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California AG and state senators introduce bill to ban hidden fees

oag.ca.gov

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Re: California AG and state senators introduce bill to ban hidden fees

#91

Post by yamtaddle »

wpietri wrote: post #20
eganist wrote: post #5

Tons of industries affected by this, though hospitality comes to mind as being particularly egregious. "resort fees" you can't get out of where they tell you what you're "getting" for those fees, Airbnb service fees, cleaning fees, things that should all be spread across the nightly rate. The feds doing this for airfare was the best thing to happen for consumers shopping for flights. Ideally we would take it further…

I agree with you on almost all of this, but I think the cleaning fee is different. It represents an actual cost for an actual activity. I think AirBnb should show initial totals with it included, so you're never surprised by it. But it shouldn't be rolled up into the nightly rate because it really is a one-off. As an example, right now I'm looking at doing an extended trip, on the order of 2-4 weeks. I just need one…

> It represents an actual cost for an actual activity.

It really doesn't. It's been a stealth way to increase your rates for a long time now.

> I think AirBnb should show initial totals with it included, so you're never surprised by it.

They do, but it makes comparing rentals (both within AirBnB and across services) a pain in the ass, because it's not factored into the initial rate-per-night that you see and that they sort by if you ask them to show cheapest-first. [EDIT] I glossed over the "should" when reading the parent for this part—whoops. I thought they meant it's included once you're into the actual listing, not on the list-of-listings page, which is already, but which isn't enough. I stand by the first part—cleaning fees rarely represent the "actual cost" of the activity, on US AirBnB.

Re: California AG and state senators introduce bill to ban hidden fees

#92

Post by 88913527 »

jawns wrote: post #32

"Californians are fed up with being bombarded by junk fees that, more and more, are making it unaffordable to attend a concert, go to a sporting event, take a vacation, or stay at a hotel." Oh, believe me, state Senator Nancy Skinner, requiring businesses to disclose these fees up front is not going to make these purchases any more affordable. Companies will either maintain the fees but comply with the disclosure req…

Leveling the playing field means increased competition which means better prices for consumers. It does make it more affordable. Your listed examples are discretionary purchases. So it might not matter much to higher earners, but I'm sure some median earners bounce when they make it to the final step in the checkout flow when all the fees are revealed and now it's out of budget.

Re: California AG and state senators introduce bill to ban hidden fees

#93

Post by ajkjk »

junofan wrote: post #74
themitigating wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know this is sarcastic and if you didn't post it first I would have. The inconsistencies some people have when complaining about regulation, California, and Democrats is just irritating

What does a consumer protection bill have to do with regulation?

Uh...

Re: California AG and state senators introduce bill to ban hidden fees

#94

Post by epicureanideal »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #41
epicureanideal wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I find it very interesting that a $20 restaurant meal might only be netting $1 to the owner. Makes me feel like going out isn’t actually that bad of a deal.

Lots of retail businesses have less than 5% profit margin. Even insurance companies, including health insurance, have less than 5% profit margins.

Well I do wonder about the exec compensation at insurance companies though. 5% profit but mega million compensation packages…

Re: California AG and state senators introduce bill to ban hidden fees

#95

Post by yamtaddle »

wpietri wrote: post #79
zamadatix wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I definitely wouldn't mind it broken out in the details section but the main displayed price should always reflect all costs (including taxes!) IMO. If I'm going to need to do math on the pricing it should be for the corner cases like comparing the daily price of stays at different places for different lengths of time not for finding out how much something costs on its own.

Totally agreed. I lived for a time in Australia, where all the prices included tax. The price you saw was the price you paid. When I got back to the US, I wondered what the hell was wrong with me that I spent my life seeing our much more confusing system as reasonable.

That and the way our income taxes work are two of the most annoying things that the anti-tax right have "won" in the US. Everyone's life is made a little worse all the time, in the name of some I-suspect-imaginary "awareness campaign" to increase resistance to taxes. In fact I doubt there'd be any less awareness if they'd just mandate that tax be itemized and given sufficient weight on receipts, and that the IRS mail out some tax-burden statement for the ~90% of people who shouldn't, in a well-functioning system, need to manually fill out and file anything.

Re: California AG and state senators introduce bill to ban hidden fees

#96

Post by pydry »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #82

I think a lot of comments here are missing the reason as to why these hidden fees have become so much more prevalent in the past 20 or so years. The short of it is that comparison pricing is now much easier to do because of the Internet, and many, if not a majority, of shoppers will just sort by price ascending and pick the first result (or, only pick from the first couple results). Thus, there is a huge incentive fo…

>But, as someone who is privy to a ton of A/B testing in this area, the opposite nearly always results in higher conversion, where there is a lower up-front price and fees are only tacked on during checkout.

That is evidence that bait and switch works, not that people want it.

Re: California AG and state senators introduce bill to ban hidden fees

#97

Post by rootusrootus »

dangwhy wrote: post #86
grahar64 wrote: post #27

As a foreigner who lived in the USA for a few years, I always thought the US runs in hidden fees. From tipping, to taxes not in the sale price, to insurances not being able to give a price for a procedure, to hotel fees… I could never actually guess how much anything would cost. Either the wording of the law will have a ton of exclusions per industry.

> tipping This has gotten ridiculous past 2-3 year. Buy a $3.00 coffee , $1 tip is expected. I hate those ipad type payment consoles.

Not only that, but now everyone wants tips for things which never expected it before. Food cart? Tip. Fast food drive-thru? Tip.

Heck, my barber now charges $25 for a haircut (which takes all of 15 minutes) and we're expected to tip for that too.

Then there are tips that I apparently don't really know about but if I don't, I'm the jerk. I never knew I was supposed to tip the natural gas guy when he comes by to do some service (which is 'free', this is service from the actual gas company on the meter). My neighbor tips the garbage truck driver.

If someone put an initiative on the ballot that explicitly banned tipping, I'd vote for it.

Re: California AG and state senators introduce bill to ban hidden fees

#98

Post by vkou »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #82

I think a lot of comments here are missing the reason as to why these hidden fees have become so much more prevalent in the past 20 or so years. The short of it is that comparison pricing is now much easier to do because of the Internet, and many, if not a majority, of shoppers will just sort by price ascending and pick the first result (or, only pick from the first couple results). Thus, there is a huge incentive fo…

Well, of course bait-and-switch is going to result in a higher conversion rate than showing the price up front.

I'd like to not be swindled, but if the marketplace is half-swindlers and half-honest people, it's highly likely I'll be taken in by the former. What the kind of heuristic am I expected to use to avoid getting swindled?

Re: California AG and state senators introduce bill to ban hidden fees

#100

Post by slg »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #82

I think a lot of comments here are missing the reason as to why these hidden fees have become so much more prevalent in the past 20 or so years. The short of it is that comparison pricing is now much easier to do because of the Internet, and many, if not a majority, of shoppers will just sort by price ascending and pick the first result (or, only pick from the first couple results). Thus, there is a huge incentive fo…

>This is also a case where consumers say they want one thing, but their behavior is a different matter. For example, pretty much everyone says they prefer the full price to be shown up front in search result pages. But, as someone who is privy to a ton of A/B testing in this area, the opposite nearly always results in higher conversion, where there is a lower up-front price and fees are only tacked on during checkout.

This seems to be very misguided logic to me. I can also trick people with fraud but that doesn't mean the victims are indifferent to the fraud. It being effective doesn't mean people like it. Consumers can still hate this hidden fee approach even, and perhaps especially, because it is effective.

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