Blog dedicado a la formación en todos sus ámbitos: presencial, online, a distancia
Got one of these? Google says to stop using the charger it came with.
We’ve heard of magical pizza buttons in far away lands before, but now there’s something in the works right here at home. It’s not going to be on the market anytime but still. A button just for pizza, when you need it most. That’s a world I want to live in.
NPR’s All Tech Considered gets down to pie business with a new gadget called the PiePal, which is pre-programmed to order you up a pizza with just one push. No opening an app, entering your credit card info and ugh, all those other steps involved with modern technology.
The current device only orders Domino’s pizzas — their online ordering technology was simply the easiest for the developers — and can be set with whichever kind you might most need in a cheese emergency situation, so there are limits.
“This is not a client project for Domino’s,” says the chief marketing officer of iStrategyLabs, the company behind the device. “We know zero people at Domino’s. We just used their ordering infrastructure because they have the most sophisticated online ordering structure of any of the major pizza chains. So anyway, you create an account with us and key in your mailing address and billing info, and select the one order you want to get over and over and over again.”
This baby isn’t ready for primetime yet, as right now anything could bump the device and accidentally send out a call for a pizza, pronto. The next version would have a case around it that only opens with two keys. High amount of protection for such a precious, powerful device.
You can sign up to be a Beta “Taster” at the company’s website to help the project along and also to get pizza.
This sort of makes me hanker for the days of yore, when your phone was, in effect, a pizza ordering button — especially if you had the local delivery service programmed as a speed dial. Technology has progressed so much we’re now regressing… Deep thoughts. I’m having them.
This Device Lets You Order A Pizza With The Push Of A Button [NPR]
No, not just in the car. While they are actually in control of the car, steering thousands of pounds of metal, plastic, and flammable liquid at a high speed in close proximity to other equally dangerous vehicles. Drivers between ages 17 and 29 have even scarier stats: 49% say that they’ve engaged in browsing while driving before.
Yeah, you think that you’re invincible, that you’re a much better driver than all of those other idiots on the road, and you would never be hurt or killed. There are other scary prospects, though. Before you remove your right hand from the wheel, just remember this cautionary tale: a Wisconsin man looked down at his phone to text, and the next thing he knew, he crashed his car into a tanker full of liquid manure.
Study: People Are Checking Email & Surfing Internet While Driving [CBS Local]
The Wall Street Journal reports on a 2011 study from Georgetown’s Center on Education and the Workforce, in which it found that the median income of recent fine-arts graduates was a respectable $42,000 and that the unemployment rate for those recent graduates was a better than average 7.8%.
“Artists can have good careers, earning a middle-class income,” says the Center’s director. “And, just as important and maybe more, artists tend to be happy with their choices and lives.”
According to that report, former fine-arts majors are making about the same living as all those people who have a liberal arts degree. In some cases, those with a fine-arts background are actually doing better.
“They do a little better than psychology majors, since counseling and social work is a very low-wage occupation,” explains the director.
Unemployment among those with graduate degrees in the fine arts is below 5%, while the median income goes up a bit to $50,000.
While some people leave behind their easels and trombones when they graduate and go get jobs unrelated to their studies, the Journal cites a Vanderbilt University study of around 2,800 fine-arts graduates and found that, between 1999 and 2009, 4 out of 5 of these artists had found work related to their studies.
So if your kids are talking about wanting to go to college and pursue an education in the arts, don’t assume that this is a dead-end full of debt, when it could be the start of a long and happy career (or at least a good way to spend four years).
It might seem like a giggle and a half to pretend you’re a police offer to get a discount on donuts, but rest assured, cops take it very seriously. Not donuts, impersonating the police. Well okay, also probably donuts but they’re delicious so who can blame’em?
Officials in Florida say the 48-year-old man went to the drive-thru of a local Dunkin’ Donuts last week and said he was a police officer, reports WWSB News. He then asked for a discount on his donuts. A docount?
In any case, the clerk didn’t believe the guy so he allegedly showed his gun and exclaimed, “See, I’m a cop!” Very convincing, but it’s unclear whether he was believed that time.
Not having learned his lesson he apparently went through the drive-thru again, and the manager made a note of his license plate.
Then things got serious and police set up surveillance at the Dunkin’ Donuts, effectively catching the bad customer in a sting. A delicious, jelly-filled sting.
He was arrested and charged with one count of false impersonation of a law enforcement officer and improper exhibition of a firearm.
Man impersonates officer to try and get discount on donuts [WWSB]
If you think you’re sick of seeing the same types of stunts, buzzwords, messages, and gimmicks showing up in TV ads, think of how it must be for the folks paid to come up with advertising ideas. Even when you have fresh ideas, the client might be too timid to take a chance, choosing instead to opt for whatever has been shown to work before. But one Toronto-based agency is doing its best to undercut annoying ad trends, all in the name of promoting itself.
Vice.com has the story of the agency, john st., which has been creating its own promos over the last few years with the simultaneous goals of poking fun at the beaten-to-death advertising trends of the day and trying to get new clients.
In 2011, it swiped a huge paw at the cats-on-the-Internet trend by declaring itself the first Catvertising firm and scored a couple of million views on YouTube:
Then last year, it announced a new, completely fake service called Buyral, “a vast network of professionals, working day and night, constantly clicking on your videos,” an obvious stab at the obnoxious trend of advertisers creating deliberately bizarre commercials with the sole purpose of having them go “viral,” even though that does nothing to actually move product.
The latest self-promo (see it at the top of this post) from john st. is their best thus far, going further in its mockery of viral videos by specifically targeting shock ads that supposedly lure in real people, scare the bejeezus out of them and then sell them a product.
In the spot, the agency promotes its new “Exfearience” ads, in which they do things like sneak into family’s home in the middle of the night while dressed as robbers, only to reveal they’re in a beer ad, or the ad where a mom’s baby is kidnapped in the park and no one seems to care… except the too-calm police officer who reveals that it’s all a setup for a deodorant commercial.
“Fear releases adrenaline, which is directly related to memory,” explains an Exfearience Planner, “so we’re literally searing your brand into their minds.”
“We don’t really do flash mobs… we prefer to create actual mobs,” says a creative director with the agency. “Most ads are dramatic. We want them to be traumatic.”
And our favorite line from the clip:
“You’ve heard about sending people into space? We’re gonna do that, only we’re not gonna bring them back.”
So the question remains as to whether or not john st. is any good at selling other companies’ products. On that, we have absolutely no idea. But if there must be advertising for advertising agencies, at least let it be as self-aware as these spots.
The anonymous agent signed his or her name as “Behind the Clip-on.” You know, the clip-on bow tie. BTC started by quoting from last year’s memo to Best Buy workers about the chain’s planned hours for Thanksgiving and Black Friday. The powers that be decided to open at the stroke of midnight on Black Friday in 2012. According to the memo BTC passed on, they wanted to balance competing with other retailers and letting their employees actually celebrate one of the few holidays that retail workers consistently have off.
“Throughout all the holiday strategy meetings we decided, not only will we have a unique competitive opportunity with a midnight opening,” said the memo, “but we will also provide a balance of being there for our customers when they want us to be there and giving our employees time with their loved ones before the winter holidays.”
This year? None of that compromise nonsense. BTC writes:
This year, our announcement was merely that we would be opening at six o’clock due to what customers had indicated they wanted. There was also a tacked on bit at the end of the internal memo that thanked employees for their upcoming hard work. Hardly inspirational, especially since it is highly unlikely that corporate will be working the long hours we will now be forced to.
Many Best Buy employees will be working split shifts, with part taking place on Thanksgiving, and the rest taking place on Black Friday. For example, Geek Squad members will all be working split shifts in my location, which means that those opening have to be at work around 5:30, leave at midnight, and come back for another 5-6 hours Black Friday. For smaller Best Buy stores with fewer Agents, their plight can best be summed up by this direct quote from one of the Geek Squad managers:
“This is going to be a staffing nightmare…4 agents to work 28 hours with clients here potentially the entire 28 hours…”
Those four Agents are going to have a very long 28 hours, pretty much ruining their Thanksgiving.
That sounds pretty awful: Geeks, you have our sympathy. No, really, you do. We make fun of Geek Squad, but we’re human beings who understand what working terrible split shifts is like. The Geeks are only a small part of the store’s staff, though. What about everyone else? BTC points out a few things that you might not realize about what a 6 P.M. opening on Thanksgiving Day really means. Not everyone rolls in at 5:30 after an early dinner. BTC explains:
Speaking of Sales Support, let’s talk for a bit about how much fun these new hours will be for the Warehouse team, as well as those individuals who are responsible for setting the Black Thursday ad. The ad cannot be set until the store closes Wednesday night…this means that employees will be working late into the night and possibly early morning of Thanksgiving, trying to get everything ready to go. Most of these employees will then need to come back for Black Thursday, I have personally seen one schedule that had the person at Best Buy from 8 am to 4:30 pm on Thanksgiving. I have a feeling his Thanksgiving will be somewhat lacking in cheer.
This is so last minute that employees who naively expected Best Buy to open at midnight as it did last year and bought plane tickets or planned family events are now facing the loss and disruption of those plans. One guy I know personally actually loses pretty much his entire Thanksgiving with his family whom he rarely sees.
And remember, Thanksgiving and Friday work is mandatory, there is no volunteering. If you are sick, you had better show up hacking up a lung or you will be fired. Given that only full time employees have sick days anyhow (and still get written up if they call in sick without staggering into work tangled in their own intestines, although it takes multiple write-ups for termination so this isn’t a big deal most of the year) this adds special luster to an already festive holiday work atmosphere.
Yeah, sounds cheery. While BTC admits that they’re only a front-line employee and don’t know a lot about the big picture or the bottom line, from behind the Geek Squad counter there isn’t much of an advantage to opening earlier every year. “Yes, there will be hundreds of people in line for the store opening…but they will be there no matter what time the store opens,” notes BTC. “The initial rush is always people trying to get the early deals, after which it tapers off for 4-5 hours where there is very little traffic.” Moving the opening time back just means that customers will rush in six hours sooner, and employees will have more time to sit around pondering how their lives have gone wrong. Really, it’s the people camping outside who should be doing that.
Finally, here’s one last bit of wisdom from BTC. If you’re reading Consumerist, you probably already know this, but: be nice to the people who are giving up their holiday, probably against their will, to help you buy stuff.
Remember that Best Buy employees are primarily hard working individuals who are doing the best they can to get your tech wants fulfilled. Many of us are working other jobs as well, trying to make ends meet. Holidays, we are tired and exhausted as no other time in the year, but we still try to greet you with a smile.
[R]emember that we have given up our holiday to help you shop for yours, and you have no idea how much a cheerful customer who shows that they appreciate you being there can do to help the day pass.
[I]f you take some time to show us you appreciate us, we will bend over backward and do handstands to help you (Not literal handstands, typically tech ability does not go hand in hand with athletic ability. Many Agents are shaped more like a pyramid with fuzzy edges and would seriously strain something attempting this).
Customers who show consideration and take time to genuinely thank us instead of shouting or treating us like idiots are rare and are valued as such.
The thing about trees is, they grow. But not fast enough for one Homeowner’s Association, which has been fining a man $10 a day until the amount reached $5,000 because he planted trees that are too small.
The magnolias are just like all the other ones in the neighborhood except for the glaring height difference — the HOA requires that all trees must be above six feet tall in order to maintain an even, matching appearance in the subdivision, reports WESH.com (link has a video that autoplays).
But the man who dared to dream about his little trees growing up thinks that taller isn’t always better, which is why he went small. Other trees in the area that soar above the streets aren’t so healthy, and he thinks it’s because they were planted too tall.
“I don’t think they’re bringing down property values in the neighborhood,” he says of his wee plants, but the HOA says the man’s just got to stick to the agreement he made with the group by living there. So it’s pay up in 20 days time or take the trees down.
“He wanted to make a tree nursery out of an area controlled by the HOA and we said no,” a group rep said of his efforts.
The man is still stunned by the rule, saying it’s hard to face after serving time in the military and wanting to make a home for himself. He doesn’t have the money to pay the fine so the trees will be coming down.
“It’s funny, I don’t have the right to plant a tree in front of my house,” he says. “There’s something wrong there.”
Man fined $5,000 by HOA for trees that are too short [WESH.com]
“There are certain pockets where we’re absolutely going to experience that down tick from the LTE network down to 3G because of capacity constraints,” admitted VZW’s Fran Shammo (not to be confused with Vince ShamWow) during an investor conference on Tuesday.
The issue seems to be that LTE users have become the company’s biggest data hogs, with 64% of VZW’s traffic being used by the 33ish% of its customers with LTE devices. So all that advertising and pushing of LTE devices to consumers worked, but the company can’t always make enough of its network available to meet all customers’ demands.
CNET reports that Shammo (not to be confused with Shamu) told investors that VZW is investing more money into the LTE network, along with investments in small cell technology and using more spectrum to build up network capacity.
“By the end of this year you are going to see all those issues dissipate,” Shammo said. “And then going into next year we will be ahead of the curve again.”
Yesterday, West Virginia Senator Jay Rockefeller introduced S.1680, the “Consumer Choice in Online Video Act” [PDF] which amend the Communications Act of 1934 to deal with the numerous ways in which telecoms have tried slow down streaming video or make it expensive to consumers.
“Online video distribution has the potential to increase consumer choice in video programming, lower prices for video services, bring innovative services to the video distribution marketplace, and disrupt the traditional multichannel video distribution marketplace,” reads the bill.
The bill points out that the quality of service provided by ISPs is essential to the success of online video, and that ISPs that institute usage-based pricing tiers “can negatively impact the competitive position of online video distributors and the appeal of their services to consumers.”
Another problem is that many people get their Internet and cable TV from the same company, meaning it may be in the ISPs selfish interest to make streaming video look bad to consumers who may be tempted to cut the cord.
“Internet service providers that are affiliated with a multichannel video programming distributor or an online video distributor have an increased incentive to degrade the delivery of, or block entirely, traffic from the websites of other online video distributors, or speed up or favor access to the content and aggregation websites of their affiliates, because online video distributors pose a threat to those affiliates’ video programming distribution businesses,” reads the bill.
Thus, the act sets out to put an end to these practices by making them illegal, stating, “It shall be unlawful for a designated Internet service provider to engage in unfair methods of competition or unfair or deceptive acts or practices, the purpose or effect of which are to hinder significantly or to prevent an online video distributor from providing video programming to a consumer.”
As Ars Technica points out, this law would bolster the already existing FCC net neutrality guidelines, which Verizon is currently trying to tear to shreds in court.
In terms of usage-based pricing, the law proposes that data caps may not be used “in a way that deters competition from unaffiliated online video distributors that may be in competition with the Internet service provider’s or its affiliate’s services.” This would seem to be a direct response to companies like Comcast that have tried to argue that their own streaming services should not count against customers’ data caps while those from competitors like Netflix and Amazon would.
And you remember how in the middle of the Time Warner Cable blackout of CBS, the network decided to block streaming content on CBS.com for all TWC customers, regardless of whether they had cable or not? This bill would outlaw that too.
“No video programming vendor that has made available its video programming to consumers online may restrict access to that online video programming for a subscriber of a multichannel video programming distributor or its affiliate, or an online video distributor or its affiliate, during the time that vendor is involved in a dispute with such distributor,” reads the legislation, which GovTrack currently gives an impressive 10% chance of being enacted.
Any workers on overnight, day or evening shifts on Thanksgiving will get a meal on the house from Walmart, a Walmart spokesman says. That’ll be about 1 million employees he added, as the Black Friday sales start at 6 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day this year, reports ABC News.
“We’ll have turkey, mashed potatoes, rolls, and pies. The pies will vary based on regional varieties, so there will be pecan in the south, pumpkin everywhere, probably apple pie in regions where that is traditional. Regional traditions will be reflected in what we bring in,” the spokesman said.
It won’t be bringing in your Grandma to cook, however — catering firms and other restaurants near the stores will cook up the meals. Many stores will offer employees sandwiches to help ease the pain of the holiday rush on Friday as well.
“The idea is to make it as fun and festive as we can,” adds the spokesman.
Walmart’s EVP said as much on Monday, saying any complaints are in the minority because store “associates are really excited to work that day. It’s a pretty high-energy day for associates as well.”
It doesn’t sound fun to at least some workers, one of whom started one of the many Change.org petitions against Walmart’s holiday hours.
“Most businesses are closed on Thanksgiving, I understand that Walmart is a staple in many towns, but everyone survives it being closed on Christmas. As a single mother, it breaks my heart to know that I won’t be able to spend that time with my son,” writes the author of the petition.
Walmart to Give Workers Turkey Dinner on Thanksgiving [ABC News]
(Good Morning America)
Yes, we’re talking about Healthcare.gov, the federal government portal that handles health insurance shopping and enrollment and subsidy applications for people who don’t receive insurance through their employers and who are residents of the 36 states that declined to set up their own exchanges. The reasons why this happened and the real-life fallout of the site’s failure could fill hundreds of pages, and ProPublica has done a great job covering the competing narratives about why the site isn’t quite working as planned. What happens when a person who has no real involvement in the policy or technical aspects of a site like this literally becomes the face of a brand in peril?
In case you haven’t seen it plastered on every surface or acquired your own personal hatred of her as you tried to apply for your own insurance, this is the stock photo we’re talking about:
Password reset confusion.
Adriana appeared on ABC’s “Good Morning America” today to prove that yes, she is a real person. And no, she didn’t program the site by herself.
She’s a pretty typical American: she’s a parent, a wife, and gainfully employed. She’s a legal immigrant from Colombia and a permanent U.S. resident, despite conspiracy-mongers’ claims online that the site mascot was an illegal immigrant. She moved here about six years ago. And she’s human: people making fun of her on the Internet makes her sad.
“I’m glad that my [21-month-old] son is not old enough to understand, because you know whatever happens to you, it hurts them too,” she told interviewer Amy Robach.
Obamacare’s Mystery Woman Says She Fell Victim to Cyberbullies [Good Morning America]
According to the Wall Street Journal, the discussions are in the early stages but the idea is generally that cable customers would be able to get a bundle that includes Hulu Plus membership, and that the Hulu library would be accessed not through a computer or gaming console but through the customer’s cable box.
The Journal also reports that Hulu is talking to AT&T about a wireless bundle that would include Hulu Plus.
A Hulu/cable deal would seem to make sense for all parties. Cable companies, which in most cases are also providing the broadband access to residential subscribers, may be able to convince people from cutting the cord completely by offering a bundle that gives subscribers access to the HuluPlus library on their TVs, especially if it can be done in a way that minimizes any of the hiccups many consumers associate with streaming video. Hulu benefits by opening up its potential subscriber base to consumers who don’t want to hook up a second or third device to their TV or who find it an annoyance to switch between devices.
And since Hulu’s owners — FOX, Disney, Comcast — are also major network and cable broadcasters, they may benefit by giving subscribers an easy way to catch up on serialized programming. This so-called “Netflix effect” has been seen on numerous shows, like Breaking Bad and Vampire Diaries, where viewership increased as seasons progressed because viewers were able to quickly binge-watch previous seasons and get up to speed.
The Journal says that Hulu’s pitch to the networks is that it become the primary repository for their online archives, rather than the fragmented approach currently being used. That may be problematic, given the amount of time and money these companies have invested in their own streaming services and applications (most of which are horrid).
There is also the question of whether or not Hulu can outbid competitors like Netlfix and Amazon. Most network content is not owned by the network, but merely licensed, with the producing studio often controlling the secondary rights for streaming and syndication. One industry insider recently said that Netflix is becoming the preferred route for syndicating TV content and that the licensing money from the streaming service is “pure heroin” to TV studios desperate to see a return on investment.
As part of the 2004 deal with the FTC, Trudeau was allowed to use infomercials to sell his books, so long as he didn’t misrepresent what was actually written in those books. But in the years following that settlement, the regulators learned that Trudeau’s latest round of TV spots sold his weight-loss program as an “easy” diet that didn’t require exercise. Problem is, the program actually calls for an hour of walking each day, a 500 calorie/day diet, and prescription injections of hormones found only in pregnant women. Not exactly easy.
This latest trial did not deal with whether or not the program works. Instead, the question was whether the statements made in the infomercial misrepresented the contents of the product being sold, thus violating the terms of the 2004 court order.
“He made the book sound way better than it actually was,” the prosecutor explained to the jurors. “If he told the truth, that book wasn’t going to sell nearly as well than if he lied.”
Trudeau’s attorneys argued that everything stated in the infomercials was done so in a way as to be stated as Trudeau’s personal opinion, and thus protected under the First Amendment.
“Watch any television commercial for any product — it’s the views and opinions of the persons who are making and selling the product,” argued Trudeau’s attorney. “That’s what advertising is.”
The judge in this case took the unusual step of revoking Trudeau’s bail pending sentencing, claiming the pitchman was too much of a flight risk. Trudeau was recently ordered to jail by the judge in a related civil case over allegations that he has failed to pay any of the $38 million in court-ordered penalties even though he supposedly has funds available to pay at least some of that amount.
Trudeau also spent some time behind bars in 2010 when he called on his followers to deluge the judge in his case with e-mails.
FULL CONFESSION
What a credit card rewards fool I have been… Frankly, I sucked.
I have several credit cards. Over the years, some have changed hands from bank to bank. And most have changed their rewards program one way or another.
While researching this story, I decided I should check in on my own rewards — something I admit I haven’t done in years.
After about an hour on the phone with ridiculously peppy customer service reps, I had redeemed enough points to give me more than $1,800 of credits on my credit card statements, and I arranged for another $75 of gift cards to be delivered to my home. I also got a bonus of five times the points on new purchases between now and the end of the year on one of my cards (I didn’t even have to ask), plus two 0% balance transfer offers that I’m not planning to take.
Why did I suck? I also learned I had let enough points expire that could have meant another $1,500 in cash or account credits.
Yeah, I sucked.
So do as I say, not as I do (Or, did. You know I’ll be checking on my rewards programs more diligently from now on).
Here’s what you need to know to make the most of credit card rewards programs.
THE COST
The first issue to consider with rewards cards is the actual cost to you.
While some cards have no annual fee and reasonable interest rates, studies have shown that many rewards cards charge annual fees and have interest rates that are higher than average.
If you tend to keep a balance on your cards, a higher interest rate will cost you over time. Whatever rewards you redeem may not be worth the extra interest you’re paying, or the annual fee, if there is one.
To help do the math, sites like CreditCardTuneUp.com and NextAdvisor.com offer tools that can help.
Some cards have limits, such as only earning points up to a certain amount of spending. Maybe you get great rewards for your first $2,500 spent, but after that you get nothing, or very little.
Conversely, some credit cards’ rewards don’t really kick in until after you’ve spent a certain amount of money — offering you 1% cash back on your first $2,500 of purchases and 5% afterward. The goal is obviously to entice you to put as much money on your card as possible, making it more than likely that you’ll need to spread out the payments over months, effectively negating any rewards.
You should also pay close attention to the expiration of points or other rewards you may accumulate for spending. If you miss an important deadline (um, like I did) you could lose benefits that otherwise would have mean some greenbacks.
WHAT ARE YOU GETTING?
Call each of your current cards to see exactly what rewards you’re offered and how to redeem them. Make sure the plastic you have supports your needs and interests, before it’s too late.
Here’s some of what you will find:
Earn points: Many cards allow you to accumulate points based on your card usage, and these points can be redeemed for products, gift cards, or even balance credits, depending on the card. Read carefully what you can use your points for, and how many points you get for purchases. Some cards offer, across the board, one point for every $1 spent, while others offer higher points for certain purchases, such as three points for every dollar spent on gasoline or two points for every dollar spent on dining. Match your cards to your spending habits.
Cash back: Some lenders offer cash back, rather than points, based on how much you spend with your card. Understand the benefits for different kinds of purchases and what you can use the cash for.
Earn rebates or discounts: Some cards will give you a rebate, or money back, for purchases at specific retailers. Others give you the equivalent of a coupon for a percentage off of your buys at certain retailers.
Travel: If you’re a frequent traveler, you can find rewards that translate into free or discounted airline tickets, rental cars and hotel stays. Watch out for blackout times, though, which won’t allow you to use rewards to book travel at certain times.
If your card offers rewards for items you’ll never or rarely use, consider sticking it in the back of your wallet in favor of a different card.
MORE FINE PRINT
Let’s face it. Credit card companies are trying to make money. They’re not trying to give you rewards, unless, in their minds, they’re enticing you to spend more, keep balances, pay interest.
As such, rewards are not always as simple as they appear to be.
Some are not available right away, and you may have to wait before your purchases translate into points or future discounts. Most have expiration dates (as I was painfully reminded) so it’s important to understand how quickly you need to use what rewards you earn.
Some cards also penalize your rewards accumulation if you are late on a payment. Your point value could be removed entirely, or you may not be able to accumulate future points. Others may charge a fee to reinstate points that were eliminated from your account because of a late payment.
RESEARCHING CARDS
Because we all have different spending patterns and money needs, it’s hard to say one card is better than another.
There are many resources where you can compare card offerings and find those that meet your needs.
Here are just some of the sites you can use to compare rewards cards and their costs and benefits:
BankRate.com
CardWeb.com
Credit.com
CreditCards.com
LowCards.com
BEFORE YOU DUMP
If you decide to dump some of your cards because the rewards aren’t worth it, take a moment to think about what it may mean for your credit score.
There are two issues to consider.
First, think twice before cancelling your oldest card. Your length of credit history is one of many moving parts of your credit score, though FICO recently said it’s not an important part of your score.
And second, removing a card from your collection could have a negative impact on another part of your score, known as your credit utilization ratio. This looks at how much of your available credit you’re using, and is expressed in a percentage. If you have $10,000 of available credit and you use $2,500, you have a 25% ratio — pretty good. If you then cancel a card with a $5,000 balance limit, you lower your overall available credit to $5,000. That would make your credit utilization ratio 50% — not so good.
If you’re not planning to make any major purchases, such as a home or a car, the dings caused by card cancellations won’t really matter long-term. If you continue to pay on time and keep your balances relatively low, cancelling unneeded cards may be worth the temporary change to your score.
Have a topic you’d like to see covered in How To Not Suck? Or maybe you’re an expert who would like to share your insight with Consumerist readers? Send us a note at notsuck@consumerist.com.
You can read Karin Price Mueller’s stories for The Star-Ledger at NJ.com, follow her on Facebook, and on Twitter @kpmueller.
PREVIOUSLY ON HOW TO NOT SUCK:
How To Not Suck… At Getting Ready For Tax Season
How To Not Suck… At Picking A Retirement Plan
How To Not Suck… At Deciding When To DIY
How To Not Suck… At Getting Out Of Debt
How To Not Suck… At First Year College Budgets
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Equities strategist Brian Sozzi has developed a very specific sideline: taking blog readers on tours of sad, pitiful, delapadated stores belonging to iconic 20th century retailers. This isn’t just a hobby, but is related to his work. Namely, telling people, “for gosh sakes, don’t buy Sears Holdings stock!” Now, his Retail Despair Tour is making a stop at JC Penney.
There’s a lot there to look at. Similar to Kmart and Sears, there are clearance racks crammed full of stuff that nobody wants and display racks that are empty. There are stained carpets and hardware and trash where there shouldn’t be.
Spacious, empty aisles might work at the Apple Store, but here it just puts the focus on the patched-up floor.
When prices reach sub-thrift store levels, it’s a sign that they can’t move merchandise through the store.
What’s supposed to be on these empty racks? Who cares? It’s not like anyone is coming to buy anything anyway.
Who goes to JC Penney to spend $2375 on a bedding set? If you have that much to spend, you’re not visiting a JC Penney store. If you’re already in JC Penney, you don’t want to spend $2375 on a bedding set.
19 Sad Photos That Show A Dying JCPenney [Business Insider]
A man who stands accused of pilfering a Snickers bar from a Brooklyn 7-Eleven is now suing the company over the emotional distress he says he suffered after a video showing the altercation with employees went viral. This is no simple nabbing of a shoplifter and waiting around for the cops to show up.
In the video, employees grab the man as he’s leaving the store, while he protests that he hasn’t taken anything. (You can watch it here , but be warned there’s lots of bad language and thrashing about.)
It’s all downhill from there — during the struggle the man’s clothes are pulled off until eventually he’s left with just a torn shirt around his waist and his pants down to his ankles. At one point during the kerfuffle it appears that an employee bites the man on his back, or at least bares his teeth very closely.
In the year since the Oct. 20, 2012 incident, the video was shown widely on the Internet on numerous news outlet. That lingering reminder of the incident and the situation itself has caused the 29-year-old emotional and physical distress, he says in the lawsuit, which can be read here.
The suit calls the incident a “violent, unprovoked and widely publicized assault…completely disproportionate to what they were accusing him of: stealing a candy bar.”
In addition to suffering “bruising, bite marks and…physical pain,” the plaintiff also endured “serious and permanent injuries…pain, shock and mental anguish…These injuries and their effects will be permanent.”
He’s seeking a jury trial and unspecified damages over the brawl.
CONFUSED FROM THE START
Since the dawn of financial aid, schools have often sent out misleading and mislabeled financial aid offer letters to potential students, lumping together various potential sources of aid or making inaccurate assumptions about parental contributions.
In 2011, the Dept. of Education released a very helpful, simplified financial aid “shopping sheet” that more clearly spells out exactly what are the costs for attending the school, what grants are being offered, and the various loan options.
The shopping sheet allows applicants to compare apples to apples when looking at schools, rather than forcing them to decode each particular college’s financial aid offer. This would be great, if every school adopted the shopping sheet, but colleges have been very slow on transitioning to the simplified form, meaning students are left in the dark.
“Many consumers wrote to us that they didn’t fully understand their options upfront for financing college,” writes Consumers Union, “or stated that the financial aid application process was opaque and
confusing.”
To that end, CU is calling on Congress to require a standardized shopping sheet for all colleges — and one that goes a step further than the DOE sheet by plainly showing what the student’s monthly payments will be after leaving school.
OVER-BORROWING
Because of the confusion early on in the financial aid process, many students and their families tell CU that they ended up taking out either too many loans or taking out higher-interest private student loans when they had not yet maxed out their ability to get lower-interest federal and state aid.
Consumers Union is asking schools to provide worthwhile, unbiased pre-loan counseling (as opposed to the shenanigans at some for-profit colleges that were caught encouraging applicants to take out as many loans as possible) so that students know what they are getting into in the long run.
“Especially when it comes to private loans, schools need to step in and explain the differences between private and federal loans, and ensure that students have exhausted their options for federal aid first before taking out private loans,” reads the report.
REPAYMENT RIGIDITY:
One of the most common complaints about student loan repayment — especially with regard to private student loans — is the inflexibility of repayment plans. Given the current job market, it could take quite some time for a recent graduate to get a job, let alone one that pays well enough so that student loan payments are not putting them further into debt. Yet many private loans have minimal or no income-based repayment options. Banks also tend to say no when consumers ask to refinance their existing private loans to a lower interest rate.
Thus, Consumers Union is calling on Congress to require all lenders to offer flexible, affordable and manageable repayment options, including income-based repayment plans, deferments and forbearances, as well as acceptance of partial payments.
LOAN DIS-SERVICING:
It’s not just home loans that lenders are inept at servicing. Perhaps the most frequently complained-about issue with student loans is confusion and general idiocy on the part of those servicing the loans.
One example cited in the CU report is from a borrower who was trying to dispute the interest rate on his loan — he claimed to have agreed to a fixed APR of 6% while the servicer contended he’d agreed to variable rate loan that was now at 13.5% — but could not get anyone at the servicer to provide him a copy of the loan documents to resolve the issue.
Another borrower says that because her loan has been sold off and passed along so may times over the years that she’s had to take the initiative to be proactive with each servicer switch so that she doesn’t fall behind on payments.
“Congress and the CFPB should require student loan servicers to establish clear procedures and a single point of contact for questions and complaints,” writes CU. “Complaint handling, resolution and appeals should be centralized and monitored by regulators.”
STOP LYING TO STUDENTS:
As alleged in the recent lawsuit filed in California against one for-profit college network, schools don’t always provide applicants with accurate information about the success of their graduates or the quality of the education being provided. So in the end, those students may have spent many, many thousands of dollars on a program that promises to land them a job but fails to deliver.
The CU report calls on Congress and the CFPB to prohibit deceptive marketing, abusive collection and servicing practices, and other fraudulent practices. It also pushes for the Department of Education to issue a strong “gainful employment” rule to prevent students and taxpayers from subsidizing low-performing career colleges.
You can check out the full report at CU’s DefendYourDollars.org.
The two were duking it out under an arbitrator, who decided yesterday that Starbucks will fork over $2.23 billion in damages plus another $527 million in prejudgment interest and attorneys fees after Starbucks slunk out of a deal early. Mondelez International will get the money as it spun off from Kraft in 2012, reports USA Today.
Things went sour in March 2011 when Starbucks skipped out on a contract it had with Kraft since 1998 that allowed the food company to sell its bagged beans in grocery stores.
Both sides blamed each other, of course: Starbucks said Kraft mismanaged the brand, causing breach of contract. But Kraft said that wasn’t so and told Starbucks it had to pay up as it was going to lose $500 million per year without that deal.
“We strongly disagree with the arbitrator’s conclusion,” said Troy Alstead, Starbucks chief financial officer, in a statement. “We believe Kraft did not deliver on its responsibilities to our brand under the agreement.”
Dispute with Kraft costs Starbucks $2.7 billion [USA Today]
Yes, for people who simply must own the latest gadgets but who also have no idea how they work, Geek Squad’s Gaming Setup service is here to help. We know, we know, most of the value here is in coming to the customer’s house and making sure that everything works.
GAMING SETUP [Geek Squad]
Geek Squad Will Setup Your PS4 or Xbox One for Just $99 [Gotta Be Mobile]
