Shopper club cards might be part of an Orwellian masterplan to scrutinize your purchasing habits, but they also have another, less well-known use. Zach says that after an evening of drunken frolicking around New York, he lost his keys. A month later, this showed up in his mailbox. [More]
accolades
Swine Flu Fanatics Kick Man With Sniffles Off Airplane
By 5.4.09
James says he got ejected from his United Airlines flight because he had a cold and some of the other passengers wigged out, fearful of becoming swine flu victims. His letter, and its surprise ending, inside…
Magic Pricematching Fairy Visits Costco
By 3.13.09
Reader Lyn is happy to report that he is not suffering any buyer’s regret. A week after buying a big ol’ 52″ Sony Bravia LCD TV from Costco for $1950, one of “my wife’s and I’s once-in-ten-years type deals,” he saw the same one sitting in the TV section for $200 less.
Local Mechanic Does For $52.27 What Belle Tire Said Cost $1000
By 3.12.09
Mechanics are like doctors – it often pays to get a second opinion. When Josh’s wife’s Jetta failed, Belle Tire said it would cost $1,000 to replace the transmission. When Josh checked it out himself, he saw that it probably just needed to have a cable reattached to the transmission. Belle refused to check it out and insisted that it would cost $1000. So Josh to it a local mechanic, Otto Khim, and they fixed everything for $52.27, a savings of $947.43. Then he drove back to Belle Tire and laughed in their face. His story, inside…
UPS Gets A Twitter Monitor To Solve Your Problems
By 2.16.09
Looks like UPS has set a guy on Twitter to search for complaints and offer help as well as act as customer service ombudsman. If that package just never seems to be coming or you’d like the guy to just stop playing skeeball with it on your front porch, and regular customer service isn’t of help, Thomas looks like your guy. In addition to being a web-dude at UPS, he’s been blogging since ’99 and founded a theater company in ’06. Sounds like a cool cat to me. You need a real human being non-drone your face-fronting Twitter presence. He’s ThomasAtUPS on Twitter.
Panasonic Solves Gadget Problem Sent Through Generic Email Address!
By 1.28.09
Emailing a company about a product problem via their front-facing email address usually has about as much effect as wishing your way out of debt (just don’t tell the producers of The Secret). But Steve emailed Panasonic and instead of getting nothing or a generic response back, he actually ended up sending a series of emails back and forth with a product engineer who solved his consumer conundrum. Amazing! Here’s his story.
Nestle Quik Flipbook Ad On DC Metro Walls Is Kinda Magical
By 12.2.08
As the DC red line train I rode last week shot through a tunnel, a happy brown bunny jumped up and down on the walls, lofting up a bottle of Nestle Quik. It wasn’t a video, it was a series of back-illuminated panels, each one a successive frame in the animated cartoon. It was like running through flipbook in real life. I found a clip of it on YouTube, posted inside, the cartoon starts at 15 seconds in.
Sam's Club Lets You Swap Out RedRinged Xbox Hassle-Free
By 11.21.08
Virg’s Xbox360 got the dread Red Ring of Death. He bought it in Feb ’07, and it started failing this Nov ’08. He figured it would be months before he would get it back and expected to have to pay somewhere. Much to his surprise, Sam’s Club let him swap it out for a new one for free.
Sears Replaces Man's Shovel With No Hassle
By 10.27.08
Man walks into Sears store with broken Craftsman shovel. Moments later, walks out with brand-new, better, Craftsman shovel they let him pick out, for free. True story. [OneProjectCloser]
USAA Lays Smackdown On Shady Enterprise Rental
By 5.22.08
USAA is like a unicorn in a pack of walruses: a financial services company that truly cares about its customers and really helps them out. Not as some kind of lucky exception, but as a matter of policy. Reader “Mary Marsala With Fries'” story, about how USAA opened up several cans of whoop-ass on an Enterprise facility that was trying to screw her over on charges, is yet further proof.
Geek Squad Replaces Soaked Computer For Free
By 4.28.08 — Updated: 3.9.13
Nicole’s computer seemed to have developed water damage after she sent it in to Geek Squad, a favor for which they wanted to charge her $730. After her story posted to The Consumerist, some higher-ups cattle-prodded Sam, in charge of Geek Squad’s “Public Defender” team, and he jumped into action. Now Nicole has her computer back, completely repaired, free of charge. She says, “Sam at Geek Squad corporate was really helpful.” Woot, internet pillory wins again! [More]
Apple Sends You Replacement Laptop With Broken Keyboard, Apologizes Wtih Free Sims 2
By 4.25.08
Terry writes:
I work in an IT dept at a tech company in Utah and we have about half Apple computers and half PCs. We had a 17″ MacBook Pro with a bad hard drive, so I sent it in with AppleCare and got it back within a couple days. They sent it back with a new hard drive, a new battery, and a broken keyboard! There was tape covering the tab, caps lock, and shift keys and when I lifted it off, the caps lock key came with it! (see picture)…
James At Verizon Fiber Solutions Center Deserves A Cold Beer
By 4.21.08
James at Verizon Fiber Solutions Center, this is The Consumerist calling to say that you deserve a beer. One of our readers shared with us a story about how you went above and beyond the call of duty to get his router fixed. You could have just left Jeff with “the tech should arrive,” but instead you took a personal interest in Jeff’s case and got his problem solved. You rule. Jeff’s story, inside…
Man Experiences Competent Verizon DSL Tech Support
By 2.27.08
Nick was able to actually get decent Verizon tech support. But to do it, he had to trick the phone system and select “install problems” instead of “tech support” when he called. He writes:
I live in northwest Pennsylvania, an area formerly held by telecom company GTE (GTE North to be specifically I believe?). This has been particularly troublesome to the folks at Verizon when I’d call for tech support. Over the past few years of getting DSL from Verizon when the need would arise to call tech support I would cringe. I *knew* they wouldn’t be able to find my account, it always happens.
DeLorme's Awesome Customer Service Vastly Improves Road Trip
By 2.14.08
Brendan writes:
My wife and I had a trip planned to drive south from Illinois to Louisiana. The trip included a number of side-journeys, so I decided to upgrade my GPS from an older laptop-tied unit to a hand-held. After looking at various devices on the market, I decided on the DeLorme PN-20 GPS; it had similar features to most of the Garmin GPSMap units, but included full navigation and topographic maps of the United States.
Bath & Body Works Apologetically Delivers Discontinued Oil For Free
By 2.13.08
Kevin writes:
The other day my wife called up customer service at Bath & Body Works to ask about a scented oil she loves that they didn’t have at any local stores. Turns out it was discontinued and when they checked the computers they couldn’t find any in stock anywhere. They apologized and offered to send out a coupon which made my wife happy. She gave them our address and forgot about it. Yesterday, I went out to get the paper and found a box at our front door…
Target Delivers Dresses With Correct Amount Of Packaging
By 2.13.08
Morgan writes:
I’ve seen a lot of poor shipping posts in the past few weeks, and thought I would share a positive shipping story! I recently ordered 12 bridesmaid dresses from Target.com (2 sizes for each girl, just in case, plus two for myself). I expected a barrage of boxes at my door, but was pleasantly surprised to find 10 dresses neatly packed into one Amazon box, and two more dresses in a smaller Amazon box. I guess some companies CAN ship competently!
The right size box for the amount of material inside…AMAZING! What will they invent next? Maybe Target can share this secret with their retail brethren.
