Part 1:Low Grade Scam By International-Destinations International-Destinations has a scam so glaringly obvious that it makes me admire professionals who are impressively creative when they are outrageously crooked. Brief: A FAX arrived as a Memo with the Continental Airlines Logo displayed. It came from the H. R. DEPT of an otherwise unnamed company. It offers […]
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A drugstore.com AND Google SCAM?
No Hurry To Alert Consumers BBM!! BUYER BEWARE MOMENT I stumbled into this today while ordering two items from drugstore.com. A screen box lured me to buy more, “You’re just $7.12 from free shipping.” I fell for it. I ordered a third item for $19, doubling my total to $38. As soon as it processed […]
Why DO NOT CALL Doesn’t Work
Just like any other large organization that feels compelled to publish a mission statement, the Federal Trade Commission states a mission and dodges implementation. At least the FTC mentions consumers: The mission of the Federal Trade Commission is to prevent unfair competition and to protect consumers from unfair or deceptive acts or practices in the […]
“Reader’s Service” Poses As Publisher’s Helper
Telemarketer: “Hello. I am calling to see if your issues of [A MAGAZINE YOU MAY SUBCRIBE TO] are coming.” If questioned, the operator will claim the call is for quality assurance on behalf of the publisher. It’s a lie. It’s a scam-start. An attempt to recruit a client is buried in the chatter. The objective […]
Magazine Solutions’ Slick New Hooks
Hook #1: A lead-off hitter calls to ask if my New Yorker is coming without interruption. When I say “yes,” he apologizes for a recent non-subscriber offer for $79.95 sent to me—which I never received. To make it up to me, he offers a two-year renewal at $59.95/year. Digression: He was fishing to see if […]
Simple Escapes’ Complexity Defense—And Payoff
Imagine my surprise when I discovered an annual fee for a service I never used or knew I had or realized I had been paying for. I study monthly credit card statements—or thought I did until I caught the Simple Escapes charge for $84.00. I called its toll-free number to ask who they were, what […]
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Gary Nelson: I just wonder what will be taking place on these "...
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Joseph Ting: e: Fleeced by fees when you travel by Stephanie Ro...
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Nadia K. Faulkner: http://www.johnythegame78r2.com...
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Ellie Esposito: Same thing happened to us. Would be nice to know d...
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Josh Saintperle: Hmmm -- last time I called Comcast for a problem, ...
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E.A. Blair: If I claimed to be in a constant conversation with...
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Charles Selden: Hope my post was helpful....
Why This Blog?
My name is Charles Selden. I write this blog for consumers who have been abused by corporations. Like you.
Me?…abused?
That’s right. Abuse is not confined to children, spouses, the elderly, or baseball umpires. The most regularly abused person is the American consumer. It has gone on so long that most people accept it as “just the way things are” and are sure nothing can be done about it. You have been abused as a consumer--unless within the last 12 months you have not shopped for food, called a toll-free number for technical assistance, tried to find “your question” in a list of FAQs, bought an appliance or computer, eaten out, booked a flight, watched cable TV, taken a vacation, used a credit card, paid a medical bill, bought an item on the Internet or purchased a cashmere sweater. If all of your purchases and calls for help ended happily, you are either exceptionally lucky or a wee bit delusional. The fact is abuse of consumers is profitable for corporations, although abuse is not a word they would use.
There’s no shame in being a consumer abused by a corporation. The shame is that more consumers do not fight back when abused. That’s where this blog comes in.
I’ve been a consumerist for more than four decades. I look forward to corporate abuses, especially the compensation and fun parts. The corporations do their part and I do mine. This blog chooses a few of the “better” episodes to amuse and instruct consumers. The blog will not urge you to join a movement or contribute to a cause. Indeed, it is absolutely not about trying to change what corporations do to consumers. Why spoil a good thing?
As for my Manifesto, it owes a lot to Thomas Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence. He used the word abuses to describe what King George and his cohorts were doing: “a long train of abuses…to reduce them under absolute Despotism.” Corporations treat consumers that way.
To see how I fight back, try my blog for a while. Laughter is good for your spirit and getting compensation for abuses is good for your bottom line.
Portraits by Mike Peters
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