Business

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PC World: Thanks for Subscribing?

Recently, MrConsumer’s PC World subscription was running out, and he had no intention of resubscribing. Then comes this surprising letter:

PC World envelope

What? Thank you for what? This says you are confirming my order. What order? I didn’t place an order? Did you charge my credit card without my permission?

Inside is a “new order confirmation” which says…

*MOUSE PRINT:

PC World confirmation

“Thank you for your previous subscription….”

What a bunch of crap.

Mouse Print* wrote to the publisher, IDG, asking why they would stoop to using this type of deception, and whether they would now discontinue such a misleading practice.

Their response: they sent none.

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Yuuup, Storage Wars Auctions May be Rigged

Storage Wars MrConsumer admits it — he is a fan of Storage Wars, the A&E cable series. In the show, the contents of abandoned storage lockers are auctioned off each week to the highest bidder. There are four recurring and quirky cast members, who, along with members of the public, bid blindly on these storage lockers in the hopes of finding some treasure amongst the junk. The cast members almost always win a storage locker in each auction, and many times they find an antique or other unexpected treasure worth thousands of dollars.

Now, one of the four regulars, Dave Hester (famous for placing bids by exclaiming “yuuup”), alleges in a lawsuit that the show is rigged. He claims, among other things, that the producers “salt” lockers with high-value items to heighten excitement when a successful cast member “finds” it, and that they assist the less well-financed cast member bidders who would not otherwise have enough money to pay for the storage lockers on which they are bidding.

Hester spoke out about these problems to A&E executives, suggesting that these practices were in essence rigging a game show, which is against federal law. Hester says he was then fired after the producers had already exercised an option to renew his $25,000 per episode contract. He filed a lawsuit against them last week.

*MOUSE PRINT: Excerpt from lawsuit:

Storage Wars suit

As a regular viewer, MrConsumer always wondered about several things in this “reality” show:

1. With dozens of bidders present at most auctions, how is it that the cast members almost always seem to be the winners?

2. Why would cast members bid often thousands of dollars for abandoned junk, that on its face, is worth no more than a few hundred dollars?

3. If such valuable items were stored in these lockers, why wouldn’t the true owner have paid the minimal storage bill or removed the valuable items before failing to make monthly payments?

4. With cast members seemingly only bidding against each other as the prices rose beyond what an average citizen would bid for a pile of used household goods, were the producers subsidizing those above fair market value bids?

Now we may know the answer.

*MOUSE PRINT:

As we have asserted before, some of the worst mouse print is the mouse print that is missing. There is no disclaimer in the television program credits stating that the producers of the show offer financial assistance to some bidders and that some items are “found” for dramatic effect.

A&E has had no comment on the lawsuit yet, but earlier this year said in a statment, “there is no staging involved. The items uncovered in the storage units are the actual items featured on the show.”

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Choice Hotels: That Room Safe Could Cost You

A regular Mouse Print* reader, Bob, recently returned from a cross-country car trip and wrote to complain about what he calls the “hotel safe scam.” Here’s his story:

You check into a hotel, and you are asked to initial a registration form in several places and then sign it. You initial to accept the hotel’s rate. You initial to acknowledge the non-smoking policy. And again for the no-pets policy. Some hotels also ask you to initial the “optional” safe fee. Then you sign at the bottom.

People are tired, distracted, in a hurry, or perhaps their English isn’t so good. If you stay in enough hotels, it all becomes routine. Many consumers just do as they are asked without reading.

The safe fee is usually $1.50 per day, but sometimes a different amount. Supposedly, it’s for the use of the safe. In some cases, I found the safe locked and unusable, but that made no difference to the charge.

An “optional” fee is rather extraordinary. The hotel form often says that you can ask for the fee to be removed. Some say they will remove the fee up to 60 days later. If you ask up front that the fee be removed, some tell you to ask again at checkout. In every case, when I insisted that the fee be removed, it was, although I had to ask twice sometimes.

The safe fee is a hidden-in-plain-sight scam. The hotels expressly tell you about the fee and rely on inertia to get your money. The hotels know that most people won’t notice or won’t object. Checkout at most hotels doesn’t require any action by a consumer. The hotel often slips a bill under your door, and you can leave without stopping at the front desk.

Sure enough, some Choice hotels tack on a “safe with limited warranted” charge of $1.50 a day onto your bill:

*MOUSE PRINT:

Choice safe charge

Mouse Print* contacted the PR folks at Choice Hotels to ask for an explanation of this charge and why they chose a sneaky way to raise the cost of a hotel room. The company did not respond.

The lesson here is clear: don’t blindly initial all the Xs on that card when you first register at a hotel, and scrutinize your bill for “optional” charges that the hotel might tack onto it.