Many years ago, I had a job that included selling lottery tickets. Sometimes I’d make a mistake, maybe printing out a quick-pick when the customer wanted to dictate numbers to me, or printing off a Win 4 ticket instead of a Take Five. “That’s okay,” some customers would say. “Maybe it was a lucky mistake. I’ll buy that one.” This never translated to big payouts for my customers, but won a convenience store customer in California $380,774. [More]
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Fertility Service Threatens Customer With Multimillion-Dollar Lawsuit For Complaining To Better Business Bureau
By 10.29.15
A New Jersey woman who thought she’d been cheated out of several thousand dollars by a service that connects prospective parents with willing egg donors did something that a lot of ticked-off consumers do: She filed a complaint with the Better Business Bureau — not knowing that the company would then threaten her with a massive legal action for daring to speak her mind. [More]
Amazon “Prime Now” Drivers Accuse Company Of Wage Theft
By 10.28.15
If you’re in one of the markets where Amazon offers one- to two-hour “Prime Now” deliveries, the courier who comes to your door may be wearing an Amazon uniform, but they might not be Amazon employees. Some Prime Now drivers in California are accusing the e-commerce giant of using their “independent contractor” status to get away without paying them a legal wage. [More]
Anthem Blue Cross Will Pay $8.3M To Customers To Settle Class-Action Suit Over Mid-Year Policy Changes
By 10.27.15
When you sign up for an insurance policy, you’re given a price for that plan for the year. So when California consumers discovered changes to their Anthem Blue Cross policies in the middle of the year that came with extra out-of-pocket costs, two policyholders filed a class-action lawsuit against the insurance provider in 2011. Anthem Blue Cross has now agreed to a settlement that includes reimbursing about 50,000 customers in California almost $8.3 million. [More]
Police: Walmart Shopper Doused Halloween Costumes With Lighter Fluid, Set Them On Fire
By 10.14.15
There always has to be someone – or something – that tries to ruin everyone’s favorite spooky holiday: the thief who wiped out a preschoolers’ pumpkin patch, the wild boars that threatened to put a damper on trick-or-treating, and now a California man who allegedly set an aisle of Halloween costumes on fire at Walmart. [More]
Contractor Accepts $7,500 In Payments, Disappears
By 10.13.15
When you hire a contractor and they do a competent job, you should be able to just hire that contractor again without checking their background and starting the process over. Right? Not so fast, as one person who aspired to have new doors installed in his home learned the hard way. He hired back a contractor he had used in the past without checking any licenses, and paid about $7,500 for his mistake. [More]
California Governor Finally Signs Nation’s First Law Getting Tough On Antibiotics In Farm Animals
By 10.12.15
Weeks after the California state legislature passed the nation’s first law intended to hold farmers and veterinarians accountable for the use of antibiotics in livestock, Governor Jerry Brown finally signed the bill over the weekend. [More]
Beauty Products Sold In California To Be Microbead-Free By 2020
By 10.9.15
While a bill that would have prohibited the use of tiny microbeads in face wash and other personal products nationwide died in Congress last year, California didn’t give up its fight to keep the microscopic plastic spheres from entering its waterways and turning up inside the stomach of consumers’ seafood, passing legislation that bans the use of the products in the state by 2020. [More]
California Realizes Maybe It’s Not Such A Good Idea To Print Full Social Security Numbers On Mailed Documents
By 10.7.15
Earlier this year, a California state agency was heavily criticized for tempting identity thieves by printing full Social Security numbers on millions of documents it mailed out to state residents. Making matters worse, the agency didn’t really seem to understand why this might be a problem. After a few months to think about it, the bureaucrats appear to have finally come around. [More]
Hospital Doesn’t Know The Difference Between Copay And Deductible, Sticks Patient With $3,900 Bill
By 10.2.15
When a California man checked with the hospital about the copay for his daughter’s treatment, the hospital told him it would $500. Except what they meant to tell him was that his insurance deductible would be $500, but that he’d be stuck with a bill for nearly $4,000. [More]
California Governor Urged To Sign Bill Limiting Antibiotics In Farm Animals
By 9.22.15
Some 80% of all antibiotics sold in the U.S. go into animal feed, primarily for the purpose of growth-promotion (or under the vague, confusing umbrella of “disease prevention”), a practice that researchers believe is contributing to the development of drug-resistant bacteria that sicken millions, and kill thousands, of Americans each year. California legislators recently passed a bill aimed at limiting the overuse of antibiotics on livestock and it’s now up to Governor Jerry Brown to decide whether or not to sign it. [More]
Comcast Must Pay $33M To Settle Charges It Listed 75,000 Unlisted Phone Numbers
By 9.18.15
Nearly a year after the California Public Utilities Commission held a hearing to determine if Comcast should be held liable for a screwup that published more than 75,000 phone numbers, names, and addresses that were supposed to be unlisted, the cable and Internet giant has reached a $33 million deal that puts an end to the matter. [More]
AT&T, Verizon Must Pay To Investigate Landline Service Quality Problems In California
By 9.10.15
The California Public Utilities Commission plans to get to the bottom of why Verizon and AT&T phone service isn’t consistent in the state by making it clear that the state hasn’t forgotten a years-old order requiring that both providers conduct and finance investigations into their infrastructures. [More]
Fake Comcast Employee Sought In Sexual Assault
By 9.10.15
Even if you don’t have a service call scheduled, you might be inclined to answer the door when someone in a cable company uniform comes knocking. But police in California are on the lookout for a man who allegedly posed as a Comcast employee to enter a woman’s house and sexually assault her. [More]
The Uber Misclassified Employee Lawsuit Is Now A California Class Action
By 9.2.15
While class action lawsuits can be an effective consumer remedy, they are not a quick one. Former drivers for ride-hailing service Uber first filed a class action on behalf of all California drivers in 2013, and it has just now been certified as a class action. The original lawsuit alleges that drivers for Uber are misclassified employees, who should have their vehicle expenses covered by their “employer,” Uber. [More]
Lawsuit Alleges Chipotle Misleads Customers About Use Of GMOs
By 9.1.15
Back in April, Chipotle proudly declared that it was the only major fast food chain in the country to contain an entirely GMO-free menu. Now, just four months later, a recently filed class-action lawsuit says that proclamation isn’t exactly truthful, accusing the fast casual restaurant of false advertising and deceiving diners into paying more for their food. [More]
Nestle Says There’s No Place For Forced Labor In Cat Food Supply Chain
By 8.31.15
After American consumers learned about horrible working conditions and trafficked workers on some fishing vessels out of Thailand, class action lawsuits began, accusing American, European, and Thai companies of benefiting from deplorable working conditions farther up their supply chain. One of the companies accused, the Swiss conglomerate Nestle, says that “forced labor has no place in [their] supply chain” for Fancy Feast cat food. [More]
California Senate Approves Bill To Regulate E-Cigarettes Like Traditional Tobacco Products
By 8.28.15
Eight months after the California Department of Health declared that e-cigarettes were a threat to public health, the state’s lawmakers are taking steps to ensure the devices are regulated much like their traditional counterparts. [More]
