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FTC bans hidden junk fees in hotel, event ticket prices

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Re: FTC bans hidden junk fees in hotel, event ticket prices

#121

Post by ToucanLoucan »

OptionOfT wrote: post #106

I'd be interested to see whether a movie theater is considered an event. Our local one charges a convenience fee when buying online because ... they can? I wish they banned all mandatory add-ons. If I don't have the choice it should be part of the base price. The touristic railroad near me advertises a price, and then slaps on a mandatory Fuel Surcharge and Historic Preservation Fee. Excuse me? How can I compare what…

> How can I compare what I'm going to spend my money on if you're just allowed to lie to me?

You're not supposed to, that's the point. It's frankly shocking (and also not, but you know) how much businesses in America are allowed to bullshit you.

I signed on with a telco for high speed internet when we bought our house for $65 a month and by the time we got fiber and I could finally tell them to kick rocks, the bill had soared to nearly $200 for the exact same service over the course of 4 years. Why? Because they can, and go fuck yourself.

A hotel stay for a vacation was supposed to cost $851, but they demanded a $300 pre-authorization on top of that. Why? Because they can. I wasn't notified ahead of time, absolutely nowhere was this information given to me. And I could take that on fine, but why is this allowed? What if I wasn't so fortunate and was traveling by air, do I just sleep in a box because the hotel can't guarantee I'll be able to pay for $300 worth of room service I have no intention of buying?

I feel like this just happens everywhere now, I just expect it. I expect to get fucked over in one way or another, and on the one hand I'm sure it's my anxiety, but on the other hand there is so much expensive arbitrary nonsense that's just plunked down in front of me, and yeah, most of it I can handle fine, because I work in tech and make good wages. So I guess just fuck everyone who grew up at the income level I got, because I am fucking sure that my single mother trying her hardest as she was, wouldn't be able to get by if I was born like 15-20 years later than I was.

Edit: Oh and FUCK every politician who has ever farted out words something like "responsible consumption of healthcare" because sweet Jesus, healthcare billing is an utter nightmare. I don't think I have EVER, EVER in my entire life had some kind of medical event where I knew the costs going in that were then reflected afterwards. It's just all made the fuck up on the fly with no respect for the patients, when they are already stressed out and scared.

Re: FTC bans hidden junk fees in hotel, event ticket prices

#122

Post by syndicatedjelly »

poorlyknit wrote: post #41
drdec wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you want to put in your shipping address to every website before you can shop?

A zipcode should be plenty and grocery websites do that already.

The zip code I live in spans two different cities (as well as different counties in my state). It's stupid but also it's reality

Re: FTC bans hidden junk fees in hotel, event ticket prices

#124

Post by diehunde »

crazygringo wrote: post #80
guidedlight wrote: post #10

They should ban hidden taxes too. The sticker price should be the final price.

If you're talking about sales taxes, they can't until you input your shipping address. Because they depend on where you live. Nobody's trying to fool you by not including sales taxes. There's just no way to show them in advance, unless you want to start typing your address and zip code into every shopping website before you even browse.

Right, but even when they do have your zipcode (because you added beforehand for checking stock for example) they don't update the prices. It would be nice to have the option

Re: FTC bans hidden junk fees in hotel, event ticket prices

#125

Post by physhster »

coldpie wrote: post #43
itake wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and service fees at restaurants. The price on the menu in Seattle or SF is ~25% lower than what the product actually costs.

Minnesota banned these this year! It goes into effect Jan 1st. https://minnesotareformer.com/2024/05/20/governor-signs-junk...

Imagine if that guy became VP...

Re: FTC bans hidden junk fees in hotel, event ticket prices

#126

Post by munk-a »

ghaff wrote: post #87
munk-a wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Time will tell - the change I'm really hoping will stick is the outlawing of non-competes without consideration.

A lot of people probably weigh this too much. Forcing companies to have some skin in the game is good. But, in practice, if a company really wants to enforce a non-compete--even with consideration--it's probably not great unless you're in a position and want to take a sabbatical with substantially reduced compensation.

This is absolutely true and when I read my first non-compete my dad calmly explained how unenforceable they are due to hardship exceptions and lack of specificity. However, I had a very business minded father to ask and most people don't. Non-competes have been abused to scare uninformed employees into staying in positions they want to leave or as revenge for someone leaving.

The fact that they're so often unenforceable is probably a decent argument that they're an irrelevant complication of labor interactions that we don't need anyways. They only ever made sense with executives and those folks usually have large sums of money attached to their compliance.

Re: FTC bans hidden junk fees in hotel, event ticket prices

#127

Post by trustinmenowpls »

I need this for my internet provider, advertised price is $25* ** ***

Network access fee: $2.65

Municipal upgrade fee: $16.30

Fees end up costing nearly 80% of the entire bill. There are no taxes or gov surcharges of any kind.

*(with autopay discount)

**(with autopay direct deposit discount)

***(will not be reflected on first 3 bills)

ETA: here's their current promotion: https://i.imgur.com/TfwsdQv.png $20 for service, $20.49 in fees! fees are 102% of the supposed price!

Re: FTC bans hidden junk fees in hotel, event ticket prices

#128

Post by crazygringo »

websap wrote: post #119
crazygringo wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Correct, it doesn't. IP geolocation is nowhere near precise enough. Remember, sales tax isn't something big like state-level. It's literally town -level, including tiny towns. Two sides of the same street can have a different sales tax. Not to mention all the extra rules, such as individual clothing items under $110 being exempt in New York.

I will take the blurb which says taxes are an approximate calculation based on web browsing data available, vs, no taxes shown. We're gate keeping good features for large % of users over some edge cases.

Gate keeping what?

You know where you live, you know what your local sales tax is. The current system works fine.

Re: FTC bans hidden junk fees in hotel, event ticket prices

#129

Post by bluGill »

cyberax wrote: post #71
caseyohara wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not likely; sales tax is extremely complicated in the US. There are 13,000 sales tax jurisdictions, and many of them have different and incompatible rules for things like sales tax nexus.

A business already has to take care of the sales tax. So they can just show it on the price tag.

No they cannot. Taxes are not uniform. Walmart probably won't deal with this, but in many states business (read farmers) do not pay sales tax on some items (read likely to be used on a farm) and so stores that want to sell to business will have the ability to verify you are a business to give that discount.

It is worse for online where until you log in they have no clue what taxes will apply. If you are buying a gift for someone in a different area I don't know what tax rules apply but there is good odds they won't know until you get to the shipping information what the real taxes are.

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