• videos

    Busted: Linen's N Things Liquidation Prices Actually Higher Than Original

    A Good Morning America hidden camera investigation found that if you peel back the label on the "sale" items at Linen's N Things, you'll find the old label underneath, with a cheaper price. How do they get away with saying "10-20% off sale" then? More »

    10:36 AM on Tue Nov 25 2008
    By Ben Popken
    21,573 views, 100 comments

    Most discussed Chris H: A sale must be a meaningful reduction in price, and raising prices in anticipation of a sale is a deceptive more »

  • ripoffs

    How To Avoid Getting Ripped Off By Cash4Gold

    Rob at Cockeyed.com saw a late night commercial for Cash4Gold ("Sell your jewelry NOW!"), so he decided to test their service. His friend Brent gathered up some scrap gold and first had it appraised at a local pawn shop. Then, armed with a baseline of what to expect, he mailed it in to Cash4Gold. Their offer: $60, or one third of the appraised value. When he called and rejected it, they countered with a surprising new figure. More »

    11:41 AM on Mon Oct 6 2008
    By Chris Walters
    32,644 views, 80 comments

    Most discussed RamV10: On the subject of selling gold, how does one go about selling a diamond? My cousin's wedding ring was bought for more »

  • appropriation

    3M Steals Viral Image Idea To Avoid Licensing It

    There is probably nothing more pathetic in the world of marketing than watching a big corporation try to do something "viral"—usually they end up looking like Elaine dancing. But sometimes, they're so cynical and soulless about it that they don't just come across as incompetent, but as exploitative cheapskates as well. In 3M's case, they wouldn't pay $2,000 to license a well-known photo with its own viral history, and instead recreated a fake version of it to save a grand. We guess they're just hoping none of the sites and communities that made the photo popular in the first place will notice. Oh wait, this is supposed to be viral or something... More »

    9:53 PM on Mon Sep 15 2008
    By Chris Walters
    39,831 views, 80 comments

    Most discussed balthisar: ::shrug:: What "community"? What "stealing"? If you think about this logically, store displays aren't things that "go viral" -- that only more »

  • follow ups

    Chairman Of Advantage Rent-A-Car Investigates 49-Day Repair Claim, Waives It

    Earlier this summer, we wrote about how Paul was being gouged by Advantage Rent-A-Car on repairs that had to be made after his rental was damaged in a hit and run. Paul was willing to pay the repairs on the vehicle, but Advantage wanted almost double the amount. After we posted his story, Paul was able to get in touch with a higher-up at Advantage who passed him along directly to the Chairman. Here's what happened. More »

    7:57 PM on Thu Sep 11 2008
    By Chris Walters
    10,302 views, 23 comments

    Most discussed Deeter2: Similar thing happened to me with Bugdet in Campbell River, British Columbia: hit a deer in a remote area which more »

  • guitar center

    Guitar Center Adds $100 Premium To iPods

    Update: Guitar Center has fixed the pricing error and offered refunds.
    Quick, get out your throw-away cash and head to Guitar Center! Their website sells the iPod Classic and both sizes of the iPod Touch for $100 more than what you'll find pretty much everywhere else. (We guess there's extra rock-n-roll in them.) You know what makes us crazy? We bet people still buy them. More »

    7:45 PM on Thu Sep 11 2008
    By Chris Walters
    6,407 views, 19 comments

    Most discussed trujunglist: After I buy my iPod Touch and Macbook Pro from Guitar Center, I'm gonna go to the Apple Store and more »

  • ticket brokers

    BBB Warns Consumers: Stay Away From TicketsMyWay

    The complaints about TicketsMyWay—the Las Vegas-based ticket broker that doesn't actually deliver the tickets it sells, then threatens you with litigation or fines if you attempt to get your money back—have reached a high enough level to earn a Consumer Alert from the Better Business Bureau:
    [Parent company] Event Tickets LLC has an unsatisfactory rating from BBB due to its performance, which includes nearly 100 instances of non-delivery of tickets, nearly another 100 complaints involving refunds and exchanges, and on about 200 occasions, the company has failed to even respond to BBB or consumers to resolve issues.
    More »

    9:45 AM on Tue Sep 9 2008
    By Chris Walters
    6,207 views, 19 comments

    Most discussed Canino: I'm pretty wary of the BBB since my company periodically receives complaints obviously meant for a large and well-known company more »

  • rip offs

    FreeTripleScore.com Will Cost You $30 Per Month

    The rip-off site "freecreditreport.com" has a new competitor, and it's running fear-mongering spots on the "we'll air any commercial" cable nets (by which we mean G4). Freetriplescore.com warns you that your credit score can keep you from getting a job! But they'll give you you "free" scores from the big three credit reporting agencies if you sign up for their $30 per month membership plan. Remember, the only "free" credit report website you should ever use is AnnualCreditReport.com. For free credit scores, on the other hand, check out Ben's post.

    2:19 PM on Tue Sep 2 2008
    By Chris Walters
    4,201 views, 36 comments

    Most discussed sleepydumbdude: Sucks, question though. Transunion won't give me mine from annual credit report because it says I have a login but more »

  • united airlines

    United Makes You Pay To Move To Upgrade Area They Would Have Moved You To Anyway

    Joe may have uncovered a deceptive policy at United Airlines that's screwing over customers. Here's how it works. If you've got an economy ticket and the only seats available are in Economy Plus, but you didn't spring for the extra Economy Plus fee, you're asked if you would like to pay the upgrade fee for economy plus seating. If you decline to upgrade, they seat you there anyway. Sounds pretty sketchy to me. Here's Joe's story: More »

    11:04 AM on Thu Aug 7 2008
    By Ben Popken
    11,747 views, 58 comments

    Latest by vrn3b: @krunk4ever: The "deception" part sort of comes in in the situation we had. We tried to check in more »

  • spirit airlines

    Spirit Airlines Stealing Your Money Is "Nonrefundable"

    Our network of spies and informants have penetrated every major American corporation. The following is dialog from a recent Spirit Airlines board meeting, as imagined by reader David, whom they screwed over. The first sentence of this post is therefore a non sequitor, but that's ok. What's not ok is Spirit's policy making its various fees and upgrades non-refundable. So if they screw up your ticket and then have to issue you a new one, you don't get to keep the upgrades you bought. They just take your money, because of their ironclad policy against refunds. Now let's join that imagined Spirit Airlines board meeting, already in progress...

    (pictured: Spirit Airlines CEO Ben Baldanza laughing because he just took your monies and is going to go buy some cakes) More »

    3:23 PM on Fri Jul 25 2008
    By Ben Popken
    8,059 views, 18 comments

    Latest by AgentTuttle: If the service paid for is not provided, I don't see how it is anything but theft. It'd be hard more »

  • furniture

    Furniture Store Deducts 20% From Refund For Furniture They Never Delivered

    If a store sells you something, and then fails to deliver the product, you should be entitled to a full refund, right? Not so at Furniture Bargains of Calumet City, IL. There, even when they don't give you the furniture you ordered at all, they'll take 20% off your refund, at "the manager's discretion." Which I guess is just a fancy way of saying, "we feel like robbing you today and the manager said it's ok." AJ's story, inside... More »

    10:48 AM on Mon Jul 21 2008
    By Ben Popken
    6,874 views, 24 comments

    Latest by vdragonmpc: Hey dont feel bad. I purchased a lovely sectional sofa from Bassett Furniture in Richmond Virginia. Those jokers took MONTHS to more »