Consumerist
american airlines
Posts Tagged “
Cancellations
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american airlines
never again
Dear United Airlines: "You Have Designed Your Customer Service To Piss Off Your Customers"
After a mechanical snafu grounded his flight to Zurich, Aaron received several vouchers and an upgrade as compensation from United Airlines. Unfortunately, the vouchers and upgrades proved so difficult to use that he has given up and is now publicly vowing never to fly United Airlines again. More »
walmart
How To Cancel An Order You've Placed On Walmart.com
As we noted in this earlier post, it's technically not possible to cancel an order after you've placed it on Wal-Mart's website. A helpful reader says there are a couple of ways around this, although neither option will immediately free up any hold on your funds. More »
walmart
Walmart.com Holds $550 Hostage For PS3 Bundle It Won't Ship
Consumerist reader The Unicorn has $550 tied up in some strange Wal-Mart purgatory for a PlayStation 3 bundle that they won't ship to her, even though it clearly states in their online terms that they won't charge you for your order until it's shipped. Her customer service queries are being met with content-free scripted CSR-bot responses. She writes, "Here's the thing: don't ever buy anything from Walmart, ever. I knew this, and ignored it, and now I'm paying the price."
Update - 06/27/08: The Unicorn says Wal-Mart called her today and offered to cancel the order!
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etfs
T-Mobile Introduces Declining Early Termination Fees
Tmobile just announced that they will let early termination fees decline over the course of a contract. Previously, you had to pay the full monty whether canceled on the first day, or last day, of your contract. This chart shows you how the new fee breaks down over time:
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complaints
Canceling HBO Costs $1.99 But Canceling Comcast Is Free, Which Do You Choose?
UPDATE: Comcast Responds To Yesterday's Article, Waives $1.99 FeeReader Jonathon wanted to cancel his HBO so he contacted one of Comcast's infamously useless online customer service representatives. CSR Adam informed Jonathon that to cancel HBO would cost him a fee of $1.99. He asked to speak to a supervisor to get the fee waived but CSR Adam said that would be impossible. The CSR then pointed out that there would be no charge to cancel Comcast's service altogether. Decisions, decisions. Jonathon's letter and chat log, inside... More »
success stories
BBB Works Against Sprint
Some people think the BBB doesn't work. They do, but only if the company cares about keeping a clean record. See when you look up a company in the BBB database it shows you how many complaints have been filed against the company, how many were answered, how many did the consumer report as being satisfactorily resolved, etc. So if you have a valid complaint, file it with the BBB, and the company cares about its BBB record, you have a decent chance of getting a solution. You might not believe it, but it turns out Sprint is one of those companies. Here's Kevin's story of how the BBB got his erroneous text message charges refunded and let him leave contract early without early termination fee... More »
holland america
Holland America: Sorry, You And Your Wife Are Too Young To Go On Your Honeymoon
Reader Austin and his fiance will be married on May 22, and their honeymoon cruise leaves May 29... without them. Holland America says that Austin (23), and his bride to be, Kelly (20) are too young to sail. Austin says he wasn't told about this restriction when he booked and paid for the cruise. More »
complaints
Verizon Interprets "Materially Adverse" Differently From Reality So You Can't Cancel Without Termination Fee
Joseph would like to cancel his Verizon contract without early termination fee by arguing that the recent monthly administrative fee increase is materially adverse, but unfortunately for Joseph, Verizon's lawyers have filled their customer service reps brains with a bunch of hooey about what materially adverse means. In fact, when Joseph was reading the very clause in the Verizon contract that allows him to what he wants, the call center supervisor laughed at him. According to his account, when he criticized the poor customer service, she started screaming at him. The text of Joe's attempted EECB, inside... More »
complaints
DirecTV Makes You Pay Termination Fee Even If You Can't Use Their Service
DirecTV is a lying pack of liars. They told Ian that if he moved to a place where he couldn't use his dish, then they would let him out of contract without early termination fee (ETF). Well guess what? He moved to a place without a balcony or roof access. Double guess what: Now DirecTV says he has to pay an ETF and they say there's no record of all those reps telling him that, and that that's not part of their policy. Triple guess what: Ian called up DirecTV sales and recorded their sales rep telling him that they DO let you out of contract if you move to a new place where you can't use DirecTV. Are DirecTV retention reps just not versed on company policy, or are they a pack of scumbags? I dunno, but you know what they say, never trust a company run by a man in a mustache. Ian's audio recording and letter to the CEO of DirecTV is inside... More »
refunds
Bobby's brother canceled an order the day after placing it, and everyone he's spoken with at Circuit City seems to agree that they owe him a prompt refund on his cash. But that all happened on March 7th and 8th, so why is Circuit City still saying the check is in the mail? Are they waiting to get their stimulus check first?
More »
Two Months Later, Circuit City Still Hasn't Refunded Customer His $338
Bobby's brother canceled an order the day after placing it, and everyone he's spoken with at Circuit City seems to agree that they owe him a prompt refund on his cash. But that all happened on March 7th and 8th, so why is Circuit City still saying the check is in the mail? Are they waiting to get their stimulus check first?
More »
verizon
Reader Uses Being Nice To Quickly Escapes Verizon Without Early Termination Fee
Mason used the increase in monthly administrative charges to escape his Verizon cellphone contract without early termination fee, but unlike others, had very little trouble. The secret seems to be being nice! Wow, are we still doing that? Yes, we are, and it works wonders: More »
complaints
Verizon Offering Credits To Keep You From Escaping Contract Without Early Termination Fee
Alicia wants to escape her Verizon contract without paying an early termination fee, but she's having some trouble. She writes:Just today, I was informed that Verizon is now increasing their monthly administration charge. I have a right to cancel with having the early termination fee waived because of this increase. The Verizon supervisors I spoke to (total of 4 people) refused to follow this clause and would not waive the early termination fee even though Verizon changed the fees. They said they would give me a credit for this increase, so then it would not adversely affect me, so I can't have the ETF waived. I made it clear that I had a right to cancel and have the ETF waived regardless of what credit they would be willing to give me. They said that having the ETF waived is not an option and they can not do that. Am I in the wrong?More »
how to
Quit AOL Using Highlighters
It looks like AOL is up to its old shenanigans and is still making hard for some people to cancel service (yes there are still some people using AOL), but reader Richard figured out a way to finally get through to them, with a highlighter. He writes:I could not find a way to contact AOL to stop my service. So I took a yellow marker, drew a line though that line item on my credit card bill, and wrote on the bill...."Do not pay, account in dispute". I paid all the other items on the CC bill that month. It took AOL about 2 weeks to call me.....I told them what I thought of their service, and instructed them to terminate my account, while I was still on the phone. It worked. They seem to understand when you tell them you are not going to pay.That's one way to go about it. You could also call up your credit card company and request a chargeback, but this has the added benefit of zero hold time. First rebates, now AOL cancellations, this highlighter is starting to look mighty potent.
credit cards
It's Impossible To Cancel Arcot's SecureCode On Your Mastercard
Be wary of Arcot, a credit card security company that's devoid of customer service.Nels had to sign up for Arcot's SecureCode to complete an online purchase. Now he wants to cancel it, but can't find anyone at Arcot who can help him. The web pages he's sent to are dead ends, and he left messages with Arcot's executives that were never returned. More »
refunds
Blockbuster Cancels Your Membership If You Demand A Refund On Unplayable Rentals
Andrew is having some trouble with Blockbuster: the 360 and Wii games he rented were unplayable, and the store manager refused to refund his debit card or apply the cost of the unused rentals to a purchase, saying "It's not store policy." She even tried to upsell Anrew to their Game Plan, saying, "Five bucks additional wouldn't have killed you, with what you spent on the games previously." What? He finally convinced her to credit his debit account—"however, she terminated my ability to rent games from the store" as a consequence. Andrew, don't you understand? Blockbuster needs that money if they're ever going to buy Circuit City. Here's Andrew's story:
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bad company
Bally Cashes Cancellation Check, Continues To Bill For 15 More Months, And Now Demands "Past Due" Payment
Ashoka just found out that Bally never canceled his membership, even though they cashed his $50 cancellation check a mere 5 days after he mailed it to them last year. They've said there was no date on the paperwork, but Ashoka has a printout that proves otherwise. And they said they tried to contact him last year about the "problem," but not by phone—even though they called him promptly this month when he changed his credit card info and the automatic billing didn't go through. Bally, just admit it: nobody gets out, ever. More »
travel
