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Personal Finance

Five Easy-To-Follow Principles To Safeguard Your Financial Future

Ron Lieber kicks off his inaugural Your Money column by presenting five excellent principles to help guide your financial decisions. More »

Results

Complain About Tropicana's Shrinking Containers, Earn A Free Carton Of Juice

Joel loves his orange juice and is none too pleased with Tropicana's recent decision to shrink their containers by 7 oz. He fired off a complaint through Tropicana's website, and was pleasantly surprised when the company responded with a coupon for a free carton of shrunken sweetness. More »

Banking

Bank of America Mistakenly Shuts Down Access To Your Account, Charges You For The Pleasure

Poor Jacob. He only wanted to deposit a $2,019 check with Bank of America. Apparently, this was enough to provoke the bank into shutting down his account, leading to overdraft fees whenever Jacob tried to access his money. More »

Class Actions

The Sleep Number Difference Is Mold

A recent class action claims that Select Comfort Sleep Number beds are nothing more than overactive allergen mills. According to the suit, the bed's faulty air chambers allow moisture to form under the mattress foam, providing a perfect breeding ground for mold spores. More »

Whoops

IRS Sends 15,000 Stimulus Checks To The Wrong Bank Accounts

That economic stimulus check you were expecting may have accidentally stimulated your neighbor's bank account. Newsday is reporting that 15,000 checks tumbled astray thanks to an IRS "computer programming glitch." More »

watch out

Why Is CVS Selling Year-Old Expired Eye Ointment?

Raghu wants to know why CVS sold her a bottle of Tears Naturale PM that expired last year. We're all for pushing expiration dates, but not with year-old preservative-free medicine that is meant to stay in your eye overnight. More »

A lawyer in Florida has launched a business where he'll send a complaint letter on your behalf for a flat $50 fee. He even sends prospective customers to our website to educate themselves on "fighting back." Florida only. [Equal-Footing]

Satire

Step Back In Time To The Blockbuster Living Museum

Before the days of Netflix and the internet there was the "video store." According to The Onion, Blockbuster was "a specialty shop where customers would exchange money for the short term use of videos in an archaic system called "renting." Now we can visit the Blockbuster Living Museum to relive those days of yore. Watch The Onion video, inside... More »

Case of the missing laptop

Mysterious Black Hole That Is HP's Repair Division Swallows Yet Another Laptop

We're starting to suspect that HP's repair department consists of a giant warehouse inside of which is a nothing but a black hole that eats laptops. Stephen Hawking is their receptionist, and he makes sure the techs don't accidentally cross the event horizon when they're chucking your computer into oblivion. More »

Stubborn

Guy In Wisconsin Is Refusing To Buy Any More Damn Gasoline... For A Month

Brian LaFave of Sheboygan, WI has had enough of high gas prices, so he's parking his truck and biking to work... for a month. Brian used to put 300 miles a week on his trusty pickup truck, but no longer. He's biking to work, not accepting free rides unless his friends are already in his neighborhood, and taking the money he saves and donating it to charity. More »

The CDC says several large salmonella outbreaks going back to 2006 were started by tainted dog food. "This is the first time human illness has been linked to dry dog food," says a CDC epidemiologist. Always wash your hands after handling pet food.

sephora spy

Can Foundation Really Be Waterproof? (And Other Details About The Next Generation Of Expensive Beauty Products)

FROM JEZEBEL.COM: Sephora Spy is back! Fresh from "SOS" training — it's the OT-8 of Sephoraologists! — our undercover Sephora operative Jasmine takes a turn for the scarily-technical this time around. Waterproof foundation! Hyaluronic acid! Uniforms like something out of the Starship Enterprise! More »

AT&T's one-iPhone-per-customer rule lasted only one day before the company went back to its three-per-customer policy. Apparently they found some more iPhones in the back. [Information Week]

DIY

Make Your Own Groceries

Food's getting too expensive, leaving us with two choices: lose our lead on per capita obesity, or find new ways to save money. We're not the type of nation to give up a first place position on anything, so that leaves us with saving money, and one way to do this is to make your own stuff. We know, it's crazy! Apparently early settlers somehow created their own Cheetos and Frappuccinos, but we're not going to get that primitive. Instead, here's a quick rundown of some interesting Do It Yourself tutorials we found that might give you some ideas on how to cut costs the next time you go grocery shopping. More »

topposts

Top Posts Of The Week

"Gay" Player Name Banned By Xbox Live
"According to the supervisor, it wasn't that she found the name offensive, but it was the "greater Xbox community" that found it offensive."

Fake, Funny Poncho Ad Causes Outrage, Laughter
"He thinks the ad is hilarious, but we found at least one complaint from a Weekly Dig reader who thought the fake ad was "misogynist" and that the "potential hilarity was ruined by bad taste and poor judgment."

Charter To Begin Tracking Users' Searches And Inserting Targeted Ads
"Charter Communications is sending letters to its customers informing them of an "enhanced online experience" that involves Charter monitoring its users' searches and the websites they visit, and inserting targeted third-party ads based on their web activity."

Starbucks: Shut Up, I'm Recording The Celtics Game!
"Customers, please try not to talk about the Celtics game. I am recording it and watching it when I get home tonight. I would really prefer to not know the outcome ahead of time. Thanks."

Lazy Employees Lose Kohl's An Easy $300 Sale
"I am watching the counter person empty out and count up her drawer (It's about 6:55) and it turns out she can't hear me, or the other two gentlemen at the counter at that time."

(Photo: msmail)


Refunds

A Radio Shack Manager Explains Why They Ask For Personal Info On Cash Returns

Last week, we pointed out that even with a receipt and the product in hand, and even though you purchased it with cash the day before at the same store, Radio Shack won't give a refund unless you give them your home address first. We got a lot of insider tips from former employees in the comments section, and the next day we received the following perspective from a Radio Shack store manager. We think his explanation still doesn't explain why you need personal ID to refund a cash transaction when you've got the item and the receipt in front of you, but read on if you want an unverified store manager's point of view. More »

Happy Endings

Your New, Sealed Copy Of GTA4 Contains "Boyz N Da Hood" Disc

Some scammer out there has a sense of humor (and a shrink wrap machine), because when Greg opened his apparently "new" copy of Grand Theft Auto IV, he found a used copy of "Boys N Da Hood." More »

Worst Company in America

Round 40: Capital One vs ATT

This is Round 40 in our Worst Company in America contest, Capital One vs AT&T!Here's what readers said in previous rounds about why they hate these two companies...

More »