Is that package of Thin Mints from last season’s Girl Scout cookie buying palooza looking a little too freezer burned to eat? If you can’t wait for those glorious order forms to come around again, perhaps some Girl Scout cookie-flavored lip balm will tide you over. [More]
Retail Services
Behold! The Scourge Of Mad Holiday Shopping Now Starting At "Black Midnight"
By 11.8.11
Black Friday? That is so 2010! The drive of rival retailers wanting to get the jump on you getting the jump on post-Thanksgiving holiday sales has resulted in a new sleep-defying ritual of shopping insanity known as “Black Midnight.” [More]
Walmart Gets 10 Million Reasons To Keep Aisles Clean
By 11.8.11
A delivery woman who slipped and fell at a Colorado Walmart will collect $10 million from the company, thanks to the state Supreme Court, which gave a thumbs-up to the majority of the settlement decided in a jury verdict. Before you go getting jealous of the victim, bear in mind that she underwent three spinal surgeries, couldn’t return to work and lost her truck. [More]
BofA Charges Man $39.23 On A $0 Balance
By 11.7.11
Bank of America charged Roger $39.23 in interest on his credit card, even though he had a zero balance. How could that be? [More]
Video: Occupy Portlanders Open Credit Union Accounts On Bank Transfer Day
By 11.7.11
Saturday was the fifth of November, and many remembered to take a stand and shut down their big retail bank accounts, transferring their cash to a new credit union account. Here’s a video out of Occupy Portland covering what happened on Bank Transfer Day. Interviewees talk about why they’re switching to a credit union, and how this is just the beginning. [More]
McDonald's Exec: Swipe Fee Reform May End Up Hurting Our Bottom Line
By 11.4.11
A number of the new or increased banking fees, including Bank of America’s scrapped attempt to charge debit card users $5/month, that have popped up recently have been financial institutions’ reactions to recently enacted regulations that cap swipe fees — the amount banks charge retailers each time a debit card is used to make a purchase. While the goal is to put billions back into retailers’ coffers, some of the nation’s biggest chains say it may end up hurting them. [More]
Here's An Idea: Credit Union Pays Members For Using Their Debit Cards
By 11.4.11
Instead of charging customers a $5 monthly fee for using their debit cards, one credit union is actually paying its members to use their debit cards. In a direct jab against the big banks, First Community Federal Credit Union is running a promotion that lets members earn up to $5 a month for swiping their debit card. [More]
650,000 People Joined Credit Unions In Just The Last Month
By 11.4.11
In the month following the announcement of Bank of America’s (subsequently scrapped) plan to charge a $5 fee to some of its debit card users, at least 650,000 Americans consumers have opened accounts at a credit union. According to some reports, that’s 50,000 more than the number of new accounts opened in all of 2010. [More]
Video Of People Closing Down Their Accounts At Big Banks
By 11.4.11
Tomorrow is Bank Transfer Day. By this date, people all across America are shutting down their accounts at large, costly, name-brand banks and transferring their funds to new bank accounts at their local credit union or community bank. Here is an excellent video made in Portland that follows along with several different people as they close their bank accounts and give their reasons for doing so. One person wants to save money, another disagrees with the bank’s foreclosure practices, a third is mad about the bailouts, and the last is a union withdrawing its funds to show solidarity with holding Wall Street accountable. [More]
Banks May Push Prepaid Cards Onto Customers To Make More Money
By 11.4.11
No longer able to make as much money from processing debit card transactions due to new regulations, banks are expected to start increasing their bottom lines by coaxing customers into using prepaid cards and signing up for credit cards. [More]
Kmart Reportedly Sold "Modern Warfare 3" Early, Buyers Look To Flip Games Online
By 11.4.11
Some Kmarts were rumored to have started selling Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 this week, days in advance of its release date next Tuesday. The snafu was apparently due to mislabeled boxes that led managers to believe the game could be stocked and sold immediately, and the sales have initiated a grey market in which the games are going for a significant premium online. [More]
Walmart Spoils Memorial Service Because They Think My Photos Look Too Professional
By 11.3.11
Consumerist reader Jessica was trying to do something nice for her late friend’s memorial service by collecting photos that she then uploaded to Walmart.com to ordering prints. But when she went to pick up the pics, the folks at Big W wouldn’t hand them over without a written copyright release. [More]
Big Retailers Opening Doors Even Earlier On Black Friday
By 11.3.11
Instead of the usual 3am Black Friday door opening, several retailers, including Target, Macy’s, and Kohls, announced they’re going to be open at midnight this year. [More]
$1 Error Leads Bank Of America To Threaten Foreclosure On House That Was Already Sold
By 11.3.11
A family in Utah sold their home earlier this year and thought they had rid themselves of their Bank of America mortgage. That is, until they received a foreclosure notice several months later for a house they no longer owned — all over a $1 coding error. [More]
Wine Products: The Booze Equivalent Of Velveeta
By 11.3.11
In American stores, you can find food-like substances that call themselves “cheese food products” or “meat products” that contain some meat or dairy, processed beyond all recognition. Think Slim Jims or Velveeta. But diluted “wine products” lurk on shelves in those uncivilized places where people can’t buy food and booze in the same store. They look like bottles of wine and have wine-like labels…until you read the fine print and learn that they’re wine cut with sugar water and grape juice, and bottled in the idyllic wine country of Bayonne, N.J. [More]
Thailand Flooding May Cause Hard Drive Shortages, Price Increases
By 11.3.11
If a butterfly on the other side of the world can cause a hurricane, a flood in Thailand can wreak havoc on hard drive customers. Devastating floods in the country are expected to soften manufacturers’ abilities to crank out hard drives, and analysts say private customers will have to deal with the resulting price increases more than computer manufacturers. Affected companies include Toshiba and Western Digital, which have temporarily shut down Thailand plants. [More]
Hurry To Best Buy For Free Nonexistent Shipping
By 11.3.11
The game Tony Hawk: Shred is marked down to $9.99 from $29.99 at Best Buy, with free shipping. Fantastic deal, and Yero went to check it out. Then he noticed something odd: shipping is free, but this item cannot be shipped. Is something that doesn’t exist inherently free, or does not existing at all mean that it can have no cost? [More]
Movie Studios Create Special Blu-Ray Slipcovers For Target, This Target Tosses Them In Trash
By 11.3.11
Michael has a cool hobby that I had never heard of until today: collecting new Blu-Ray disc releases, especially limited editions and interesting slipcovers. Studios issue exclusive slipcovers to certain retailers: a great marketing opportunity and plenty of fun for collectors, right? Sure. If the employees at Michael’s local Target hadn’t been ordered to slip off those neat slipcovers and toss ’em before putting new movies in plastic security cases before they go on the shelves. [More]
