Dean writes:
I received a call yesterday from my newspaper (the San Diego Union Tribune). The nice young man on the phone told me that I had an unpaid bill, and if I liked, he could take care of that over the phone with me right then. I take a certain amount of pride in paying all my bills promptly, so my first impulse was to go ahead and get it taken care of asap. But after the first few seconds of surprise and confusion, I got suspicious.Usually you pay for subscriptions like this up front, so I asked the young man if this was really a past due bill, and he had implied, or a subscription renewal. He sheepishly admitted that yes, he was trying to get me to renew my subscription. I immediately declined, and silently vowed to never subscribe to their paper again (we get most of our news on the internet anyway, so no big loss).
At first I thought it was just some kid free-styling with the script a little to try to bump his numbers, but then later that same day I get another call, this one from a young woman, using the exact same script. The newspaper folks must be getting desperate to sink to such tactics. It’s just sad to see such devious tactics from such a large and respected company.
Those poor newspapers, still struggling to cope with 18% profit margins. Thank heavens FCC Chairman Kevin Martin swept in on spectacled dragon of deregulation to allow papers to buy up other media outlets so they won’t have to rely on sneaky renewal practices.
Ask for an itemized bill if a company makes a questionable request for payment. Don’t forget to mention that sending baseless requests for money constitutes mail fraud, a federal crime.
(Photo: stickywikit)
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Common tactic.
@Islandkiwi: I hate those, especially when I get them three months after I paid the yearly subscription.
I dare the Washington Post to try this. If they do my DS will get a lot more playtime.
Has anyone else bought a newspaper subscription as a fund-raising product? I think the SJ Mercury News (and the SF Chronicle) allow people to go around selling subscriptions and they get to keep some of the profits. It’s low because it’s hard to say no to some guy who says he’s down on his luck or some teenager who’s raising money for school. I signed up with that hard luck guy, paid in cash, and specifically asked if I had to call and cancel or if the paper would stop coming after the 3-month subscription he was selling (he assured me there would be no continuation). Needless to say, the paper continues to come every day for 8 months, even after the SJMN calls to ask for money and we ask them not to send any more papers. They finally stop sending papers – and then send a collections notice. Bastards.
We just moved into a new town (not that far off from where we lived, but a much smaller “in da’ boonies now” place) and we are getting the local paper for a couple reasons.
I. This paper focuses on what they are good at – almost entirely local stories, almost zero of the AP stories that I can find online hours earlier. Even the front page of their sports section is entirely local HS and Jr. High sports. We can’t get most of that anywhere else.
II. It is a way to get more familiar with the area and the local businesses.
Oh and III – it is just $9 a month. Can’t beat that with a stick.
Thanks, Consumerist, for posting these sorts of stories. I had not heard yet of this particular tactic… and now hopefully I am inoculated against it.
@Eyebrows McGee: The problem with relying on bloggers is bloggers don’t do original reporting. They rehash stories that have already been done by newspapers. It’s not clear to me where the blogosphere is going to get its fodder if all the papers go under.
I recieved a notice from a company called NORTH SHORE AGENCY last night that indicated I had a past due bill for a subscription to Entertainment Weakly ( <– spelled this way on purpose. ) for 52.00.
When I tried to call to contest this I was met with an automated system that does NOT allow you to speak with a human. PERIOD. The only thing I could do was input a bunch of #’s they provided me with and choose an option that stated I didn’t request the magazine.
If they report this to the credit agencies I am going to find out what legal actions I may take to preserve my good credit standing. Any suggestions ?
Additionally I wrote: NEVER ORDER, NEVER RECIEVED on the latter and put it back in the mail today.
@healthdog:
That doesn’t make much sense. They’d be much better off looking for customers in the USD/La Jolla UTC area, where people actually are rich and snobby.
@lakecountrydave:
Well, I have to say that it probably is easier for them to mail customers a pack-in flyer with their magazine every time the mag goes out instead of sending individual notices. Seems to me like you’re saying they send you an individual letter every time, so that obviously doesn’t make sense.
The only reasoning I can think of is that if a subscriber gets a subscription renewal notice at the END of the subscription, it will make him/her think “hey, I shouldn’t waste my money on that mag because the last one I got was like 3 weeks ago and it wasn’t really good anyway, too many articles on belly button lint” and then they just won’t renew. By sending out constant renewal notices, it would more or less remind the customer that they should still get the magazine, even if they got a fresh issue the same day. They’d be like “oh yeah, I just read the latest issue like 2 days ago and that article on belly button lint really blew my fucking mind! Renewal? Fuck yeah, I can’t wait for part 2 of the belly button lint article in the next issue, so I’d better renew now to make sure I get it!”
Sending it out after the fact likely means loss of subscription, sending it out during means the mag is fresh in your mind.