AT&T is raising the rates for sending text and picture/video messages to 20 and 30 cents, respectively, giving customers a chance to break free of their contract without early termination fee if they use the now-classic “materially adverse changes to contract” argument. Inside, how to deploy that tactic, as well as the text of the rate change notice.
how-to
Make Your Own Passport Photos
By 1.24.08
If you have a computer and a digital camera, there’s no reason to ever pay a drugstore $8 for a couple of crummy passport photos and lousy customer service. This blogger discovered that he couldn’t even get an in-focus photo from a local CVS: “When we pointed that out, he was like ‘Oh really? don’t worry all photos printed here look like that and no one ever came back because a photo was not accepted.'” If you’re not Photoshop-savvy, just use the free epassportphoto.com website.
Dispute An Airline's So-Called "Weather Delay"
By 1.16.08
Unless it’s due to the weather, if there’s a flight delay or cancellation, passengers are entitled to some kind of refund, unless of course it’s due to the weather, but are flight delays as due to the weather as often as airlines say they are? And how would you go about proving otherwise? Well, as a fascinating interview posted over at airline blog Elliot.org informs us, you could always hire the services of a forensic meteorologist.
What To Say When You Call The CEO's Office
By 1.16.08
This classic article on the art of “turboing,” escalating your problem to the executive’s office, has some great advice about what to say when you get there. Here’s a line Rob Levandowski, himself a former Tier 2 XEROX customer service rep, uses to get his foot in the door once he reaches the CEO’s secretary:
Get 100 Gallons Of Heating Oil For Free
By 1.12.08
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez wants to give you 100 gallons of free heating oil to help survive the cold cruel capitalist winter. The hogshead of liquid warmth is available to anyone enduring a financial hardship who fills out a handy online form.
How To Get Rid Of Sprint's Text Message Ads
By 1.12.08
Here’s where you can go to opt-out from annoying text message ads sent to you by Sprint. Yes, it’s legit, you get to that page from the opt-out link on this Sprint page. However, they may have trouble saying goodbye. Scott, our tipster, writes, “After I sent my phone number through this page, I received 5 text messages from Sprint, telling me that I won’t receive any more text messages from Sprint…”
How To Become A "Brand Strategist"
By 1.10.08
Don’t Believe The Hypebeast gives a mock tutorial on how to become a “brand strategist,” basically some white douche who figures out how to make brands and products appeal to that fabled white unicorn, youth culture endowed with ungodly amounts of disposable income.
1. To be an influential and successful youth culture brand strategist, you’re going to need to be a White male, preferably with an affluent upbringing, but with a penchant for rap music and 80’s punk. Don’t have that particular penchant? Wikipedia that shit!
Hit the link for the next five easy steps to siphon monies from big brands wanting to get jiggy with it, whatever it is.
How To Mind Control Customer Service Reps
By 1.8.08 — Updated: 3.8.13
Reader Lona says that people in her family have called her a consumer advocate since she was sixteen, and now she is going to share with us 2,177 words on the customer service tactics and techniques she uses to get satisfaction. She writes, “in 99% of situations, it allows you to reach an agreeable solution to almost any problem. It is something I do for family and friends, and for myself.” Some of her methods have been mentioned in various ways on the site before but others are completely unique. And by the time you read her true success story at the end, you’ll swear she has Jedi mind-control over customer service reps. It boils down to, without raising your voice, asserting control over the conversation from the beginning and then never relinquishing that power.
Silence Unwanted Callers Who Keep Calling Your Cellphone
By 1.7.08
Baby Toolkit has a great method for silencing people who keep calling your cellphone and can never seem to get it into their head that there is no “Maria” at this number and there never will be. Create a contact called “Wrong Number” and change its ring settings so the ringer is silenced. Whenever a wrong number calls, add it to the contact. Boom, saves you cellphone minutes, aggravation, and the time it takes to dig through everything to find the phone only to find out it’s for Maria, again.
How To Never Wait On Hold With Your Credit Card Company
By 1.7.08
Reader Jamie shares a neat workaround so that he never has to wait on hold with his credit card company. He says that whenever he calls, “I do not use the 800-number on the back of the card. Instead, I use their outside-the-US instructions on the back of the card and call them collect at their regular phone number. When the credit card thinks that they are paying international collect call charges, they do NOT put you on hold – they take your call right away!”
Dish Subscribers: How To Get Cinemax For 1 Cent For 1 Year
By 12.19.07
Dish Network customers can get the Cinemax movie channel for one cent for year if they switch to paperless billing. Here’s how:
How To Report Merchants For Requiring A Minimum Purchase Or Making You Show ID
By 12.12.07
Stores are violating their contract with the credit card companies if they set minimum or maximum charges, or force you to show ID in addition to your credit card (with the obvious exception being for age-limited purchases). Depending on your state and your card issuer, surcharges or “convenience fees” may be banned as well. The best way to straighten these guys out is to report them to the credit card company. People who have done so on the Credit Boards message board say that when they report a merchant, they get a letter from the credit card company and when they go back to the store, the shenanigans have stopped. Here’s all the contact infos for the credit card companies to file a merchant complaint, as well as links to merchant agreements, in case you feel like standing up for your consumer rights. Someone better warn Amy’s Ice Cream!
Save $10 On T-Mobile Total Internet
By 12.12.07
A reader writes in to say he saved $10 on his T-Mobile bill when he called up to ask why there were two different “Total Internet” options on his add-ons list. Were they the same thing? Yes. So he could switch to the cheaper one without penalty and get exactly the same add-on? Sure.
Why Are Nintendo Wiis So Hard To Find?
By 12.9.07
Nintendo thinks depriving potential customers of the coveted Wii is a sound business decision that will ensure its long-term survival. Sure, you want the Wii now, but your passions are fleeting and unreliable. If you can’t wait for Nintendo’s post-holiday production ramp-up, hit the jump and we’ll tell you how we snagged our Wii.
How To Block Facebook's Beacon
By 12.5.07
Don’t like Facebook secretly tracking your online purchases and telling your friends what you bought? Users of the Firefox we browser can use an easy add-on that jams the beacon’s signal. Just install the BlockSite add-on, and then add http://*facebook.com/beacon/* as one of the blocked sites. Make sure to keep those asterisks in. If that sounds a little complicated, this step-by-step walk-through at Wikihow shows you how it’s done. Alternatively, you could also add the same url to AdBlockPlus, another Firefox extension.
Get Those Credit Card Rate increases Canceled
By 12.1.07
A Kiplinger reader shares his strategy for getting ridiculous rate increases on his three credit cards rolled back to their original rates. It’s a technique that’s probably familiar to a lot of Consumerist readers when negotiating for lower rates in general: be polite but unyielding, know where you stand as far as leverage (it helps to have a perfect history with the company), start with basic customer service, and then escalate as needed.
Fix Your Old Christmas Lights
By 11.30.07
Save some money by re-using your existing strings of light this Christmas—even if they’re currently acting all wonky. Here are some handy guides on how to repair dark strings of Christmas lights, whether they’re LED or the classic incandescent type. They’re fairly detailed, with a sort of techy “how things work” vibe, but contain a lot of useful information. For example, just because a string of incandescents has an AC outlet at the end, that doesn’t make it an extension cord—the more power you pull through the cord, the greater the current and the higher the risk of shorting out bulbs.
