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1000s of Online Shoppers Sold their Souls to Sneaky Store

We have preached for years that you have to read the fine print in advertising, on product labels, and in contracts or you could get snookered.

Well, some 7,500 online shoppers earlier this month didn’t heed that advice and unwittingly sold their souls to a British computer game seller. How could that happen? The company buried this new clause in their terms and conditions:

*MOUSE PRINT:

“By placing an order via this Web site on the first day of the fourth month of the year 2010 Anno Domini, you agree to grant Us a non transferable option to claim, for now and for ever more, your immortal soul. Should We wish to exercise this option, you agree to surrender your immortal soul, and any claim you may have on it, within 5 (five) working days of receiving written notification from gamesation.co.uk or one of its duly authorised minions.”

But, being the consumer-conscious company that they are, Game Station provided a convenient opt-out provision:

*MOUSE PRINT:

“If you a) do not believe you have an immortal soul, b) have already given it to another party, or c) do not wish to grant Us such a license, please click the link below to nullify this sub-clause and proceed with your transaction.”

How many people opted out? A mere 12%. Pretty sad commentary on the number of people who actually read the fine print on websites.

The company, incidentally, is returning all the souls to their rightful owners, since this was an April Fool’s joke.

Thanks to Randy C. for submitting this story idea. You can read more about it here.

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The Case of the Disappearing Charity Donation

Those who watched the Apprentice a week ago Sunday saw a competition to promote the sale of Symantec’s Norton 360 computer protection software that is packaged along with Lifelock’s identity fraud protection service for $79.99. The commercial that immediately followed the selection of the winner promised to give $10 of each sale to a particular charity.

What probably went unnoticed by most people was a fine print disclaimer that flashed on the screen momentarily, limiting the donation.

*Mouse Print:

“up to $25,000”

While certainly any donation to a charity is a kind gesture by these companies, and $10 is a good percentage of the selling price, the cap on the donation really means that only the first 2500 orders will trigger it. If your company had in essence a two hour commercial for a product on national TV, wouldn’t you expect that tens of thousands of orders would be placed? If you then ran a commercial the following week on the Apprentice (last night) and said the charitable donation offer was being continued, wouldn’t you expect even more people to sign up? And wouldn’t you expect some goodly percentage of people watching either week might erroneously believe that they were helping a charity when in fact they may not have been?

To add insult to injury, if someone visits the Apprentice website at NBC.com, to find out about the offer, they would have seen the ad above. When clicking it, the user is taken to this descriptive page:

In neither place is there any mention of a $10 donation. In fact, in order for there to be a $10 donation, one of two promo codes have to be filled in on the order form (and they are not mentioned at all on the NBC site).

*MOUSE PRINT:

To make matters worse, a promo code that does not trigger the charitable donation is already filled in on the ordering page.

*MOUSE PRINT:

To their credit, both Lifelock and Symantec mention the charitable donation limit of $25,000 on their websites (albeit in small type), and pre-fill-in the proper code on their ordering forms. Mouse Print* wrote to NBC and Symantec to point out the problem, but no explanation or fix has yet been made.

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Comcast’s 2-Year “Guaranteed Rate” Increases

There is a change in the way “triple plays” for TV, Internet, and phone service are being marketed by major cable companies. Advertised promotions used to be limited to six months or a year at the most. Now many of them are for two years. This can be good or bad, depending on the details (which of course are not always immediately obvious).

Comcast/Xfinity is currently running a TV commercial touting a “guaranteed rate” (in large type) of $99 a month. The announcer even says:

“We’ll guarantee your rate for two years.”

One might come away with the impression that the $99 rate is guaranteed for two years, but that is not so.

*MOUSE PRINT:

In surprisingly large type, but much smaller than the $99 rate, Comcast discloses that the rate  jumps up $16 a month in the second year. Does that disclosure really overcome the other representations in the ad about the $99 price and the oral promise guaranteeing the rate — not “rates” — for two years?

It is unclear whether one would be allowed to cancel the deal after the first year, or if the customer is bound to a two year contract (and possible early termination fees).