Here’s a tip the AirFareWatchDog blog stumbled across: If you’re late for a flight by no more than two hours because of a mitigating circumstance, like the eponymous flat-tire, and pitch your legitimate woe to the airline they will sometimes, at their discretion, let you rebook without paying an extra fee. [AirFareWatchDog] (Photo: madmolecule)
BLOGS
Labor Department Screwing Unemployed By Not Answering Phones
By 12.4.08
The waiting area of the New York Department of Labor Office is getting increasingly crowded. It’s not just the economy, more people are showing up because they can’t get anyone on the phone.
Tweeter Turns Over To Liquidators Early, Customers' Pre-Paid Items In Question
By 12.3.08
Tweeter, a MA mid to high-end electronics retailer, and not a misspelling of a popular microblogging service, decided yesterday to close its doors 6 days ahead of schedule, and send home everyone without paying them. Furthermore, customers who have already paid for the merchandise, expecting to be able to come by and pick it up, will have to deal with the liquidators. [BoingBoing Gadgets] (Thanks to Hawkins!) (Photo: dalvenjah)
End Of Month Is Best Time For Gadget Haggling
By 12.1.08
A salesman at a major electronics retailer told FreeMoneyFinance a bevy of tips you can use to bargain down the prices in-store on big-ticket items, like:
Don't Worry About AMEX's Bank Yank Clause
By 11.26.08
CreditMattersBlog explains why that new AMEX contract language we wrung our hands over this morning is nothing to fret about.
Price-Check Your Black Friday "Deals"
By 11.17.08
I’m really interested to see what happens with “Black Friday,” the hectic shopping day after Thanksgiving where retailers traditionally mark down their products for Christmas deal-seekers, this year. As the shark has been so thoroughly jumped on this shopping spree, the deals have gotten worse and the retail trickery more tricky, so can a consumer still make out?
Southwest Reduces Airfare On 56 Destinations From Minneapolis
By 11.6.08
Last night, Southwest reduced airfare on 56 destination going to and from Minneapolis, starting March 9, 2009. Look for this to set off a nice pricewar that will benefit travelers’ pocketbooks. For instance, their new one-way between Minneapolis and Chicago will be $69. Farecompare’s Rick Seaney predicts that the legacy airlines will react by slashing prices, adding flights, and possibly dropping those dread 2 night minimum stay round trip fares in favor of straight one-ways. Rick says he’ll be posting a total airfare schedule rundown later today on his blog, rickseaney.com.
Use Prosper.com Loan To Get Lower, Fixed, Interest Rate
By 11.5.08
Blogging Away Debt wrote about the 7 things she did recently to cut her finance charges from $400/month to zero, and one interesting one was using a loan from peer-to-peer lending site Prosper.com to get a break on interest rates:
Best Buy Sells "New" Laptop Used By Employee
By 11.5.08
Best Buy sold Clif a “new” laptop one of their employees had bought, used, and returned. They made up for it by giving him an actually new laptop with a slightly better configuration, then tried to upsell him to the Best Buy extended warranty. Two things I enjoyed about this story: 1) The clerk he went to return the laptop to was the same employee who had used the laptop (Clif knew this because he saw the guy’s resume on the laptop) 2) Clif then subsequently asked to speak to the manager in private and explained the situation there. That’s the classy way to do it.
Girl Dresses As Credit Card For Halloween
By 11.3.08
This man says he saw a 10-year-old girl (not pictured) on Halloween dressed as a credit card. Cute. What financial-crisis-related costumes did you see this year? [Adverts Ruin Everything]
Walmart Sells Lead-Tainted Facepaint For Kids
By 11.2.08
This facepaint for kids, sold by Walmart, contains lead. It says it right on the package. What the hell?! Maybe it’s the tubes that contain the lead, not the paint? Doesn’t sound right. Well, at least it doesn’t smear. Large version, inside.
How Midwest Airlines Is Like Schlitz
By 10.31.08
How is Midwest Airlines like Schlitz beer? A traveler angry over how Midwest’s wider business seats now cost an extra $50 explains. [Upgrade: Travel Better]
Coke Never Advertised To Kids, Is "Wholesome"
By 10.30.08
I don’t have kids, but if I did, instead of breastfeeding them I would give them bottles of Coke. That’s because Coke is “wholesome.” And if they grew up drinking Coke, it would be because of the decisions I made and choices I taught them to take, because Coke has never advertised to kids. Both these “becauses” are supplied by Coca-Cola. See, Dr. Dr. Yoni Freedhoff spotted an ad page 1632 of the June 17th edition of the Canadian Medical Association Journal that said:
Leaks: Details On Sprint's New Decreasing ETF
By 10.30.08
More details have emerged about Sprint’s new decreasing-monthly ETF, thanks to a page from the Sprint customer service manual that fell into NeoWin’s hands. Basically the ETF on a 2-year contract is $200 after the first 30 days and until month 20, then it starts decreasing by $10 at month 19, until it gets to month 5 where it holds at $50. However, they say it’s their policy to waive it if there’s less than 30 days left. Once again, the decreasing-ETF will only apply to new contracts signed after November 2, 2008. Full scan of the internal document, inside…
Help Consumerist Win BOBs
By 10.29.08
All around the world, people like us. To cement our global grip, however, you need vote for us as Best English Blog in the Deutsche Welle International Blog Awards 2008. Vote here.
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]
"The Purple Horror" Monavie Group Blog
By 10.23.08
Remember the Monavie Acai juice Multi-Level-Marketing scam Chris Walters told you about a few weeks ago? There’s a whole community blog set up where people can post their Monavie stories as moderator-approved comments at purplehorror.com. Here’s one from a frustrated salesperson: “Our upline said that we weren’t pitching it the “right way”. Their idea of the right way was to lie. They didn’t think of it as lying, but it was… They would ask people if they had any medical conditions and whatever they said, the answer was always “Monavie can definitely help you with that.” Note the word “upline.” That’s a common word multi-level-marketing schemes use to refer to the person directly above you in their modified pyramid scheme.
ATT Filters Own ToS Changes As Spam
By 10.23.08
Red Tape Chronicles reports on how AT&T internet decided to announce a change of its Terms of Service (ToS) via email. Some of the policies were contentious enough for some, but then many customers didn’t even receive the email, because AT&T’s own filters marked it as spam. Its questionable whether you can announce you’re changing someone’s contract by email fiat, especially if your own system prevents them from even receiving the message in the first place.
