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FTC rule on unfair or deceptive fees to take effect on May 12

ftc.gov

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Re: FTC rule on unfair or deceptive fees to take effect on May 12

#71

Post by Swizec »

throwawaymaths wrote: post #65
brewdad wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Typically the will be advertised as BIG MONTHLY PRICE $50/mo Then an asterisk and tiny, tiny print somewhere below stating "plus taxes and fees" So it depends on how you define "fees not included in the advertised price" but the last time I had a postpaid plan, I couldn't even know how much those added taxes and fees were until my first bill arrived.

it's really never as bad as it is for hotels. I once booked a hotel stay in san francisco which looked like $300 on the website, but after I was done I was charged an extra $200 for various fees which was mostly a san francisco hotel tax.. I never saw it until I checked out . It doesn't even matter if every hotel in SF gets that tax, I don't care, I want to see it before I book the place. Ideally at the "price map" s…

> As an aside, I don't know why AirBnB can't get their shit together and push all the fees to the map. My guess is that most of those fees are not per night? Well make the front matter say "$120/night + fees" and when you select your dates you know what the total cost is.

The problem is that everyone says we want this then votes with our wallet that we don’t.

Stubhub once tried to be upfront honest about fees. Bookings dropped like a stone. People just didn’t want concerts at those prices. But an extra $20 when you’re already paying $80, ehhh sure okay I’ve already come this far and feel pretty committed to going.

> As the study found, “Overall, the StubHub users who weren't shown fees until checkout spent about 21 percent more on tickets and were 14 percent more likely to complete a purchase compared with those who saw all-inclusive prices from the start.“

https://boondoggle.substack.com/p/stubhub-and-the-case-of-th...

Re: FTC rule on unfair or deceptive fees to take effect on May 12

#72

Post by Spooky23 »

breadwinner wrote: post #50

Why limit this to live-event and lodging industries? Why not all the fees tacked on by cell carriers? For example, AT&T charges a fee to "recover certain aggregate expenses AT&T incurs, including, but not limited to, charges AT&T or its agents pay to interconnect with other carriers to deliver calls from AT&T customers to their customers and charges associated with cell site rents and maintenance" [1] [1] https://www…

Different regulatory body with jurisdiction.

Re: FTC rule on unfair or deceptive fees to take effect on May 12

#73

Post by thomquaid »

Swizec wrote: post #71
throwawaymaths wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's really never as bad as it is for hotels. I once booked a hotel stay in san francisco which looked like $300 on the website, but after I was done I was charged an extra $200 for various fees which was mostly a san francisco hotel tax.. I never saw it until I checked out . It doesn't even matter if every hotel in SF gets that tax, I don't care, I want to see it before I book the place. Ideally at the "price map" s…

> As an aside, I don't know why AirBnB can't get their shit together and push all the fees to the map. My guess is that most of those fees are not per night? Well make the front matter say "$120/night + fees" and when you select your dates you know what the total cost is. The problem is that everyone says we want this then votes with our wallet that we don’t. Stubhub once tried to be upfront honest about fees. Bookin…

The StubHub example is the abuse that is being banned. Yes, you can bait and switch people and take more of their money than they are otherwise willing to spend if you deceive, manipulate, and withold disclosures. It is (arguably) wrong/bad, but profitable.

Re: FTC rule on unfair or deceptive fees to take effect on May 12

#74

Post by Spooky23 »

betterThanTexas wrote: post #21
da_chicken wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would suggest that a pre-recorded performance is inherently more fungible. If movie theater A is going to charge you a $20 fee when you get to the theater, you can just go to theater B later and see the same show. If you're trying to see the single Chicago date of Tropical Fu Dogs' Coconut Cream tour, well, you either pay the fee or you don't ever see that show.

Ok, so why is the government endorsing hidden fees for fungible products? There is no situation where this benefits anyone but shareholders.

The live event people are far more odious and abusive. They operate monopolies, but modern American law has been perverted to be unable to recognize that.

Re: FTC rule on unfair or deceptive fees to take effect on May 12

#75

Post by Spooky23 »

throwawaymaths wrote: post #68
diggan wrote: post #5

> Live-event tickets include those for concerts, sporting events, music, theater, and other live performances that audiences watch as they occur, but not pre-recorded audio or visual performances. What could be the reason pre-recorded audio/visual performances are excluded? Shouldn't this just be for everything? Why would some types of tickets be required to be truthful about fees and not allowed to lie about the tot…

how often do you get extra fees on a pre-recorded performance? Aside from sales tax, my guess would be, for me it's been zero times.

If you buy tickets online, Regal adds a small fee. It’s like $2.

The issue is LiveNation adds $80 in some cases.

Re: FTC rule on unfair or deceptive fees to take effect on May 12

#76

Post by cscurmudgeon »

gruez wrote: post #7
diggan wrote: post #5

> Live-event tickets include those for concerts, sporting events, music, theater, and other live performances that audiences watch as they occur, but not pre-recorded audio or visual performances. What could be the reason pre-recorded audio/visual performances are excluded? Shouldn't this just be for everything? Why would some types of tickets be required to be truthful about fees and not allowed to lie about the tot…

Movie theaters/studios lobbied harder

[dead]

Re: FTC rule on unfair or deceptive fees to take effect on May 12

#77

Post by Spooky23 »

xnx wrote: post #59
ronbenton wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Airbnb is really bad about this. Advertising lodging for $100 and then suddenly when you go to book there's an additional $100/night of fees.

Hotels can be even worse. They will add a "resort fee" when you show up. You can refuse to pay, and then have nowhere to stay.

Hotels don’t charge a cleaning fee, then fine you for not ckeaning.

Re: FTC rule on unfair or deceptive fees to take effect on May 12

#79

Post by Swizec »

thomquaid wrote: post #73
Swizec wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As an aside, I don't know why AirBnB can't get their shit together and push all the fees to the map. My guess is that most of those fees are not per night? Well make the front matter say "$120/night + fees" and when you select your dates you know what the total cost is. The problem is that everyone says we want this then votes with our wallet that we don’t. Stubhub once tried to be upfront honest about fees. Bookin…

The StubHub example is the abuse that is being banned. Yes, you can bait and switch people and take more of their money than they are otherwise willing to spend if you deceive, manipulate, and withold disclosures. It is (arguably) wrong/bad, but profitable.

Exactly. When consumers don’t vote in their own best interest with their wallets, legislation is the only option.

Let’s do airlines next

Re: FTC rule on unfair or deceptive fees to take effect on May 12

#80

Post by autoexec »

throwawaymaths wrote: post #68
diggan wrote: post #5

> Live-event tickets include those for concerts, sporting events, music, theater, and other live performances that audiences watch as they occur, but not pre-recorded audio or visual performances. What could be the reason pre-recorded audio/visual performances are excluded? Shouldn't this just be for everything? Why would some types of tickets be required to be truthful about fees and not allowed to lie about the tot…

how often do you get extra fees on a pre-recorded performance? Aside from sales tax, my guess would be, for me it's been zero times.

The closest I can think of is people paying for amazon's streaming service, and realizing that most of the shows and movies on the service require various amounts of money to watch on top of the monthly fee they're already being charged. Netflix (and almost every other streaming service) had already set an expectation that paying for a streaming service would be enough to watch the shows offered on that service.

That said, back when I actually had prime it was only ever for the shipping so I never saw how amazon advertised their streaming service to people. Maybe the ads actually said "Sign up to Prime Video today for $187 and get access to 20% of the shows on the platform as well as an opportunity to pay even more for the other 80% of the titles!"

I've also seen random mentions of spotify having hidden fees, but I've never used the service and have no idea if they have them or ever have had them.

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