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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

#261

Post by beart »

carlosjobim wrote: post #205
EdwardDiego wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean? Minimising monopolies is how you keep the free market competitive.

Free competition should mean that you don't get punished for winning. There is no sport that punishes a competitor who is constantly winning, as long as they are competing fairly. Imagine Schwarzenegger being banned from Mr Olympia or Gretzky being banned for life from minor league ice hockey. So that the other competitors are given a fair chance of winning. But every sport punishes competitors who are cheating or be…

I'm not an expert on these things, so I'm asking in good faith; what significant anti monopoly policies have been enacted in the US in recent history?

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

#262

Post by YaBa »

Symbiote wrote: post #120
YaBa wrote: post #79

Now do the same with airline companies. WizzAir charges the crap out of you for everything they can. Do not fly with WizzAir!

A recent WizzAir flight was advertised (when I searched for the route on their website) for €21. I rejected all optional extras, and that was the total price I paid. No checked luggage, probably only a small cabin bag that fitted under the seat in front, no priority boarding, no seat selection. It's a budget service, but the advertised prices aren't deceptive.

Trust me, you got lucky, they "randomly" selected passengers with those kind of bags for inspection due to measures, 1mm above? charged! Emphasis on randomly, because the pattern was simple: foreigners? charged, locals? go on. We've saw a poor guy squeeze the hell out of his backpack to no avail, it fitted the measuring box, still, charged because "you had to squeeze it"; guess what, plenty of room under the seat, the guy could put two of them. On me? bag had wheels, foreigner, automatically selected for inspection, took the wheels away, still charged because "it had wheels first". I've flew a dozen companies, not even Ryanair, the low of the lowest treats passengers like this.

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

#263

Post by amyames »

onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #182
breadwinner wrote: post #140

This shouldn't be controversial. FTC isn't banning these fees, it is only requiring merchants to disclose the fees. Why would anyone be against that? Another good rule is click-to-cancel. Just a couple of days ago I logged into my Dish Network account to cancel it (after they hiked prices). There is no way to cancel online. There is no way to cancel via chat. You have to call. As soon as you call you're told the wait…

Of course it's controversial. They do this to increase profits. A certain portion of the population is pro-profit at virtually any cost. It might seem like Dish employees wake up every day and say, "What can we do today to screw our customers even more?" But usually they're just trying to find ways to make more money.

>It might seem like Dish employees wake up every day and say, "What can we do today to screw our customers even more?"

Made the mistake of buying a boost mobile sim this year. It was “expired” upon opening it. Retailer refused to refund it.

Having not learned my lesson yet, I went elsewhere and ripped it open to check the expiration date this time before I bought it.

Well “it’s prepaid for 90 days and comes with 35 gigs” it says on the card.

Go to activate it, it puts a further $100 on my credit card and congratulates me for activating my 30 gig service plan.

Hokey frauds.

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

#264

Post by adgjlsfhk1 »

throw10920 wrote: post #255
jfengel wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a move afoot to eliminate all regulations unless they've been specifically passed by Congress. Which is basically incapable of passing anything. Ironically, that inherent dysfunction is the main reason to suspect that won't happen. But politically, every regulation as automatically partisan, even when it has overwhelming support.

> There is a move afoot Who is behind this move? What individuals, and what politicians? By what legal means is this happening? I've literally never heard of anything like this before - without further details, this is just political flame-baiting.

> Who is behind this move? What individuals, and what politicians? By what legal means is this happening?

The supreme court. The removal of Chevron Deference this year means that the courts have given themselves huge amounts of power over any administrative decision that isn't specifically regulated by congress (rather than the prior stance which was to presume that agency decisions were reasonable interpretations of the legislation unless there was clear evidence to the contrary).

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

#265

Post by Curvature5868 »

throw10920 wrote: post #255
jfengel wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a move afoot to eliminate all regulations unless they've been specifically passed by Congress. Which is basically incapable of passing anything. Ironically, that inherent dysfunction is the main reason to suspect that won't happen. But politically, every regulation as automatically partisan, even when it has overwhelming support.

> There is a move afoot Who is behind this move? What individuals, and what politicians? By what legal means is this happening? I've literally never heard of anything like this before - without further details, this is just political flame-baiting.

https://apnews.com/article/supreme-court-chevron-regulations...

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

#266

Post by brandall10 »

carlosjobim wrote: post #205
EdwardDiego wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean? Minimising monopolies is how you keep the free market competitive.

Free competition should mean that you don't get punished for winning. There is no sport that punishes a competitor who is constantly winning, as long as they are competing fairly. Imagine Schwarzenegger being banned from Mr Olympia or Gretzky being banned for life from minor league ice hockey. So that the other competitors are given a fair chance of winning. But every sport punishes competitors who are cheating or be…

It's funny you bring up Schwarzenegger, as his last Olympia win was mired in controversy for being almost certainly rigged.

Did he cheat? No, everyone used a similar amount of steroids. But to anyone with eyes and a basic knowledge of the sport it's overwhelmingly obvious that the organizers and judges threw it in his favor because of the attention it would bring.

Which is the issue when an entity becomes too big to fail. There is a power disparity that is virtually impossible to overcome as the leverage is so much that any opponent can be swat down with ease.

Things such as:

- leveraging economies of scale when dealing with suppliers and resources to the point of starving access to competition

- using lobbyists to write legislation in their favor or blockade opponents

- doing fuck all with no reservations, then pay out lawsuits and fines at an order of magnitude less than profit made and damage done

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

#267

Post by Der_Einzige »

throw10920 wrote: post #255
jfengel wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a move afoot to eliminate all regulations unless they've been specifically passed by Congress. Which is basically incapable of passing anything. Ironically, that inherent dysfunction is the main reason to suspect that won't happen. But politically, every regulation as automatically partisan, even when it has overwhelming support.

> There is a move afoot Who is behind this move? What individuals, and what politicians? By what legal means is this happening? I've literally never heard of anything like this before - without further details, this is just political flame-baiting.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_13771

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

#268

Post by ewoodrich »

blitzar wrote: post #229
tokioyoyo wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It somehow works almost anywhere outside of NA? It's really not a crazy concept - estimate it based on geolocation and say "more exact will be available once you enter your address". The problem is, that genuinely negatively affect the sales because people see the true price of things.

Apparently they can track you to the nearest 5m 24 hours a day, figure out that your teenage daughter is pregnant and replicate your likeness and voice perfectly - but when it comes to sales tax its an intractable problem.

That's a non-sequitur unless the question being considered is specifically whether a data hoarder like Google should build in estimated sales tax in their store vs "a random shopping cart from a retailer I've never interacted with before".

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

#269

Post by rat87 »

throw10920 wrote: post #255
jfengel wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a move afoot to eliminate all regulations unless they've been specifically passed by Congress. Which is basically incapable of passing anything. Ironically, that inherent dysfunction is the main reason to suspect that won't happen. But politically, every regulation as automatically partisan, even when it has overwhelming support.

> There is a move afoot Who is behind this move? What individuals, and what politicians? By what legal means is this happening? I've literally never heard of anything like this before - without further details, this is just political flame-baiting.

The politicians on the supreme court and while the case was pretty recent the move to limit it dates back a long time before that

https://www.scotusblog.com/2024/06/supreme-court-strikes-dow...

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

#270

Post by throw10920 »

Curvature5868 wrote: post #265
throw10920 wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is a move afoot Who is behind this move? What individuals, and what politicians? By what legal means is this happening? I've literally never heard of anything like this before - without further details, this is just political flame-baiting.

https://apnews.com/article/supreme-court-chevron-regulations...

Chevron is irrelevant here and does not support the argument being made, unless you're moving the goalposts.
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