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Consumers Union Wants You to Share Your Story

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the tell-it-like-it-is dept.

dcgirl20006 writes "Consumers Union, publisher of Consumer Reports launched a new site to help consumers across the country who are dealing with phone bills, cell phone contracts, cable packages and Internet scams. Consumers experiencing problems are not alone. The site is searchable and consumers can find one that most closely matches the situation in which they are in. We don't have all the answers to every problem consumers may face, but some consumers have shared solutions and suggestions."

3 of 174 comments (clear)

  1. Re:If it's so new... by angle_slam · · Score: 4, Informative
    Also, the few I read seemed to me like more of cases where people failed to read the fine print and then got upset when the other party enforced their contract rights.Because sometimes, customer satisfaction should come ahead of contract rights. For example, last year, I moved pretty suddenly (I got a job offer in mid-December and was moved 800 miles away by mid-January. Every company I dealt with realized this was an extraordinary circumstance and just let me out of any service-contract that was geographically limited. This included companies who are usually villified, such as the cable company and the health club.

    There was one exception though, the alarm company. Turns out the automatic renewal was a year contract, not a monthly contract. And it had to be cancelled by December 8. I didn't get my job offer until December 15, so I did what I did with every other company--told them I was moving, was completely unable to use their service, and requested to be let out of the contract. They wouldn't budge. "A contract was a contract." So I had the absurdity of having a contract to protect my house that went from January 8, 2004 to January 8, 2005, even though I moved out of the house on January 15, 2004!

    Turns out that is part of their scheme. In fact, a lot of alarm companies do the same thing--they put you on a yearly, automatically renewed contract, but bill you monthly (or quarterly) so you think you can cancel at any time. The reality is alarm monitoring services are 100% useless.

    There was a new commercial that one alarm company had. The smoke detector portion of the alarm went off. Then the phone rang. It was the alarm company asking if your house was on fire. The tag line? "Does your smoke detector do this?" My response--no, but if my house was really on fire, it wouldn't be forcing me to answer the phone in a burning building.

  2. I have a complaint by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    How about people who submit stories about websites to Slashdot without identifying themselves as being personally involved with the site? How trustworthy can this website be when one of their staff, Morgan Jindrich, submits the story without mentioning his own relation with the organization?

  3. Re:If it's so new... by pete6677 · · Score: 3, Informative

    ADT, right? Their scam has been going on for quite some time, and several of my relatives have been sucked into it. They try to closely guard the secret about their alarm service, which is that you can get the same thing with $100 worth of Radio Shack parts and a few hours of your time, and with no contract or reoccuring fees.