Consumerist
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everybody panic
Don't Keep Your Money In A Shoebox, Or At Least Don't Pose For A Photo With It
Thanks to the New York Post, we know there's a 48-year-old man named Richard Cruz somewhere in Manhattan who's hoarding his daughter's college fund in a shoebox. We even know what he looks like, because in the photo that accompanies the article, Cruz is posing on the sidewalk with his withdrawn cash like he just won the shoebox lottery. "'No one hides their money under a mattress any more,' he said. 'That's the first place people would look.'" Good thinking. More » -
stop payments
Stop Payment Orders On Checks Only Last Six Months
Jennifer says National City Bank has contacted her fiance to inform him that the stop payment order he placed on a check is about to expire, and he'll have to pay another $32 fee to renew it for six more months. She writes, "Have you heard of stop payment now only being 'suspend payment for six months'? This seems to me to be extortion." We're going to come down on the side of the banks in this case—but because of the recurring nature of the fee, it might just be cheaper to close the account. More » -
apple
Customer: "I Have A Brain Tumor" Apple Rep: "Not My Problem. Okay. So You Want..."
You don't have to believe everything customers say to you when you're a customer service rep. You don't even have to actually care. But if you can't stop yourself from slipping in phrases like "not my problem" when you're helping out a customer, maybe you need to try a different career. Like, say, parole officer. More » -
ups
UPS Randomly Delivers Unordered, Damaged TV, Charges You For The Pleasure
Matt didn't order a broken 42" plasma TV, and he didn't ship one either, but that didn't stop UPS from plopping a big box with a broken TV on his porch, a service for which they charged $120.12. UPS explained that the TV Matt didn't ship was being returned to him by the recipient because it was damaged, and it was now his responsibility to arrange for re-delivery. “If I was the shipper," asked Matt, who lives in Ohio, "why would the package have come from Ontario, CA, not Medina, Ohio?" The TV sat in the rain overnight, and it wasn't until Matt reached the local depot, where his father worked for 27 years, that he convinced someone to take back the mystery box. Two weeks later, a bill arrived... More » -
overdraft fees
Watch Out For These 5 Overdraft Traps
Banks need your money. They're not doing too well on their own, and you're not screwing up enough to generate the fees they need to make their shareholders happy. That's why they've set up sneaky ways to maximize your every mistake—or in some cases, ways to change the rules so that you make new mistakes where you didn't before—in order to penalize you. Here are five things SmartMoney says to watch out for. More » -
xbox live
Microsoft Charges You $50 For Two Months Of XBOX Live
XBOX Live member ForceTrainer says that after he forgot to update his credit card information, Microsoft shut down his XBOX Live account. He was fine with this, but when he tried to update his info, pay his balance, and convert his account to silver, Microsoft demanded he pay an entire year's fee to settle the two months he was delinquent. More » -
comcast
Comcast Tech Accuses 74-Year-Old Man Of Stealing Cable Service
Pretend you're a Comcast tech who has been asked to transfer Ally's account and internet service to her 74-year-old grandfather's house. Your work order shows that Ally ordered only internet service, but when you shimmy up the pole, you see that the house is also set to receive cable service. Do you:
- A) Connect the internet service and leave.
- B) Connect the internet service and check to see if the 74-year-old man has a separate account for the cable service.
- C) Accuse the 74-year-old man of stealing cable, and declare "I don't want to see your fucking bill" when the granddaughter tries to explain the situation.
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sprint
Don't Maintain A Negative Balance With Sprint Or They Will Disconnect Your Service
Sprint disconnected Bill's service for "exceeding his account spending limit," even though his account had a -$50 balance and he was signed up for Sprint's Simply Everything unlimited plan. Sprint quickly reactivated Bill's phone after he pointed this out, but warned that his service "will probably shut back off in a couple of days." More » -
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results
Polite Letter Gets Bank Of America To Refund Overdraft Fees
Jenn's checking account with Bank of America recently had a policy change designed to increase overdraft fees, and it worked: sometime between Friday night and Saturday morning she was hit with 6 NSF charges going back the previous 48 hours, because she was about 15 minutes late transferring funds into her account the day before. Technically she had broken the new policy, but Jenn hadn't realized or remembered that there was a policy change and she was taken by surprise. She decided to try to reason with BoA's corporate office about the fees, and explain why she thought they were unfair.
Today, she let us know that her letter worked: "Just got off the phone with BoA Corporate in Boston. They're refunding everything! It pays to write."
More » -
complaints
Rogue Charges Resurrect Expired Amex Card
Patricia closed her company's American Express Delta Sky Miles card six months ago, but the expired card unexpectedly sprang to life thanks to a supplier's accidental charge. American Express laughed off the matter, saying "this happens all of the time," adding that it's Patricia's responsibility to ensure that all vendors destroy her outdated billing information. More » -
banking
Wachovia Opens Bank Account Without Permission, Starts Charging Fees
John can't understand how Wachovia charged his startup $12 in fees for failing to maintain a minimum balance when his company never opened an account with Wachovia in the first place. Apparently, his former bank manager decamped to Wachovia and, without his permission, opened a new account "to ensure certain money rates," whatever that means. John isn't mad, and the bank manager agreed to close the account, but John is a little worried because a collections agency has started calling and the account now lists $24.05 in fees. More » -
good business practice
Redbox Shows Businesses How To Properly Handle A Data Breach
Redbox rents DVD movies via vending machine in drugstores and supermarkets throughout the country, and on Friday they announced that they'd found credit card skimmers attached to three of their kiosks. What's surprising is that they 'fessed up so quickly, and in a highly public manner—they've got the text "SECURITY ALERT" at the top and bottom of their website, and the email they sent to their members is detailed, forthright, and helpful, and reposted in its entirety—along with photos of sample card skimmers—on their site. Attempts at identity theft no longer surprise us, but a competent handling of the issue by a company is pretty amazing. More » -
we're using the internet
National City Mortgage Company Can't Help You Access Your Account
Reader Kevin writes in with one of those stories that makes you feel like pulling your hair out. He can't access his online account with National City and they can't help him. More » -
privacy
Identifight Tells You What Sites Your Email Address Is Publicly Linked To
Matthew wrote in to complain about a new website called Spokeo, which sounds like a stalker's dream: it sucks up all the entries in your address book, then returns a Big Brothery smorgasbord of all the publicly accessible accounts and services linked to each email address, along with updates any time something happens. It might surprise you to see just how easy it is for someone to assemble a picture of your Internet footprint with only an email address.
Don't like the sound of that? Luckily for you, someone has already been inspired to follow Spokeo's model and create a tool—Identifight—that lets you track your own email address to see what shows up, so you can patch up privacy leaks. More » -
macy's
Macy's Keeps Lowering Shopper's Credit Limit Without Warning
Trey is upset. Four times in the past year, Macy's has reduced the credit limit on his card without advance notice, even as his card membership level keeps going up. (Apparently he reallylikesliked to shop at Macy's.) "I lit into them for not advising me of my credit limit decrease, especially considering just three days before I received a brand new Macy*s platinum card in the mail, where they had the perfect opportunity to let me know it was now only $800." More » -
missing
"I Lost My Deposit Slip, And PNC Says There's No Record Of My Deposit"
Nicholas wrote in with a scary problem: his paycheck, which he deposited at his local branch of PNC on Saturday, never showed up in his bank account. The teller seemed to have difficulty processing the deposit, but the slip he gave to Nicholas showed the check had been processed. In the days that followed, Nicholas lost his deposit slip and the only proof he had that the check ever went into his account. Now the bank is telling him it can't help him without the slip, and Nicholas is wondering where the hell his money went.
More » -
checking
You'd Better Know Your Balance, Because WaMu Certainly Doesn't
"Keep track of your bank balances!"—pretty much every week on Consumerist either we or our readers say something like this. Now a reader writes in with a perfect example of why it's necessary, because apparently WaMu is incapable of keeping an accurate balance listed even after a week has passed.
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alerts
Is HSBC Straining Under An "Unprecedented" Wave Of Fraud Activity?
If you're an HSBC customer, check your account, as there may be a wave of fraudulent activity hitting your bank. Two days ago we wrote about the guy in the U.S. who discovered his account had been drained by someone in Bulgaria. Later that day we received an email from Emily in NYC who was having similar problems, only her fraud-buddy was in California and Canada making withdrawals on her account.
Emily's fiancé wrote back to us today with an update, and according to Emily, the HBSC Fraud Investigator who spoke to her "said that their fraud department was so overwhelmed, it was 'still in the developing stage of how we're going to handle' it. I asked if she knew how many customers were affected and she stated 'We don't even know.'" More »
accounts
New York, 8:40 PM
Wed Jan 7
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