whoops
It's bad enough when they lose your luggage, but what do you do when the airline loses your 83-year-old mother? File a claim? Poor Vera Kuemmel had to answer this very question as she waited in vain at the baggage claim of the Tampa airport.
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scams
Shaun says his 80+-year old grandfather, Steve, is being scammed out of over $10,000 a month. It seems Steve recently hired a female gardener who introduced him to a "wealthy friend," and now he's loaning them money to pay for groceries, cable, home upkeep, and, get this, bodyguards to protect her from an ex-husband and son who to want to kill her. When the family tries to intervene, Steve says the family is trying to put him in a nursing home and steal his money. Shaun is at a loss. How can he help his grandfather, who doesn't want to be helped? Shaun's story, inside...
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walmart
Local 6 news in Central Florida is accusing Walmart of setting their prices for sugar and other "staples" by demographic — charging more in stores where the population isn't as wealthy as other neighborhoods. Walmart's spokesperson claims to be offended by this accusation.
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success stories
Disney, inventors of childhood itself, told Daniel they would foot the bill after he got injured on their California Adventure ride. Then when Daniel and his wife Jane tried to collect, they got strung along for months by Garth Steever in guest claims. When they finally locked him down 11 months after the incident, Garth told them Disney changed its mind. By this time, the medical bills had already been sent to collections. Then Jane read about how to send an EECB on The Consumerist, and stormed the ramparts of Cinderella Castle. Here's her letter, and success story...
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wachovia
Something shady may be afoot at a Central Florida Wachovia branch...two customers say that a teller gave them counterfeit bills, according to Local 6 news in Orlando. The bank is refusing to give them a refund, claiming that they have no way of knowing if those counterfeit bills are the same ones the teller gave out, but Local 6 says that they've learned that Wachovia previously gave a customer with a similar story a refund.
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Insurance
Meet 19-year-old Caitlin Jackson. Caitlin was recently diagnosed with Chiari Malformation, a potentially fatal brain disorder that interferes with motor control and memory. Immediate brain surgery is Caitlin's only treatment option, but her insurance company, Aetna, took its sweet time approving her operation, and then reversed itself claiming her benefits had expired.
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Mortage meltdown
Shaq has a plan to save Orlando from the mortgage meltdown. Sort of. The
Orlando Sentinel says that word leaked out that Shaq was working on a plan to buy the troubled mortgages of Orlando homeowners and refinance them so that families could stay in their homes — and hopefully turn a small profit by doing so. The trouble is, the demand is overwhelming and Shaq doesn't have anything set up yet. That's not stopping him, though.
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The New High
So, Florida is apparently plagued by addicted prescription-poppers and not the pot-addled deviants targeted by our government's so-called "War on Drugs." A new report shows that
prescription drugs killed three-times more Floridians than illegal drugs, and not because old people can't follow doctor's orders. Addictive prescriptions like Vicodin, OxyContin, Valium and Xanax killed more users than all illegal drugs combined.
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