Author: Meg Marco

Are there NCAA basketball people camped on your couch? Do you need something to feed them? Do you not want to miss the game? We have located a list of the best frozen hors d’ouerves from Real Simple.

The list includes:

Best Pigs in Blankets
Hebrew National Beef Franks in a Blanket

The flaky golden wrappers on these classic snacks were far superior to the soggy, starchy crusts of their competitors. Several tasters commented on the “real beef” flavor. “The hot dog had an actual ballpark taste,” said one, “not like some others I’ve tried.”

&

Best Breaded Shrimp
Seapak Jumbo Butterfly Shrimp
“Nice and firm” was the most frequently heard praise for these breaded crescents. “They don’t taste or smell fishy,” said a panelist. The seafood lovers noted the “crispy coating and juicy shrimp inside.” Pick up some tartar sauce for dipping.

Are these good? What quick and easy crap do you give people who are camped on your couch?

The Best Frozen Hors d’Oeuvres [Real Simple]

The Chicago Reporter is a publication that reports on race and poverty in Chicago. This issue’s cover story is about mortgage modifications and the struggles that homeowners face when trying to access the Obama Administration’s refinance program. Apparently, banks are so incompetent that it can be almost impossible to actually modify your mortgage.

The article tells the story of a small business owner who thought he would always be able to pay his mortgage, but whose work dried up with the economy, and his wife, who was laid off from her full-time job. The husband was injured on the job, and the medical bills piled up.

They tried to apply for a mortgage modification, but the process has been a complete nightmare. The family called their bank, Bank of America, in December of 2008 and said they needed a lower payment due to loss in income. The bank said no because they had not yet defaulted. It told them to call back when the Obama Administration’s program was scheduled to begin.

4 months after applying, the family still didn’t have an answer.

“I begged the guy at the call center to tell me what was going on with our application,” Sofia said. The representative said that “we had been denied in March. … I started crying on the phone and asked him, ‘How can that be when I’ve talked to you guys a half-dozen times since then?’”

They told her to start over. So she did. Then they said they didn’t get her paperwork. So she sent it again. After another month, the family had run out of money and were unable to pay their full mortgage payment. They just started sending whatever money they had.

Among the 25 lenders participating in the government’s loan modification program last year, Bank of America had the most homeowners—1 million—who were more than 60 days delinquent on their mortgage. That was more than double the number of the next closest lender, JPMorgan Chase.

The Hernandez family’s frustrating interactions with Bank of America representatives is indicative of the hamster wheellike situation many defaulted homeowners and their housing counselors have found themselves stuck on during the past year. Lured by the promises of affordable mortgage payments, borrowers contact their banks in droves to avoid foreclosure.

But after sitting on hold, answering extensive financial questions, photocopying paystubs and bills, and waiting for an answer for weeks and months on end, many are told to resubmit their applications or paperwork over and over again.

The Report says its not an uncommon experience.

Now, one year after the March launch, a Chicago Reporter investigation shows that many Chicagoans have less than a 50-50 chance of getting those loan modifications—even with the help of a government-certified homeownership counselor. In addition, the foreclosure rates for the city remain high, and even when people do apply for a loan modification, hundreds still end up losing their home.

Through interviews with national and local housing experts and counselors, the Reporter found that banks are understaffed and inundated with applications, making some homeowners wait up to nine months to find out if they’ve been approved. In other cases, banks have routinely lost homeowners’ paperwork, forcing them to apply numerous times, or bank employees have incorrectly entered income data, disqualifying applicants. In addition, some banks are beginning the legal foreclosure process as they weigh whether to approve customers’ loan modification applications. Some people have been lucky enough to get approved for a temporary loan modification only later to find out that it will never become permanent.

The Hernandez family is still waiting.

Home Loan Purgatory [Chicago Reporter]

Bank of America and Comcast are leading the nominations and are on top of the bracket, but it’s time to fill out the rest with the companies you most want to see compete with the big boys. That’s why this year we’re letting 10 nominated companies play to get in. Inside you will find a poll with 10 options. You can choose 3 companies you feel deserve to have one of the final spots in the 2010 Worst Company in America Contest. The 5 companies that have the most votes will enter the tournament. The rest will go home. Choose wisely.

Here are the companies that are on the bubble with only a few nominations. (Yes, AIG only had a few. Guess you’re kind of over it, huh?) Ready? Set? Play ball!

REMEMBER: CHOOSE 3 COMPANIES.

The Associated Press is reporting that a newly released police report confirms details given by the driver of the runaway Prius, but does not address inconsistencies between the driver’s story and information provided by Toyota.

Here we go:

The account in the report is consistent with details the driver and CHP officer gave reporters shortly after the incident. Toyota, however, has cast doubt on the driver’s story.

The report said the CHP officer trailed the Prius at 95 mph on Interstate 8 east of San Diego, and the car slowed to about 50 mph before the officer told driver Jim Sikes over a loudspeaker to hit the floor brake and emergency brake simultaneously.

Sikes gradually came to an unassisted stop and was not injured.

The lights were on “for a period of time and would turn off, indicating the driver was possibly pumping the brakes,” CHP Officer Todd Neibert wrote in his seven-page incident report.

“I was within 1/4 mile of the vehicle and could smell the heated brakes which indicated they had been used extensively,” it states, referring to 400 meters.

The report offered some new details and dozens of photos about events that occurred after Sikes called police on March 8 to say his gas pedal got stuck on a San Diego-area freeway.

The report also says that the driver initially didn’t want to speak to the media, but was encouraged to do so by the police officer.

“I advised him the media would most likely seek him out if he did not speak to them voluntarily,” the officer wrote.

Authorities: Prius seen with flashing brake lights [AP]

Police in Enfield, CT say that a “well-planned” burglary of an Eli Lilly warehouse netted some criminals $75 million worth of Prozac, Cymbalta and Zyprexa.

It was yet another Mission:Impossible “hole in the roof” type job, according to Reuters. The thieves disabled alarms and took away whole pallets of drugs.

“You certainly don’t see a $50 million to $75 million burglary many times in your career,” a police officer said. “This was a well-planned event.”

It’s not know where the drugs are headed.

“Consumers should purchase Lilly products only from well-established and reputable retailers,” the drugmaker said in a statement. “Lilly recommends that consumers always inspect the product and label for signs of tampering before opening.”

Thieves grab up to $75 million in Eli Lilly drugs [Reuters]

If you’re not familiar with the concept of rescission, it’s a lovely business practice of health insurance companies in which they examine patients records to find a reason to “rescind” coverage after finding out that a customer has a life-threatening illness. This saves them money. That’s not news. What is news is that according to new documents revealed in a court case, one insurer “Fortis” (now known as Assurant Health) specifically targeted people who were newly diagnosed with HIV.

Reuters says that documents are from a court case in which such a patient, Jerome Mitchell, a college student from rural South Carolina, was recently awarded $10 million.

Previously undisclosed records from Mitchell’s case reveal that Fortis had a company policy of targeting policyholders with HIV. A computer program and algorithm targeted every policyholder recently diagnosed with HIV for an automatic fraud investigation, as the company searched for any pretext to revoke their policy. As was the case with Mitchell, their insurance policies often were canceled on erroneous information, the flimsiest of evidence, or for no good reason at all, according to the court documents and interviews with state and federal investigators.

In this specific case, the coverage was cancelled because “based on a single erroneous note from a nurse in his medical records that indicated that he might have been diagnosed prior to his obtaining his insurance policy.” After they found this error, the court found that they refused to investigate further despite evidence that the date in the note was incorrect.

Insurer targeted HIV patients to drop coverage [Reuters]

Last year it was AIG, before that, Bank of America (Countrywide). Who will take home the golden turd this year? Will it finally be Comcast, the Buffalo Bills of the WCIA contest? Or will Bank of America come back strong after being knocked out by AIG? We won’t know unless you tell us who you want in the competition. You pick the companies, you pick the winner.

Please help us out by emailing your nominations to [email protected]. Please behave yourselves and nominate one company per email address. Nominated companies must regularly provide goods or services directly to consumers. You may include, if you like, a paragraph explaining your nomination. Thank you, and may God bless the United States of America.

Nominations left in the comments, sent to our personal emails, etc. will not be counted.

In a move sure to make awkward Thanksgiving political discussions that much more media rich, C-Span has put its entire archive on the web, says the NYT.

The announcement will apparently be made tomorrow, but you can begin the digging and finger-pointing right now at http://www.c-spanvideo.org.

[C-Span Video Library]

Reader Neil makes the following observation:

Suburban Cleveland again, I purchased a can of Monster Assault energy drink and the register display seemed to be having some fun at my expense. I most assuredly do not have a ‘Monster Ass’. Although if given the option to purchase a monster ass for $2.29 plus tax, I might be interested.

Wait, would that be like, a monster ass that you would wear yourself in place of your own non-monster ass, or something you eat… like rump roast?

The Mayan calendar ends in 2012, and supposedly those clever Mayans knew something we don’t. The NYT says that if the world does end in 2012 — it’ll spare us from a ridiculous junk bond debt avalanche.

From the NYT:

Private equity firms and many nonfinancial companies were able to borrow on easy terms until the credit crisis hit in 2007, but not until 2012 does the long-delayed reckoning begin for a series of leveraged buyouts and other deals that preceded the crisis.

That is because the record number of bonds and loans that were issued to finance those transactions typically come due in five to seven years, said Diane Vazza, head of global fixed-income research at Standard & Poor’s.

In addition, she said, many companies whose debt matured in 2009 and 2010 have been able to extend their loans, but the extra breathing room is only adding to the bill for 2012 and after.

The result is a potential financial doomsday, or what bond analysts call a maturity wall. From $21 billion due this year, junk bonds are set to mature at a rate of $155 billion in 2012, $212 billion in 2013 and $338 billion in 2014.

Not as visually interesting as a giant robot eating the Eiffel Tower because it thinks its a Popsicle, but still pretty scary.

Junk Bond Avalanche Looms for Credit Markets [NYT]

It’s that time of year again, folks. Brackets, Brackets, Brackets. Please help us out by emailing your nominations to [email protected]. Please behave yourselves and nominate one company per email address. Nominated companies should regularly provide goods or services to consumers. You may include, if you like, a paragraph explaining your nomination. Thank you, and may God bless the United States of America.

Nominations left in the comments, sent to our personal emails, etc. will not be counted.

USAToday says some states, like Iowa and Minnesota, offered nice big rebates ($100 to $250 or more) in the cash for appliances stimulus program. Consequently, those states gave away the money and had a successful program. Meanwhile, New York, which offered only a $75 rebate on a new fridge or clothes washer, set a 10-day window in February for its $16.8 million in rebates, has $7 million left a month a month later.

Michigan refrigerator rebates are $50 or $100 and they are having similar problems:

“Ours is a more modest rebate, and people just aren’t really out there spending,” says Stephanie Epps, analyst for the Michigan Bureau of Energy Systems. Michigan had expected it to take at least four months to spend its rebate money. It now expects it’ll take more than six months, Epps says.

For more info about various rebates and things, check out this info from our government. The good rebates are apparently gone in a single day so make sure you’re on top of things.

We’re truly shocked to hear that the reason people are not replacing their old appliances with energy efficient ones isn’t that a new fridge costs $50- $75 too much.

Appliance rebates get hot-and-cold response from buyers [USAToday]
Cash for Appliances Update: Bigger rebates generate greater consumer interest [CR]

A coffee shop in Vermont has issued an one-year universal trespass order that bans a local amateur photographer from 67 establishments on the Church Street Marketplace because he would not comply with repeated requests to stop photographing the patrons and employees of a coffee shop.

This one should be fun. On one side you have a guy who is perfectly within his rights to hang out and photograph people in a public place. On the other hand you have a coffee shop and 66 other merchants who are sick of their customers and employees being creeped out by a guy taking pictures.

Who is right?

We join the drama after the photographer has been repeatedly asked to stop taking pictures and has refused.

About a month later, during a February snowstorm, Scott shot some pictures of a woman smoking a cigarette outside Uncommon Grounds on Church Street. Scott claims he was about 50 feet away when the woman, an employee of the coffeehouse, noticed his camera and asked him not to take her picture. Scott claims he backed off. But the woman also asked Scott to delete the pictures he’d already taken of her. He refused. The following Monday, March 1, a Burlington police officer again showed up at Scott’s workplace, and this time issued him a one-year universal trespass order that bans him from 67 establishments on the Church Street Marketplace. If Scott enters any of them, he could be arrested.

“If I had been drunk and gone into Uncommon Grounds and created a loud scene, I can understand why they wouldn’t want me in there,” Scott says. “But I wasn’t even in the store. I wasn’t even in front of the store.”

Manager Mara Bethel tells a different story.

“We’ve had a problem with him a number of times before — taking pictures of women, specifically, on the sneaky side of things — without asking their permission,” she says. “A number of customers have come in and said, ‘There’s a guy out there taking pictures and it’s really creeping us out.’”

Bethel confirms that Scott didn’t enter the coffeehouse to take pictures, nor does she describe his pictures as “lewd.” Nevertheless, she says, Scott’s persistence and demeanor were “unsettling” to her and other employees.

“For the young women around here, it felt really uncomfortable, someone kind of lurking about, and then quickly taking their picture and turning away,” Bethel says. Moreover, when someone asked Scott what he was doing, she claims he became defensive and argumentative.

It seems that both parties are within their rights. The photographer can stand outside creeping people out and the coffee shop and other merchants can ban him from coming inside for whatever reason they like, he doesn’t have to have committed a crime. In any case, according to the tipster who sent this story, the coffee shop is getting some backlash for the ban.

So, Internet, it’s up to you. Who is right?

A Photographer Is “Banned” for Taking Pictures on Church Street [Seven Days]

The federal deadline for the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) is midnight Central Daylight time, June 30, 2010, but state deadlines are often different and earlier.

Check out the list of state deadlines from the Department of Education.

Applying early is always better… you don’t want them to run out of money, right?

Application Deadlines [Department of Education]

The New York Times takes a look at one dubious beneficiary of the recession, the for-profit trade school. These places offer training in fields like health care, computers and food service …and enrollment is soaring.

The sales pitch says that students will be able to find gainful employment and pay back the massive students loans they take out to pay for the trade school — but that’s not always the case. And the recruiters apparently know it.

From the NYT:

Ms. Wallace left her job at ITT in 2008 after five years because she was uncomfortable with what she considered deceptive recruiting, which she said masked the likelihood that graduates would earn too little to repay their loans.

As a financial aid officer, Ms. Wallace was supposed to counsel students. But candid talk about job prospects and debt obligations risked the wrath of management, she said.

“If you said anything that went against what the recruiter said, they would threaten to fire you,” Ms. Wallace said. “The representatives would have already conned them into doing it, and you had to just keep your mouth shut.”

A spokeswoman for the school’s owner, ITT Educational Services, Lauren Littlefield, said the company had no comment.

In Hard Times, Lured Into Trade School and Debt [NYT]

It you’re sitting around not feeling scared enough, we recommend taking a look at this episode of the PBS show Frontline. In it, you will learn that regional airline pilots (they fly the planes that say “Continental” or “Delta” on them, but actually have little to nothing to do with those airlines) make very little money, work crazy long days, and often have tiny amounts of experience. Also: the big carriers that paint their names on the planes have no legal responsibility to make sure the “regional” flights are safe.

Daylight Savings Time Begins Sunday at 2am, so remember to set your clocks an hour ahead or risk being late for whatever you do on Sunday besides read Consumerist.

Oh yeah, and watch out for groggy drivers.

There are just so many different ways to rob a Best Buy. First some sophisticated thieves pulled off a Mission:Impossible-style heist in which they cut a hole in the roof and never touched the floor. Now some guys in a stolen U-Haul decided to just ram the truck through the backdoor. Less finesse, but equally effective.

From the Orlando Sentinel:

A trio of thieves used a stolen U-Haul truck to bust through the back door of an Orlando Best Buy store early Friday, and made off with $20,000 in electronics.

It now appears the thieves may be part of a state-wide ring that committed similar break-ins to Best Buy stores in Fort Lauderdale and St. Petersburg, according to the Orange County Sheriff’s Office.

Deputies responded to the Best Buy store, 8350 S. Orange Blossom Trail, just after midnight and found a large U-Haul truck rammed into the back of the building, said Lt. Jeff Stonebreaker.

Surveillance video shows the culprits took 3 minutes to make off with $20,00 in laptops and iPods before driving off in a different car and leaving the truck sticking out of the back of the building.

Trio uses U-Haul truck to bust into Best Buy [Orlando Sentinel]

Here’s a guy who sounds like a real lovely person to be around: The CEO of Prada Japan. A lawsuit alleges that he asked an employee to “eliminate” around 15 managerial staff he described as “old, fat, ugly, disgusting or not having the Prada look,” following a tour of 40 stores,” reports the Telegraph.

The manager who was asked to do this is now suing, claiming that she was told to, “change her hairstyle,” and “to lose weight” because the CEO was “ashamed of [her] ugliness, so he doesn’t want visitors from Italy to see her.”

What a swell place to work. Prada told the Telegraph that it has no comment.

Prada ordered manager to get rid of ‘old, fat and ugly’ staff [Telegraph]