3,250 Flights Canceled Today, Another 4,000 Delayed

FlightAware’s Misery Map shows how bad the weather has affected travel in the Southeast. With the storm headed toward the Northeast, expect the map to show a lot more red around D.C. and NYC.

As ice and snow once again socks the Southeast and makes its way northward, thousands of flights are being canceled or delayed, leaving travelers around the country stranded and unsure of when they will be able to fly again.

According to the latest data from FlightAware.com, 3,259 flights had already been canceled at U.S. airports by 12:30 p.m. ET today, with 4,039 flights delayed.

The two airports most directly impacted by the weather are Hartsfield-Jackson in Atlanta — the world’s busiest airport in terms of passenger traffic and Delta’s largest hub airport — and Charlotte/Douglas in Charlotte, NC, the home hub for US Airways.

As of right now, 832 flights out of ATL had been canceled today, with 807 incoming flights called off. In Charlotte, 392 outbound flights have been canceled, along with 408 inbound flights.

So not surprisingly, Delta and US Airways are among the airlines with the most cancelations, with 1,199 and 216 flights canceled, respectively.

Passengers booked to travel to the Southeast, Mid-Atlantic or Northeast in the coming days should check with their carrier now to see what flights are being canceled and what, if any rescheduling relief is being offered to impacted customers.

Delta’s website says travel booked through Feb. 13 to these Southeast cities — Asheville, NC; Atlanta; Charlotte, NC; Greensboro, NC; Greenville, SC; Huntsville, AL; Norfolk, VA; Raleigh, NC — can be rescheduled without a change fee, so long as the rebooked flight departs no later than Feb. 17.

For travel scheduled on Delta to these Northeast cities on Feb. 13 or Feb. 14 — Allentown, PA; Baltimore; Bangor, ME; Boston; Harrisburg, PA; Hartford, CT; Manchester, NH; New York JFK; New York LaGuardia; Newark; Newburgh, NY; Philadelphia; Portland, ME; Providence, RI; Washington Dulles; Washington Reagan National; White Plains, NY — can rebook without a change fee if the rescheduled flight departs no later than Feb. 19.

US Airways is allowing passengers with travel booked in the coming days to reschedule, depending on the date of travel and the destination city.

US Airways passengers scheduled to fly to any of these Southeast airports — Birmingham, AL ; Huntsville, AL ; Atlanta, GA ; Augusta, GA ; Salisbury, MD ; Asheville, NC ; Charlotte, NC ; Fayetteville, NC ; Greensboro, NC ; Greenville, NC ; Jacksonville, NC ; New Bern, NC ; Raleigh/Durham, NC ; Wilmington, NC ; Charleston, SC ; Columbia, SC ; Florence, SC ; Greenville, SC ; Johnson City, TN ; Knoxville, TN ; Charlottesville, VA ; Lynchburg, VA ; Newport News, VA ; Norfolk, VA ; Richmond, VA ; Roanoke, VA — today or tomorrow (2/12) are being given the option of rescheduling their trip to Feb. 13,14,15,16 or 17. No change fee should apply if the destination city remains the same, but the airline isn’t offering a firm guarantee that you won’t have to pay any additional money.

For US Airways travelers heading to these Northeast cities — Hartford, CT ; New Haven, CT ; Washington, DC (Dulles Int’l Airport) ; Washington, DC (Reagan National) ; Bangor, ME ; Portland, ME ; Baltimore, MD ; Boston, MA ; Manchester, NH ; Newark, NJ ; Albany, NY ; Binghamton, NY ; Islip, NY ; New York, NY (JFK Airport) ; New York, NY (LaGuardia) ; White Plains, NY ; Allentown, PA ; Harrisburg, PA ; Philadelphia, PA ; Scranton, PA ; State College, PA ; Williamsport, PA ; Providence, RI — on Feb. 13 or Feb. 14, the airline is making the same vague no-change-fee offer to those willing to reschedule to Feb. 15,16,17,18 or 19.

Though American Airlines is now merged with US Airways, there is slightly different info on its website.

American is waiving change fee once (so don’t expect to make multiple revisions to your itinerary without being charged a fee for people heading to these Southeast cities through Feb. 13 — Asheville/Hendersonville, NC; Atlanta, GA; Augusta, GA; Birmingham, AL; Charlotte, NC; Charlottesville, VA; Columbia, SC; Fayetteville, NC; Florence, SC; Greensboro/Highpoint, NC; Greenville/Spartanburg, SC; Greenville, NC; Huntsville, AL; Jacksonville, NC; Knoxville, TN; Lynchburg, VA; New Bern, NC; Newport News, VA; Norfolk, VA; Raleigh / Durham, NC; Richmond, VA; Roanoke, VA; Salisbury, MD; Tri City, TN; Wilmington, NC.

The same policy applies to travel booked to these Northeast destinations on Feb. 13-14 — Albany, NY; Allentown / Bethlehem, PA; Baltimore, MD; Bangor, ME; Binghamton, NY; Boston; Harrisburg, PA; Hartford Springfield, CT; Islip, NY; Manchester, NH; Newark; New Haven, CT; New York LaGuardia; New York JFK; Philadelphia; Providence, RI; Portland, ME; Scranton/Wilkes Barre, PA; State College University Park, PA; Washington Dulles; Washington Reagan Nat’l; Westchester County, NY; Williamsport, PA.

Here is info from the Southwest website:

Cities eligible for flexible accommodations Wednesday, February 12:

Atlanta (ATL)

Birmingham (BHM)

Charlotte (CLT)

Greenville/Spartanburg (GSP)

Jackson (JAN)

Nashville (BNA)

Raleigh/Durham (RDU)

Cities eligible for flexible accommodations Wednesday February 12 and Thursday, February 13:

Baltimore (BWI)

Charleston (CHS)

Norfolk (ORF)

Richmond (RIC)

Washington Dulles (IAD)

Washington Reagan National (DCA)

Cities eligible for flexible accommodations Thursday, February 13 and Friday, February 14:

Albany (ALB)

Boston (BOS)

Hartford (BDL)

Long Island/Islip (ISP)

Manchester (MHT)

New York (LaGuardia) (LGA)

Newark (EWR)

Philadelphia (PHL)

Portland (PWM)

Providence (PVD)

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

Police Catch Phone Thieves Who Robbed Girl Scouts Selling Cookies

What kind of monster robs Girl Scouts selling cookies out in front of a grocery store? Teenage boys, apparently. Police in Florida have made an arrest in the theft of a smartphone (a Samsung Galaxy S3, if you keep track of these things) from the sales table. The suspect is a 15-year-old boy.

Unlike the Great 2013 Girl Scout Cookie Crime Wave, only the phone was taken in this theft. The suspect left the cookies and cash undisturbed. He’s being charged with grand felony theft because the stolen item was a pricey smartphone.

“We see this as your victimizing these children that are here trying to, you know, better themselves and the community and you’re going to take something from them,” a police spokeswoman told the media.

Always be alert when you’re out selling things to the public, especially if you’re in charge of cash, merchandise, and your personal electronics.

Hungry for Girl Scout Cookies? The online Cookie Locator shows you where you can find them in your area. There’s also a mobile app.

Arrest Made In Girl Scout Phone Theft [CBS Miami]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Family Of Deceased Amazon Worker: No One Noticed Her Lying In Parking Lot For 7 Hours

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The family of a Delaware woman who died after she was found lying outside in the parking lot of the Amazon distribution center where she worked has a lot of questions this week: Namely, how could no one have seen her lying there for at least seven hours, with her car running?

Police are investigating the death of the 46-year-old woman who was found early Monday morning, after she’d finished a Sunday shift around 6 p.m.

“She got off work, and it appears she was clearing off her vehicle from the snow and ice and must have collapsed between her car and the one next to hers,” the police chief tells The News Journal. An autopsy ruled that she died of natural causes.

But her sister is wondering how no one saw her body or noticed that an empty car was running with door open — isn’t that what surveillance cameras are for? Well, they are, but it sounds like Amazon’s weren’t working.

“Apparently, Amazon was having problems with their camera system from 5 p.m. onward, and no one saw her out there,” the police chief explained.

An Amazon spokeswoman had no insight into the non-operational cameras, saying only: “We are deeply saddened, and our thoughts go out to [the worker's] family and loved ones.”

The woman’s mother finally discovered her after going out to find her daughter when she hadn’t come home, and another family member who works for Amazon as well directed her to the area where the woman usually parked. She found her on the ground between two vehicles and called 911, but emergency responders were unable to revive her.

“Her car wasn’t parked that far from the door,” her sister said, adding that no one told the family why the cameras didn’t see anything.

“The car was running from 6 p.m. to 1 a.m. If I saw a car running that long, I would have investigated it.”

Family: Amazon worker outside seven hours before body discovered [The News Journal]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

‘You’re Not Bankrupt? Our Bad’: Fifth Third Bank Accidentally Reports Customers As Bankrupt

How does go about accidentally being listed as bankrupt? Doesn’t seem possible, what with all the paperwork and such, right? Unless, of course, your bank takes the initiative and does it for you. And that’s just what happened for several Fifth Third Bank customers recently.

A number of Fifth Third Bank customers received letters notifying them of an error in which the “bank inadvertently reported that you had filed for bankruptcy” to the major credit bureaus, including Equifax and TransUnion, Cincinnati News Channel WLWT reports.

The problem occurred late last fall during a systems change and affected a “limited number” of customers, officials at the Cincinnati-based bank say.

The error was corrected in December through updated reporting to credit bureaus and steps have been taken to insure the problem does not recur. Bank officials say customers do not need to take any action on the issue.

“The accuracy of our customers’ credit history is important to us and we will insure that no customer will suffer negative impact,” bank officials said in a statement released on Tuesday.

Although the bank said there was no impact on customer’s credit scores some Fifth Third Bank customers are still worried.

“It would have been nice if they automatically sent off for my credit report so that I would have had the peace of mind at the same time because at this point there’s no proof that it’s been fixed,” a bank customer tells WLWT.

5/3 Bank accidentally reported some customers as filing for bankruptcy [WLWT]

by Ashlee Kieler via Consumerist

Be Proactive: Keep Track Of Your Auto-Payments Before You Lose Them All

(photo%phreak)

Sure, being able to set up automatic payments is the salvation of people who are financially forgetful. If you lose track of which payments you have set up on which card, though, you’re in for some serious problems if you have to change your credit or debit card numbers.

We should say: when you have to change your credit or debit card numbers. If the widespread Target card breach didn’t scare you, it should have. Many consumers whose cards were caught up in that net of crime now suddenly have new card numbers to deal with. The card numbers aren’t really the problem: it’s tracking down which accounts you have set up to auto-pay which other accounts that can be a headache.

Whether your cards were caught up in the Target breach or not, take this opportunity to get your auto-payments in writing so you know which cards are signed up where, and which payments to change in case of a card number breach.

Our financial wizard colleagues over at Consumer Reports suggest making a comprehensive list of all auto-debits you have set up, whether they use plastic or electronic funds transfer. If the account does use a card, make a note of the expiration date, and make sure to update the account before your card expires. (If you’re really organized, make a note of this in your calendar.)

Some bills let you set up backup funding sources: consider this in order to avoid interruptions in service or late fees for key bills.

Target breach shows why you must keep track of your automatic payments [Consumer Reports]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Groups Call On Walgreens To Stop “Evaluating” Cigarette Sales And Just Stop Them Already

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Last week, Walgreens responded to the news that CVS would stop selling cigarettes by saying it was “evaluating its tobacco line.” That didn’t sit well with some advocacy groups who have called on the nation’s largest drugstore chain to give up its nicotine addiction.

In a letter to Walgreens CEO Greg Wasson (not to be confused with Nightmare On Elm Street 3 star Craig Wasson), representatives for the National Consumers League, the Center for Science in the Public Interest, and Change to Win Retail Initiatives, ask the retailer to follow the lead of CVS and stop selling and advertising tobacco products.

“[R]emoving tobacco products from your stores would be consistent with Walgreens’ mission statement to help consumers ‘get, stay and live well,’” reads the letter. “We know that your company understands the devastation caused by tobacco… Selling tobacco products is therefore at odds with Walgreens’ stated mission to promote health.”

The letter cites the positions of organizations like the American Pharmacists Association and the American Medical Association who support bans on tobacco sales in pharmacies.

What the letter doesn’t mention is that Walgreens response to the CVS announcement was to tout its smoking-cessation program, which happens to be sponsored by Merck, the huge drug company that just happens to have the license on Nicorette products in the U.S. To some, it creates a conflict of interest for a store to simultaneously sell cigarettes and a program to help people quit cigarettes.

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

Wedding Dress Switcheroo Ends In Happy Reunions For Two Women 9 Years After Mix-Up

(Mia Oh)

In the life of the average wedding dress, there’s really only one shining moment: The Big Day. But because dresses often cost a pretty penny, many brides will lovingly pack them up and preserve them, just in case they want to pull them out again some day. One bride was devastated when she went to pull out her dress for an vow renewal ceremony only to find a stranger’s gown in her storage box.

Her eight-year-old son had suggested his parents get married again, reports the Tampa Bay Times, because he had seen all his parents’ pictures and wanted to be in them this time. So the couple decided to have a vow renewal ceremony on their ninth anniversary, complete with the dress she wore the first time around.

About a month before the ceremony, she broke the seal of the preservation packaging and pulled out what was supposed to be the dress her husband had sent to the dry cleaner almost a decade before. But alas, it wasn’t her dress.

She canceled the ceremony and stopped all the plans, and said she was heartbroken over the loss of her ivory gown.

But instead of moping, she went on the hunt: She tracked down the dry cleaners where the dress had been dropped off, and was told that the preservation had been outsourced to a company in New York. She launched a Facebook campaign and contacted the media to raise awareness of the dress, in the hopes that at least someone might recognize the dress she had in the box.

“I figured I could at least get back her dress even if I couldn’t find mine,” she said.

Finally, after her story aired on her local news, the preservation company was able to find her dress and shipped it back to her.

“I think it’s a miracle,” she said. “I can’t believe I got my dress back.”

Apparently when the company received her dress, they’d also lost track of another bride’s gown and mixed up the invoices. The owner says it’s the first mix-up they’ve had in the business’ 13 years.

And in another twist of cosmic fate — the woman whose dress was in that box lived only three miles away. She figured her dress was a lost cause and come to terms with it. When the newspaper tracked her down and told her there was a woman who had her missing dress, she was happy to get back a piece of her past.

“Several people at that wedding are not with us anymore,” she said. “It will be really nice to have something special from a time when they were all in our lives.”

As for the first woman? The couple’s renewal ceremony is back on. And even better — the dress still fits.

“They say it’s bad luck to wear your dress twice,” she said. “But I don’t believe any of that.”

Two brides find missing wedding dresses 10 years later [Tampa Bay Times]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Don’t Ask The Teen Taco Bell Employee To Hold On To Your Bottle Of Booze Until Tomorrow

(frankieleon.)

There’s asking a fast food employee to do you a minor favor — like asking for extra condiments or having a dirty booth wiped down — and then there’s asking that employee to do something against the law — like stashing your bottle of booze in the eatery’s fridge for a day or so.

The Express-Star in Grady County, OK, has the story of an area man who faces charges of providing alcohol to a minor after he was caught handing a bottle of spirits to an unwitting 19-year-old Taco Bell staffer.

According to police, the man first asked the employee for a cigarette, then handed her a bottle with the request that she stash it in the Bell freezer overnight. He then ambled off toward a nearby Arby’s.

Not sure what to do, the teen took the bottle to her boss. Believing the bottle to contain alcohol, the boss contacted police, who tracked the man down to the Arby’s bathroom.

The man admitted to the officer that he’d just been to Taco Bell, but angrily denied giving away his joy juice to the teen employee. The officer detected the classic signs of intoxication — bloodshot eyes, unsteady balance, slurred speech, and presumably the fact that he was wandering around from fast food joint to fast food joint — and arrested him on allegations of public intoxication and providing alcohol to a minor.

The lesson to be learned: If you’re going to ask a Taco Bell staffer to hold onto your booze for the night, at least make sure she’s an adult before doing so. Then don’t do it and just go home and sleep it off.

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

Don’t Want To Be Depressed By Walking Into Sears? Retailer Now Trying Curbside Pick-Up

Over the last few years, a number of former Sears customers have said that one of the reasons they no longer shop at the once-great department store is that it’s just depressing to walk around inside the store and see empty shelves, run-down conditions, and disarray. How can Sears fix that? By keeping customers in their cars!

Perhaps taking its cue from last year’s ad in which Sears admitted that it’s only value is available parking, the new curbside order pick-up procedure seems to work a lot like Sears’ current 5-minute guarantee for in-store pick-ups, though it requires the use of a mobile app, rather than just waiting in line at a counter.

You place the order online, select the curbside option after you checkout. Your supposed to give Sears some specifics about your car — make, model, color — so it can identify your car. The service is free to Shop Your Way members.

When you arrive at the store to get your order, you pull into one of the reserved parking spots for in-car pick-up customers and check in using the Sears Shop Your Way app on your smartphone. This starts the 5-minute countdown clock.

Before that timer hits zero, a Sears employee is supposed to have your order in your car and get you on your way. If the store fails to meet that deadline, then the customer is entitled to a $5 coupon.

Let’s just hope that Sears employees don’t try to manipulate this 5-minute guarantee by stopping the clock prematurely. In 2012, a Consumerist reader put rumors of clock-manipulation to the test and the results were not pretty.

[via Washington Post]

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

Toyota Recalling 1.9 Million Priuses To Fix Software Glitch That Could Slow Or Stop Cars

(stellarviewer)

The computers have won. At least the computers in about 1.9 million Toyota Prius vehicles have won, as the company says it’s recalling that number of vehicles to fix a software glitch that could cause the cars to slow down or completely stop.

That’s not an insignificant number, points out Bloomberg News — it’s more than half the Prius cars ever sold, and includes cars made around the world since March 2009, according to a Toyota spokesman. About 700,000 of those recalled Prius vehicles are in the U.S.

Since the cars were first released in 1997 there have been about 3.6 million vehicles delivered worldwide .

The glitchy software can also cause some parts to overheat in certain scenarios like when you’re accelerating from a stopped position, a spokesman said. The car then goes into a failsafe mode that allows you to drive but at reduced power. Sometimes this system can totally shut down and stop the car.

In an announcement on the corporate site, Toyota says there haven’t been any accidents or injuries reported due to the software issue.

Separate from the Prius recall, Toyota is also recalling about 260,000 other vehicles in the U.S. to address a different issue with the 2012 and 2013 model years of the Toyota Tacoma pickup, the Lexus RX 350 sport utility vehicle and the 2012 Toyota RAV4 SUV.

Owners of affected vehicles will receive a software update free of charge and will be notified by first class mail when the dealers are ready with the software updates. Check out http://ift.tt/15YuciG or call the Toyota Customer Experience Center at 1-800-331-4331 for more information.

Lexus customers can visit http://ift.tt/19izdCo or call the Lexus Customer Satisfaction Center at 1-800-25-LEXUS (1-800-255-3987).

Toyota to Recall 1.9 Million Priuses to Update Software [Bloomberg News]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist