It’s one of the more cynical gotchas consumers face, and finally, a big mobile phone company is paying the price. AT&T has agreed to pay $105 million to settle charges that it enabled, and profited from, massive phone bill cramming. In cramming, consumers unknowingly signed up for useless text-message [Keep reading]
“You’re not liable for any fraudulent charges.” It’s a cheery phrase you’ve seen or heard dozens of times lately, usually said to help ease the blow of bad news: Your credit card has been hacked. “But don’t worry! A new card is on its way! Everything is fine! Smiley face. [Keep reading]
Harassment is rampant in the restaurant industry, according to a report published today by a pro-worker non-profit group. Anyone who’s ever worked in the service industry knows this: If you want cooks to take care of your orders, you have kiss up to them. If you want better tables, you [Keep reading]
America is working again! That was the irresistible headline you heard all day Friday from business journalists cheering the monthly unemployment report. Story after story screamed that the unemployment rate had sunk below 6 percent for the first time since the recession began. Please ignore all those stories. First off: [Keep reading]
UPDATE, 12:20 a.m. – Amtrak tells me the website and kiosks are now working. No explanation for the outage so far. Amtrak’s website and ticketing system continued to experience an epic meltdown into Sunday night, as the nation’s rail service experienced a network outage that extended past 10 hours. Neither [Keep reading]
It sounds like science fiction. A lender sitting in an office who wants a payment clicks a button on a screen, and suddenly, the borrower’s car is disabled on the side of the road. “Pay now or you’ll never drive again,” is the clear message. It’s not a movie script. Car “ignition [Keep reading]
For years, I’ve been arguing that a simple, broken economics formula has put millions of middle-class Americans in a state of perpetual economic anxiety: Families with average incomes can’t afford average homes. In fact, families with really good incomes can’t afford average homes. Here’s new data to support that [Keep reading]
The concept of Moneyball is so simple and self-evident that it should never be controversial. Don’t overpay for things; and it’s possible you do, and haven’t realized it yet, because of the way you value things. In baseball: Maybe it’s better to have two decent platoon players cover third base [Keep reading]
Recent data leaks have everyone spooked, especially celebrities. There’s so much worry that I had a brief exchange with Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban last night on Twitter. Cuban, it turns out, tells me he did a bit of self “penetration test” (or pentesting as its also known) on his [Keep reading]
At-risk homeowners trying save their homes from foreclosure during the mortgage meltdown complained for years that banks were systematically stonewalling them. On Monday, federal regulators accused a financial institution of doing just that, alleging that Michigan-based Flagstar Bank intentionally frustrated homeowners and pushed some into foreclosure. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau [Keep reading]
Bob Sullivan