Slashdot Mirror
Blockbuster Settles No Late Fee Suit
fistfullast33l writes "In a followup to a previous Slashdot story, Blockbuster has settled a lawsuit with 47 states and the District of Columbia over its No Late Fees advertising campaign. The New York State Attorney General's Office released the following: 'The Attorneys General alleged that the advertising campaign launched in late December 2004 was misleading because it failed to clearly disclose that, seven days after a movie or game's return due date, the consumer would be charged its selling price if the item were not yet returned. The Attorneys General also alleged there was insufficient disclosure that not all Blockbuster franchise stores were participating, leaving customers of those stores wrongly believing that they, too, would not have to pay late fees.' Blockbuster will be refunding customers as part of the deal." Additional commenary available on MSNBC.
The idea is that when you return it, you get a refund, but you still have to pay a "restocking fee"
Scenario: Consumer "Bob" rents movie "Incredibles" from Blockbuster.
2 weeks later, 1 week after due date. Blockbuster charges "Bob's" account $17.95 for "Incredibles"
1 week after that: "Bob" brings movie back. Blockbuster credits "Bob's" account for 17.95 minus a "restocking" fee for putting the movie back on the shelf.
Not "late fees" per se, but still extra clams to shell out.
I have this really funny quote that I like to put here. Unfortunately, there's this really annoying thing called a char
Why?
Probably because they are demanding more from blockbuster? It was a settlement not a judgement, so I'm assuming that the other states are holding out for a bigger settlement.
Blockbuster wants to settle:
Blockbuster spokeswoman, Karen Raskopf, said the settlement excluded the state of New Jersey, which last month filed a lawsuit accusing Blockbuster of failing to disclose key terms of its new rental policy.
``We continue to talk to them. We are hopeful we can reach a resolution with New Jersey,'' Raskopf said.
Well, to some extent that is the entire purpose of consumer protection laws. People can be very naive, particularly when a marketing campaign is designed specifically to tug at the ol' greed strings.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Agreed. I think any Netflix subscriber probably would have guessed that Blockbuster had adopted this model when they heard the "no late fee" ad campaign.