products, crappy service.
1) United Health
2) Blue Cross California
Both companies operate on “screw the customer” as their guiding principle. United Health offers the additional service of making life miserable for actual health care providers.
Comcast Dammit!! I hate them soo much!! Thanks for an entire year+ of shitty service, me paying for services that work intermittently or mostly not at all, and thanks for numerous visits to my home only to have the issue unsolved or re-appear shortly after. COMCAST FTW!!!!
Comcast, Bestbuy, Sprint, and United Health Care. Emphasis on Sprint.
eBay. [money.cnn.com]
Microsoft. For its long-term, absolute cluster-fucked operating system, Microsoft Windows. And in typical fashion, Vista seems to be a crowning achievement in this paradigm of selling a product that isn’t ready. I couldn’t count the number of manhours devoted to fixing my PC over the last 15 yrs., due to Microsoft’s kluge OS. Yesterday, I got an email from my son who told me his computer will not even boot anymore after doing a Vista update from Microsoft. Who’s going to sue them over this type of problem? No one. And they know it. And they operate their company like the have everyone by the balls. They are the typical “company from hell.”
How about State Farm? This is company that has shown little regard for its customers and in many times, even its own agents.
While they did not pay many of the Katrina claims, Pantagraph.com reports that “State Farm Insurance Cos. rewarded its leader with a $5.26 million, 82 percent raise after posting a record profit last year. Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Ed Rust Jr. earned $11.66 million in 2006, including a base salary of $1.77 million and results-based bonus of $9.89 million, spokesman Dick Luedke said Friday. Rust made $6.4 million in 2005 and $5.5 million in 2004.”
Also, think about the lavish trips that State Farm organizes for its agents every year. They spend untold amounts of money on these “spare no expense” trips. If people only knew the kind of money that is spent on those trips in light of how they are denied claims, well, they would be in an uproar.
You can do your own research and check what State Farm customers are saying. . . even customers that have been with them for many, many years.
P.S.1 If you ever get a call from your State Farm agent to come for an Insurance and Financial Review (IFR), then run as fast and far as you can because otherwise you will have to hear how you need the extra life insurance, or loan (yes, they have a bank), or upgrade the limits you already have, or etc, etc, etc.
P.S.2 All is not lost, some justice is being done as this news snippet shows: On January 11, 2007 a federal judge ruled that State Farm must pay $223,292 in damages to a couple whose home was damaged by Hurricane Katrina. The judge also ordered State Farm to pay $2.5 million in punitive damages for the company’s failure to pay the claim. Less than two weeks after this ruling, State Farm entered into an agreement to settle hundreds of other suits brought by angry policyholders. Under the settlement, 300 homeowners who lost everything will receive their full insurance coverage. It has also bee reported that 1,000 other policyholders would receive at least half of their full coverage amounts, with an opportunity to negotiate for more.
Unfortunately, State Farm has an army of attorneys fighting these cases, and the average person has little change against the giant.
I nominate all of the major credit card companies. They sell a service: lending of money. They are all now engaging in a number of awful practices: egregiously high late fees, overlimit fees and sky-high interest rates. They try to make you incur these charges. Note that they could tell you when you are about to go over your limit (e.g. by sending a message when the vendor runs your card) or they could decline the charge; instead, they approve the charge and then tack on a $39 additional fee. You might not have purchased that latte if you had known it would cost 42.95 instead of $3.95. In addition to charging late fees of $39 (even if your (late) minimum payment is relatively small), your late payment may also up your interest rate to over 30%; some cards will increase your interest rate if you are late on a different credit card account(a practice called universal default).
at&t for being the corporate hand that enabled warrant-free spying, plus being totally useless about providing decent broadband coverage whilst denying anyone else access to their last mile links.
comcast takes second place for their traffic shaping but basically earn my ire for being the only option (that’s an option?) for broadband in my neighbourhood. never wanted my internet from the useless cable guy …
google
becau
google
because after buying doubleclick all our base belongs to them
1. GM
2. Ford
3. Chrysler
All had at least 30 years to learn from the oil embargo; didn’t learn shit. I’ll see them in hell. (if i believed in it.)
@sp00nix: what are you trying to say? haha jk i agree whole heartedly baby. ccity: worst week of my life.
United Health Care, absolute bottom of the pile insurance company.
Comcast…. by far
Comcast:
For bad ISP service for 1 month (40 percent to 80 percent packet loss) and taking 12 truckrolls and over 70 phonecalls to finally fix the problem. Then raising my rater from the “intruductory” $20 to $47 right after they fix the problem. I told them to give me another introduction to why I should stay with them and they refused. So now I do business with ATT. I’m getting a premonition…. something about a frying pan…. and fire… not sure.
Nominations from the email line:
Nick: RIAA
Carrie: Blackwater
Billybobgeorgebob: For me it’s Sears. I had to go through hell and back to get them to fix my refrigerator (thank god I had an extra one in the basement). Their repair guy was incompetent at best and took four visits to my house to try and fix it when he finally took our suggestion and replaced the compressor.
Barrett: Comcast.
The categories where Comcast excels for the worst company: Abysmal customer service, manipulation of their own networks, and just plain stupidity over their own operations.
It started when I moved down to my new place in Miami which was previously inhabited by my mom. First, Comcast came with a requisition form to pick up my mom’s old cable receiver and the internet modem. After looking over the form that seemed legit, I procured the cable box and the internet modem left by my mom and handed it to the Comcast guy that showed up at my doorstep at 9:30 p.m. After conversing with my mom about a week later, my mom wonders where her internet modem went. I discover the internet modem was hers, bought through a non-Comcast affiliated party, yet it was on their requisition form anyway. Through her own dealings with Comcast’s customer service and after 6 months of dealing with them, she has yet to receive her modem back.
Of course there’s the whole torrent manipulation thing too. You guys already know about that one, so I won’t even bother.
This part is dedicated to my own experience with Comcast’s award winning customer service. I was taking online classes but lacked the internet. I had an online exam coming up within the week, so I was debating between AT&T’s DSL and Comcast’s internet service. Because Comcast had already wired the house for my mom, plus the fact that they promised to have the internet up and running by the Sunday when I needed to take the exam, I went with them. They promised to arrive Thursday to hook up my internet. They came and set up the cable, but no internet. The technician said he couldn’t install internet in my house, saying my house wasn’t properly configured (my mom previously had internet not a month before). I wasn’t there and my wife was watching the baby, so I couldn’t bitch the guy out. I called Friday and spoke to a guy named Jeremy, I believe, who said the technician was a “retard”, and that he would send someone on Saturday to have my internet set up between 8a.m. and 12p.m. Well, 1 o’ clock rolls around and I’m on the phone with a lovely associate named Nelonge or something and she tells me she doesn’t know wtf this Jeremy guy did to my account, but that I was shit out of luck because I wasn’t getting internet that day, or by Sunday when I needed to take the exam. Lovely. I ask to speak to a supervisor and she tells me in the rude ebonics that they apparently train their staff to communicate with, that no one can do anything.
Comcast promised me timely service twice before giving me the middle finger and telling me to roll over. On Monday, with Consumerist’s assistance in procuring e-mail addresses, I e-mailed the CEO my gripe who then forwarded my e-mail to executive customer response. Mel, the associate assigned to me told me she understood my situation and would get the internet hooked up the next day. The next day I still had no internet. I politely remind Mel that I still have no internet, and I’m quite upset over the way Comcast has treated me. She swears she’ll get right back to me. No call the next day. I call back and find she’s on vacation for a week. Nice. (Meanwhile, I get my first bill. So it seems at least one person knows how to do their job…unfortunately that person works in billing.) After she returns, Comcast decides that for my troubles I can get a whole month of free cable. At least I got something, and thankfully I was able to take the exam with the help of my friend’s Verizon-wireless equipped laptop, so I wasn’t too upset in reality and finally let the issue go. However, if it wasn’t for you guys I would have been truly shafted up the rear like many poor fellow consumers who don’t have the knowledge of your website.
Comcast deserves the award for worst company in America because it seems to be the only company that is capable of making money without knowing a single thing about its own operations. No one seems to know or want to know how to do their jobs (technicians, schedulers, executive customer response reps., etc.), their reps are consistently rude and reliably inept, and in many places in the United States, people have no other option than to choose Comcast or to live in a nice apartment filled with static television and computers equipped with little more than solitaire. Not to mention I think your site has more articles exposing shitty Comcast customer service than any other company out there.
It’s Comcastic.
Martin: Bayer. 22,000 died amid delayed Bayer drug recal. My nomination for the worst company of the year. As bad as the rest of
them get, they don’t kill this many people by withholding information
about their products.
[news.yahoo.com]
Ivan: ‘d like to nominate Allstate please.
Twice that I’ve been in an accident they’ve put me through hell (one sided phone tag) and I never saw a single penny from them and my car is sitting in my garage crashed. The worst customer service I’ve experienced in my life.
And I’m not just complaining because it happened to me. I’ve been through hell with BestBuy and Chase credit services, but not as bad as Allstate.
ipinguping: AT&T
Bob:
Why don’t they just make the concerts free!
Okay, if I want to go to the show, I’ve got to get not only a Citibank card, but an Amex. And I’ve got to join the fan club too. So in this rolling wave of pre-sales, maybe I can get a seat. Which won’t be too close to the stage, because those seats NEVER go on sale to the general public!
And Live Nation is rebranding all of its smaller venues “Fillmore”, to trade on the good will of the man who helped build this glorious business. Bill Graham is rolling in his grave. Live Nation doesn’t give a shit about the public, and neither do the Police.
As for the band, rather than leave a good taste in the public’s mouth, they want to eke every last dollar from the landscape with a scorched earth policy. And if you believe this is the band’s last tour, then you’re betting that one of the three croaks in the dead pool. Because money will bring them back. Are you aware of Sting’s OVERHEAD? And the other two, while not homeless, can’t make a dollar on the road without Mr. Sumner.
We need a concertgoers bill of rights. What can it contain?
Well, let’s start off with a seating plan that illustrates which seats never go on sale, so people won’t buy fan club memberships in hope of buying these ducats.
A rebate if the final tour is not. Or guaranteed seats up close and personal if the band goes back on the road.
No t-shirt over $25.
No parking fee unless you’re in an urban center. Even if the lot is paved. Unless space is at a premium, parking is free!
Fan club fees must guarantee a seat within a certain area of the building. So people know what they’re getting.
One on sale date. No rolling dates based on privilege. Isn’t this what’s wrong with America? The division between the haves and the have-nots? Not everybody can afford an American Express card. Not everyone QUALIFIES for a Citibank card. Even if you have the cash, you might be shit out of luck. You end up sitting in the back no matter what.
No seat over $125. I’d say $100, but the industry would freak out. As for prices higher than that, those seats must be auctioned from the get go. The act can reap the reward of the upside, but it must be clear what seats are auctioned and how many of them there are, so the fan can make an informed decision.
But Live Nation doesn’t give a shit about the fan. Live Nation is as bad as radio. Live Nation is playing to Wall Street, not the concertgoer. Just like Clear Channel is playing to Madison Avenue, despite lip service to the listener. Hell, did you see that Clear Channel is increasing the number of minutes of advertising on the radio? Why not turn every station into an infomercial. Make the whole CHANNEL an ad!
And you wonder why terrestrial radio is dying and the concert business is a minefield. Grosses might be going up, but the key is to get people in the habit of attendance. That’s how you grow the business. But we’ve got the labels not wanting any more people to own music than in the CD days. New technologies allow more people to own more music at a lower price? FOUL! We’re married to the old business model!
The music business is fucked up. If you’ don’t believe this, you’re part of the problem.
[www.billboard.biz]
[www.privatepass.citi.com]
[online.wsj.com]
Tom: I’ve got to nominate Charter Communications. Their cable internet is
up-and-down, considering they sign up more customers than their hub in
Atlanta can hold, which means everyone in the southeast gets horrible
ping times. Cable TV is notoriously bad, especially their HD TV. And
their customer service lines are restricted to only phones from their
service area, which means a transplant from the NE like me can’t just
call up customer service. I have to call their billing department and
get them to transfer me over.
Brandon: DirecTV.
Shoddy service on install, channels being added/subtrcated at will. threat of early termination fee, shoddy equipment, prmised loacl channels in HD-Lied, I can keep going you get the point….Once my “contract” that I never signed is up I am switching back to Time Warner Cable
Max: If it hasn’t already been nominated then I have to put up Best Buy. As a former employee for 2 years I can easily state more about BB and the GS then your blog has written about them. When I started there it was a decent job, they already treated their customers like garbage but the job wasn’t too bad if you could get past that. When I finally left it was absolutely unbelievable how bad they treated people. I had to fight just to get my vacation time paid. I had more than one occasion of them changing my time cards without my knowledge. This lady with the $54m lawsuit was a long time coming. I dealt with someone in that same situation or even worse at least once a month. She should have started a class action.
G: Best Buy
Why?: Cheating customers (me) out of rebate checks, after doing everything by the book.
Don: 1.Comcast/Time Warner
2.ATT
Jay: AT&T. Why? NSA Wiretapping.
Robert: I nominate best buy for worst company in america. Laughed in my face
regarding my computer-building plans, among other regular best buy nonsence
Andrew: I’m voting for Sprint as the worst company in America. My drummer has
Sprint and his phone is often screwed up, making scheduling rehearsals
difficult. Sometimes that’s just his own fault though.
David: Paypal – because of their warped sense of fairness during a dispute resolution. The buyer is always right if he claims the item isn’t as described. No matter how much proof the seller provides, it is ignored. Same with chargebacks. Paypal says you can contest a chargeback. They then charge you a fee…and then decides they don’t want to follow through with your chargeback escalation (no reason given)…but they won’t refund the chargeback fee. Classic bait and switch…or even “significantly not as described.”
Jonathan: My nomination for Worst Company in America is Facebook.
(I’m surprised nobody nominated them).
Although they offer a free service, they also keep data on their servers after you’ve canceled your account (until you email them requesting to delete those). And let’s not forget the little marketing ploy-slash-invasion of privacy that is Beacon.
Linzi: Has to be Countrywide Financials for their part in the sub-prime mortgage mess.
Zak: I vote Haliburton/KBR for using sleazy lawyers and slim loopholes to get the men who gang-raped that woman off the hook. This is the most terrible thing I think I’ve heard of a company doing in a long time, even beats Wal-Mart sweat shops by a mile. Additionally they are evil by association with Dick Cheney. Haliburton/KBR is fully capable of a second year sweep.
Bank of America. I am sick of being @$$ raped by their non-boa ATM fees. Sometimes, I go to areas (in the US) that have NO boas and I still get punished. I am sick of all their hidden fees. (NEVER get a savings account there.) Also, arbitrary rate increases? Please.
Fox news! Its like the National Equirer on steriods. No real news, just sensationalism.
Comcast gets my vote.
#1 worst Sprint! #2 would be Bank of America.
I vote for Sears for total incompetence when it comes to customer service, but AT&T gets a close second. It is amazing how many hours a person can spend on the phone trying to resolve issues with these two companies, getting cut off, listening to computer voices, being told it is resolved only to discover it hasn’t been. I thank everyone for the head’s up about Best Buy. I will definitely not do business with them. What is the alternative to Comcast?
Comcast by far, ATT and their wonderful takeover of Bellsouth is second . . .
1) Best Buy — may they rot in hell for the busted TV they sold me. It took me nearly ONE YEAR of phone calls and house calls (and countless hours of my life I will never get back) for them to finally admit this and then replace it. Never EVER again will I buy more than a CD from this pile of dung.
2) Comcast — they have a near monopoly where I live (Chicago) and are impossible to deal with. Not to mention if I even call with so much as a question they try to upsell me to death.
Comcast. totally.
Y’all can complain about WalMart all you want but . . .
I can get a prescription filled there for $4 that would cost me 5 or 6 times that much elsewhere, even with medical insurance.
I bought a video game disc at a WalMart 300 miles from here. When it stopped working (got scratched) I took it in to a Wal Mart here and they exchanged it immediately – no receipt and no questions asked. To me that’s Customer Service with a capital C.
Pat