Author: Phil Villarreal

An online game is sticking players with charges of up to $300 a month, Kotaku reports. But not to worry. A forum manager has checked in and confirmed that EA is taking the problem seriously.

James Nichols, community forums manager for the offending Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning, posts:

We are working as quickly as possible to resolve this issue and reverse charges, we understand the inconvenience this has caused many and take the situation very seriously.

That said to provide the best assistance some things need to happen:

– Contact your financial as soon as you are able to explain the situation.

– Charges will be reversed, this process can take several business days depending on how many accounts are processed.

– If your bank has not yet refunded additional fees you can then contact EA Billing Support for assistance in this matter.

EA Billing Support will be unable to provide assistance until the charges are refunded (as your financial institution is unlikely to take action until the funds are present.)

We do not want our customers to sit on hold (or not be able to get through at all) when we’re currently unable to provide further assistance until your account has been refunded.

If you’ve been affected, let us know how comforting it is to you that your problem is being taken seriously.

Warhammer Online Bug Results in More Than $300 Monthly Fees For Some [Kotaku]
(Thanks, Jeff and Roger!)

People can steal your iPhone, but if you’ve got the Mobile Me app, you’ll be able to track it down. Florida police used the feature to track down a swiped iPhone and other stoolen goods, First Coast News reports.

This kind of thing isn’t so rare, but is funny every time.

From the First Coast News:

A signal from a stolen iPhone led detectives right to a man suspected in two Alva car burglaries Wednesday.

Deputies were called to 2200 Troyers Lane early Wednesday by Adam, who said two cell phones and two chargers were missing from his truck.

(Adam) said he’d parked his truck around 11:30 p.m. Tuesday and forgot to lock it.

Now, if only they’d make Mobile Me for car keys and remote controls.

Florida Police Use iPhone App to Track Crook, Stolen Items [First Coast News]
(Thanks, Justin!)

Three Old Spice-themed games have lurched onto Xbox Live. Advergames are nothing new on the console, but what’s audacious about this new set of games is you actually have to pay for them, Joystiq reports.

If these are successful, you can bet on more just like them. So get out there, everyone, and show Old Spice that we want to pay them to bombard our Xboxes with advergames.

Old Spice advergames arrive on XBL Indie Games [Joystiq]

CNN manufactured a trend story about young professionals hiding their Facebook statuses so snooping prospective employees can’t find anything to eliminate them from job consideration. The story is based on a Microsoft survey that finds hiring managers use the site to dig for dirt on applicants.

From the story:

A recent survey commissioned by Microsoft found that 70 percent of recruiters and hiring managers in the United States have rejected an applicant based on information they found online.

What kind of information? “Inappropriate” comments by the candidate; “unsuitable” photos and videos; criticisms of previous employers, co-workers, or clients; and even inappropriate comments by friends and relatives, according to the survey report, titled “Online Reputation in a Connected World.”

How do your Facebook privacy settings play into your professional life?

Young job-seekers hiding their Facebook pages [CNN]
(Thanks, Chris!)

A Florida urologist hoisted a sign outside his practice that reads “If you voted for Obama, seek urologic care elsewhere. Changes to your healthcare begin right now, not in four years,” the Miami Herald reports.

The story quotes the bitter doc:

(Jack) Cassell told the Orlando Sentinel on Thursday he wasn’t questioning patients or refusing care, because that would be unethical.

“But if they read the sign and turn the other way, so be it,” he said.

Cassell, 56, also provides Republican reading material in the waiting room – probably not a risky move, given that Mount Dora’s 10,000 residents and the surrounding area lean heavily conservative. Above a stack of GOP health care literature, a sign reads: “This is what the morons in Washington have done to your health care. Take one, read it and vote out anyone who voted for it.”

Do you think it’s ethical to integrate politics into business?

Florida doctor’s sign warns away Obama supporters [Miami Herald]
(Thanks, Avri!)

Tax preparer Robert thought a sure way to get his tax documents to a client would be to ship them via USPS’s Certified mail. Turned out he may as well have turned to Virgania Horsen. USPS says the package is at a particular post office location but says it can’t find it.

Robert writes:

I’m a tax preparer, with a client in San Francisco. I’m not in California, so I mailed him his taxes via USPS’s Priority mail and Certified (someone has to sign for it).

I mailed the Priority envelope on February 19th and, according to the tracking, it made it to the USPS office [redacted]. My client went to that location inquiring to why he hadn’t received it and if he could have it. They told him they had it, but couldn’t find it. It’s now a month a half later and the tracking still indicates that they have it.

The [redacted] Post Office has been no help, even to my local Post Office who has written to them.

This isn’t someone’s birthday card, it is someone’s taxes with their personal information on it.

Well, at least Robert and his client still have plenty of time left to get the tax return in order. Oh, wait.

Aware that service calls from Comcast often don’t work out so well, John thought he’d save himself some hassle by driving 45 minutes to the nearest service center to pick up a cable card he needed for his TiVo. He discovered that Comcast is equally capable of being inept when you visit it than when it visits you.

His tale:

I recently purchased a TiVo Premiere that requires a M-Cable card. I contacted my cable provider, Comcast, to see how much a card would cost and how I could get one. I used the live chat system and the rep took forever but eventually told me that it would cost something like $1.45 per month and that I could save a tech visit and fee if I picked it up myself at the local service center. I asked the rep to verify that the local center would indeed have one on hand when I got there since it is about 60 miles round trip. After a few minutes the rep did verify that information and gave me the exact address and hours.

The next day I had time to run to [redacted], Ca from my home in Lemoore, Ca and pick up the card. It was Good Friday and I checked on the Comcast website the hours again and that this site could issue cable cards. I just searched for cable card issuing centers with 50 miles and the one in [redacted]was the only one to pop up.

About 45 minutes later I was standing in the service center being told that they do not issue, do not store, nor have ever issued any cable cards from that site . But they would be happy to setup a tech visit and charge me the $19.95 fee and waste an afternoon waiting.

I told the rep that I had verified twice that they issued cable cards at that site and that the whole point was to save time and money picking it up my self. The rep graciously agreed to waive the service fee but I’m still going to be without HD capabilities on my Tivo until Thursday.

You should remind your readers that they shouldn’t necessarily believe what their told by Comcast’s chat reps or their own website. Instead they better call the service center themselves before heading out.

This is bad news for John, but encouraging for those who have Comcast in their Worst Company in America pool. Comcast is kinda like Duke in our little tournament.

Brett got a Roku and MLB.tv Premium package because he was psyched that the device would let him stream MLB.tv games in HD on his TV and computer. But baseball season has officially started and Brett still can’t stream his games.

He writes:

I recently purchased a Roku device and the MLB.tv Premium package beacause it was advertised that I would be able to watch the entire season with my Roku box on the big screen tv and in HD on the computer.

Today is opening day and now Roku and MLB are saying the games will not be available until mid-late April on the Roku device.

Also, the HD feature called “Nex-def” is not compatible with Windows 7 making it a total waste for me on my desktop.

While I am new to both Roku and the MLB.tv package I have been reading in the forums that this is third year in a row that MLB.tv has failed to deliver as advertised and many are alleging purposeful misrepresentation.

Another point of frustration today is that here on opening day the Roku support forum has been down all day. Hmmmm. Must have anticipated a flood of complaints is my opinion. Typical of Roku support since I got the device.

This MLB forum seconds Brett’s anger. If you were sucked into this trap, how are you coping?

Naader says his 2002 Buick Regal was totaled when his engine caught fire in February. He discovered afterward that GM had put out an engine fire safety recall for his vehicle back in 2008, but he had never gotten word of the move. Now Naader says GM is stonewalling him on the compensation front.

He writes:

On 02/24/10, my 2002 Buick Regal suffered an engine compartment fire ten minutes after I parked the car at my workplace and shut off the engine. The fire consumed everything under the hood until the San Bernardino City Fire Department extinguished the blaze.

I contacted the GM Product Allegation Department on 02/26/10, after discovering that my car had been under April 2008 GM safety recall 03075 for Engine Compartment Fires. GM had failed to inform me of the recall, and I wanted to see what the manufacturer would do to compensate me for my loss.

Paul Olle, Claims Administrator for GM, contacted me by letter to inform me that GM was denying all claims whatsoever. I was told that the California Statute of Limitations on Warranties expired four years from the date of original purchase. Since the car was originally purchased in 2002, this meant that the warranty expired in 2007.

However, I was contacting them regarding a recall claim and a failure to inform me of the recall. I was not contacting them regarding a warranty claim. I simply wanted to be compensated for the loss caused by their failure to inform me of the safety recall. Instead, GM ignored my claim entirely.

Will you be willing to intervene on my behalf and assist me with the recall/ failure to inform claim? I believe that as manufacturer of my automobile, GM has a responsibility to ensure the safety and reliability of their vehicles. I would like them to repair or replace my vehicle, at their cost, since they neglected to inform me of the safety recall.

What do you think Naader’s next move should be?

An anonymous gamer wrote in to tell us why he felt justified to illegally download a copy of Red Faction: Guerilla: He bought it on one computer but found the DRM locked him out of re-activating the game on his new computer. When customer service couldn’t help him, he went rogue.

He writes:

I recently bought a copy of the PC game Red Faction Guerrilla. The game installed fine on my system and I played it for a bit until the hard drive it was on bit the dust.

I replaced the hard drive and reinstalled the game. However, when you try to launch the game it gives you a DRM check where you have to enter your email address and cd-key and it will then connect to its authentication servers to allow you to play the game.

However, when I tried to enter my info and hit ok, it would come back would a general error saying

“There was a problem activating Red Faction Guerrilla. Could not start activation process.”
I tried contacting THQ/Volition the makers/publishers of the game and they could not help and instead told me to contact Games for Windows Live, who apparently runs the online checks as its incorporated into the game with this platform. I spoke to several Windows reps there who knew nothing about how to fix the issue, was hung up on several times, referred back and forth between THQ and then made to run through ridiculous steps to try and fix the issue, and finally told me there’s nothing they can do to help.

What I had to do instead is pretty sad considering I paid for a legit copy- I went to a torrent site and downloaded a cracked exe that let me bypass the security check and play the game the online portion of it.

I could have pirated the game from the start but I chose to be honest and try and support these companies. What good did that do? As a result of paying for this game I was treated like garbage from the companies I bought it from who were unwilling and unable to help, and then had to turn to pirates because the DRM installed with the game prevented me from playing it.

What is the point of paying for these games if you get no support from those you purchased it from and can get a better version for free by pirating it? I am in no way advocating piracy because its wrong and is hurting the industry, but the publishers and developers are in turn treating their paying customers like criminals and are just making them turn to piracy instead.

Do you think the gamer was in the moral right to do what he did?

Max bunched together $94 worth of purchases with his Wells Fargo debit card that somehow racked up $480 in overdraft fees because he was dinged with a fee for each of his purchases. An Executive Email Carpet Bomb resulted in whittling $150 off the balance, but that still leaves a nasty $330 in fees hanging over Max’s head.

He writes:

Recently, I had a weekend where i expected to make several purchases on my debit card. In preparation for this, I transferred $320 from one checking account to the check card account, which i keep empty regularly in order to prevent fraud. This transfer Occurred on a Thursday at approximately 5 PM. I made a series of purchases over the weekend (Friday, Saturday) with the card, and spent about $270 dollars, or so I thought. When i went to the bank this morning, I found out the following. The transfer that occurred on Thursday didn’t post until the middle of the day on Friday, after I had already used the card several times resulting in a 35 dollar overdraft fee each time I used the card. This quickly cleaned out my $320, and subsequent purchases have pushed the account balance to -$571, which includes $480 in overdraft fees and $94 in purchases.

I’ve called Wells Fargo and escalated all the way up to a call center manager, to no avail. The best they’re willing to do is waive $150 in fees, still leaving me owing them $330. I’m a student with limited financial resources and I don’t just have $330 to give away to the bank. Is there any recourse? Executive office service wasn’t any help at all, the guy said he was the final decision and nobody could override him. I sent an EECB and am hoping to get a response to this soon. Needless to say they’ve lost me as a customer after this mess is cleared up, but is there anything I can do from this point?

Any advice for Max, other than to cancel his account as soon as he can dig himself out of the mess?

Writing on LiveCheap, Karl Wolf put together a sad-but-funny list of signs that reveal the poverty of those who live near you.

Here are a couple of the telltale indicators:

5 Pounds of Mail, Every Day

Take a minute and watch your neighbor grab his or her mail one day. If they come away with stacks of paper and it’s not the holidays, you’ll know something is up. Miss a few mortgage postalpayments or property taxes and everyone and their cousin starts to flood your mailbox and they’re not sending you love letters. And if your neighbors are late making payments on their credit card bills, they’ll get notices piled high. If you see the Joneses with wheel barrow or duffel bag each day to grab their mail, it’s a sure sign that there’s no love lost between them and their creditors.

Landscape Me Not:

Spring time usually ushers in the new round of flowers, plants, and typical landscaping improvements. But if your neighbor’s yard doesn’t change a bit after years of top of the line grooming, it might be because the credit cards are maxed out and the checking account is more than a little light this year. Lots of people are skipping landscaping in this the third real year of the Great Recession.

Notice any of these giveaways and you know some neighborly financial kindness might be in order. Do you have any other signs to add?

7 Telltale Signs That Your Neighbors Are Broke [LiveCheap]

Evan says a UPS store employee was so annoyed he wanted to ship packages at her store that she muttered about him under her breath to coworkers and even suggested she use USPS instead.

It’s a suggestion Evan promises to follow from here on out. His tale:

I have used UPS stores for years and always considered the experience at them invaluable when compared to the USPS. But I just recently had an experience so horrendous I don’t think I will ever go back to a UPS store again. Upon entering store [redacted] we were immediately greeted with a disgusted sigh at the number of items that needed to be shipped. I would assume UPS would be happy! I guess not. When the CSH started packing I asked how much some bubble wrap would cost to fill in the box. When quoted $7.50, for maybe a foot of wrapping, I decide to use a newspaper instead. She refused and said they won’t ship it if I insisted on using newspaper. When someone came out from the back they convinced her that it was OK for me to use newspaper. (What if you wanted to ship a newspaper??)

At that point a new customer came in. He was given such an attitude that he almost immediately turned around and left, package with no postage in hand. She then turned to me and said “if you want to use newspaper you should just go to the post office.” Now mind you, at no point did I care enough to even give her an attitude or argue with her, which made it even stranger that she was so ticked off. She then proceeded to mutter under her breath about me and my friend for the entire time while packaging (easily 15 minutes or more). When a mere nine packages came to over $120.00 that just added insult to injury. I would gladly pay more to have someone pack my items for me, but four times more and be insulted? Had I listened to her suggestion to leave, she would have lost two customers – one of which racked up a $120.00 bill. In a mere 20 minutes, she single handidly lost two custmers.

I honestly can’t believe I’m saying this, but I would rather package the items myself and get terribly slow service at the USPS office, then pay easily four times as much and get insulted consistently at your establishment. Its back to the USPS!

If you’ve ever had a comparable shipwreck, please share.

Slate excerpts the Dave Jamieson book Mint Condition, which details the rise and fall of the baseball card futures market of the 1980s and 1990s.

What began as a nostaglia-fueled craze elevated into a cutthroat industry, then fell apart when overproduction reared its ugly head and demand dropped. As a result, many a collector hoarded sports cards thinking their investments would pay off nicely one day, only to find their collections are now just about worthless.

From the excerpt:

By the ’80s, baseball card values were rising beyond the average hobbyist’s means. As prices continued to climb, baseball cards were touted as a legitimate investment alternative to stocks, with the Wall Street Journal referring to them as sound “inflation hedges” and “nostalgia futures.” Newspapers started running feature stories with headlines such as “Turning Cardboard Into Cash” (the Washington Post), “A Grand Slam Profit May Be in the Cards” (the New York Times), and “Cards Put Gold, Stocks to Shame as Investment” (the Orange County Register). A hobby bulletin called the Ball Street Journal, claiming entrée to a network of scouts and coaches, promised collectors “insider scouting information” that would help them invest in the cards of rising big-league prospects. Collectors bought bundles of rookie cards as a way to gamble legally on a player’s future.

Unfortunately for investors, each one of those cards was being printed in astronomical numbers. The card companies were shrewd enough never to disclose how many cards they were actually producing, but even conservative estimates put the number well into the billions. One trade magazine estimated the tally at 81 billion trading cards per year in the late ’80s and early ’90s, or more than 300 cards for every American annually.

Did you get swept up in this nonsense of yesteryear? And what will you give me for the set of 1990 Donruss that’s taking up space in my closet?

The Great Baseball Card Bubble [Slate]

When the PS3 came out in 2006, one of the features that got geeks excited was the system’s ability to let you partition the hard drive and install Linux to use the console as a computer. Sony announced on its blog that it’s taking the feature away with a firmware update.

Technically PS3 users can still go on using Linux, but it will be at a great cost. From the PlayStation blog:

Consumers and organizations that currently use the “Other OS” feature can choose not to upgrade their PS3 systems, although the following features will no longer be available;

* Ability to sign in to PlayStation Network and use network features that require signing in to PlayStation Network, such as online features of PS3 games and chat

* Playback of PS3 software titles or Blu-ray Disc videos that require PS3 system software version 3.21 or later

* Playback of copyright-protected videos that are stored on a media server (when DTCP-IP is enabled under Settings)

* Use of new features and improvements that are available on PS3 system software 3.21 or later

It’s doubtful enough people use this bizarre little perk of the PS3 to create a stink about its loss. Guess we’re about to find out.

PS3 Firmware (v3.21) Update [PlayStation Blog]

Ubisoft had the fantastic idea of forcing gamers of Assassin’s Creed 2 to stay online while they played, to ensure via DRM that players weren’t pirating their wares. Then hackers brought down the servers, rendering the game unplayable.

Now the publisher is apologizing by tossing players some free games, Kotaku reports.

Kotaku says Ubisoft is emailing an offer to affected gamers, letting some choose the downloadable content for Assassin’s Creed 2, while offering others downloads of Prince of Persia, Heroes Over Europe, Endwar or H.A.W.X.

If you were affected by the server shutdown, let us know if you’re happy with the make-good offer.

Ubi Apologizes For Assassin’s Creed 2 PC Downtime With Free Games [Kotaku]

Coupon Sherpa came up with a list of ways hotels get sneaky to cut down on overhead.

A couple of the methods involve cutting staff:

1. We Appreciate Your Call
Automation is rapidly replacing face-to-face contact, which makes sense since payroll is one of hoteliers’ top three expenses. In addition, many hotels have moved away from direct customer interaction by automating many client services. For example, you may receive a better rate if you reserve and pay for your room online. Call the hotel directly to make a reservation and you may end up working your way through a series of menus to make your reservation.

2. Disappearing Staff
It’s not just bell boys, doormen and concierges that have disappeared. Wonder why check-in lines are so long? That’s because hotels have made the biggest cuts in behind-the-scenes staff, forcing clerks to multitask instead of focusing on guests. The result is remaining employees may feel devalued and constantly threatened with loss of their jobs, leading to a reduction in motivation, commitment and productivity. Of course, this syndrome is presently rampant throughout all industries, so why should hotels be different? BTW: Another disappearing position is the housekeeping inspector, who ensures each room is clean before a new guest arrives.

Click the link for the other methods. If you have insight to the hotel industry, what other ways do hotels cut costs?

14 Tricks Hotels Use to Cut Costs [Coupon Sherpa]

Glenn bought a Suncast compost barrel that was labeled “Made in the USA” on the box. So it’s only natural that when he opened up the box he found another box that revealed the included hardware was made in China.

He writes:

It seems like a simple concept, right? If the box containing a product says “Made in the USA, then the contents of the box should say so, also, right? RIGHT?

Well, I’ve attached some pics to say otherwise. We recently bought a compost barrel at Lowe’s, and although the outer box clearly, and proudly, I might add, said “Made in the USA”, when you open up the box, you find a smaller box contained within that has all of the frame and brackets and bolts and nuts, and it clearly says “Made in China.”

Mind you, I didn’t choose it for being American made, but simply for being available, but I know that there are many people who would get really upset over this, and rightfully so.

Perhaps the compost heap is a symbol of the global economy — that political and human rights differences don’t matter so much if two great nations can share the same compost barrel packaging.

Or maybe the outside box was labeled by liars.

Peter has stumbled on a way to save big money on car repairs: ask the dealer to refer you to their go-to mechanics, schedule an appointment with the source and tell ’em who sentcha. He says the technique has slashed his car repair bills:

A little while ago, a mailbox hit my Honda and — in a separate incident — a pipe in a parking garage scratched up the door. Since I wanted to get the dents and scratches fixed without involving my insurance company, I took my car to some body shops and was given an exorbitant quote. So I contacted the Honda dealer that sold me the car and he gave me the contact of the guy that does the dealership’s body work. I contacted that guy and told him that the Honda dealer gave me his number, and he gave me a quote that was half the price of the other body shops!

Recently my Honda was broken into and the window smashed. Since the window installation shop didn’t do tinting, I contacted the dealership to see what tinting shop they used. When the guy at the tint shop gave me a quote on tinting my window, he gave me a price less than half of what he advertised because the dealer referred me!

So my trick for getting discount body/non-mechanical work? Use the same shops the dealer uses and mention that you are a reference!

What do you do to save money on car repairs?

Jonathan says Comcast disappointed him by giving him a rebate in the form of a Comcast-branded Visa debit card pockmarked with a maintenance fee for inactivity.

He writes:

I got my Comcast cable internet hookup rebate, and it’s in the form of a $75 Citibank pre-paid Visa debit card that expires 2/2011.

I’m wondering, what’s the catch?

One big one that was easy to see: A $3/month account maintenance fee, charged if you haven’t 1) added funds to the account in the last 3 months, or 2) made a purchase in the last 3 months, or 3) if the balance is not $0. The accumulated fee for months 1-12 is applied at the end of the 12 months. Nice way to lose half your rebate, even after you went through the trouble of getting it.

I’m thinking the common scenario is a card that either isn’t used, or that is used early but not taken down exactly to $0.

Also, the ‘agreement’ says that if you go below $0, you can be charged a fee per the schedule of fees, but the schedule of fees lists no relevant fees.

So, what’s my best strategy on how to use this? What traps and pitfalls are there?

It’s kinda sh**** that, rather than sending a check, they send you this card with all sorts of legal entanglements.

These rebate cards are becoming all the rage. Consumerists, what do you do to squeeze every last penny out of such tricky minxes?