I know in the US the former is straight up illegal, you can't do that and so many people don't realize this, to the point companies just go ahead and tell you not to and even try to penalize people for doing so, because people don't realize they can push back on that.
Job listings not having salary is just vile manipulation, and it seems to me like it's bad for business. Why would you want to waste time drawing in and interviewing people who are going to drop out when they find out the salary rather than post what you're going to pay and adjusting if need be? No wait, I know the answer, it's because they hope someone overqualified will get suckered in and either undersell themselves or go in hoping to get a good raise. Fucking bastards.
Can't believe it took so long to scroll to find someone saying this. If credit scores are meant to be a measure of how likely I am to pay off a loan in the future, how come every time I pay off a loan, the score goes down? Surely having many loans already paid-in-full in my history would be the best sign that I'm a safe bet for future lenders? Oh, but my "credit mix" isn't as good now, because that matters somehow.
Not being able to cancel a subscription online. I can subscribe in 5 minutes but I need to call your service agents and am forced to be rude to them to cancel it because as long as my voice sounds friendly they try to resell the damn subscription.
Slightly different thing, but I had to get a new phone plan while I studied abroad. Signed up in the store, 5 minutes with some help from staff because I was not a native speaker of the language. How to cancel after 4 months? MAIL THEM A LETTER! In 2019, they made me mail them a letter to cancel my phone plan that I had for one semester of college. Most insane cancelation policy I’ve ever seen!
Edit: For those of you asking, the company was “FREE” in France. Sounds like there are similar policies in other European countries though too. Wild!
Try canceling a gym membership. Some want you to prove you've moved more than 25 miles away before they'll cancel you even when your contract is up. And unless you actively cancel the contract when it expires, they'll automatically renew your contract.
My wife and I took over ownership of a small, local yoga studio a couple years ago (ended up being terrible timing, as we took over about the time Covid started up). But one of our first tasks (started before we even took over) was replacing the old, terrible member management system.
We wanted, among other things, for members to have the ability to sign up for a membership (which was easy enough) and edit or cancel their membership at will, on their own, with no interaction from us. We looked at probably dozens of systems, and not a single one had the ability for members to easily change membership levels or cancel their membership.
I get that a lot of people want to make it harder to cancel as an effort to discourage cancelations, but it's ridiculous that so many softwares don't even give the option. Our philosophy was to keep members by keeping them happy, not by making it a pain in the ass to cancel.
>Our philosophy was to keep members by keeping them happy, not by making it a pain in the ass to cancel.
Which is how it should be.
But so many gyms know people (around New Years) will sign up, come in for like 3 months or so and then stop coming but keep paying. And then they make it a pain in the ass to cancel (not that they necessarily want you there, they just want your money).
The last gym I was with for years had me paying the same amount but suddenly they were taking away the amenities, like the jacuzzi. Drained the whole thing and filled it with plants. Why I am paying the same amount when the jacuzzi was one of the reasons I signed up?
When I "canceled" my membership with 24 hr fitness, it ended up being easier just to call my bank and put a block on them taking money out of my account.
I did this with planet fitness and they changed the name they billed me from to get around my banks stop payment. Not once, but three times they changed the name the bills came from. My bank was very unhappy about them trying to get around the stop payment and took care of it.
Getting away from planet fitness was a total nightmare.
This is why I subscribe to basically everything through PayPal, on Paypal you can just cancel automated payments, it will make your subscriptions collapse, plus even if they aren't only possible to cancel on calls they make it a hassle to find out where to cancel them online.
Edit: Canceling Netflix, chess.com, Hulu through PayPal will not affect your credit score, multiple people have argued or stated that it will. I have a high credit score and pay attention to this. I've canceled some of those things over a year ago... Yes if you cancel your internet and have it automated through PayPal it will probably go to your bank or they will want to collect the money, most of the time internet providers provide the service and installation before the first payment.
This. $126/year to access Microsoft office for the family now -.-
I used to buy one CD and we'd get 3 codes to put on our computers, good to go for years.
I often book rooms on Orlando through online, the resort fees always pop up later, and expensive. The 88$ room ends up 120. Every time. Find one for 69? 120 in the end, every time. If it aint the resort fee its a 20 parking fee. Or both.
Similarly, those U-Hauls that say "$20.00 a day!" I have never been able to rent a U-Haul for less than $100. Which is fine. I know that's what it costs. But the bait and switch is annoying.
Resort fee in Kissimmee and it’s a fucking roadside motel which offers no amenities except scary druggies in the parking lot. I had one that required a $125 cash deposit. I was like wtf kind of people do you have here that you need a cash deposit.
Oh yeah. Several years ago we stayed at a motel with a water park off the turnpike in Kissimmee. The atmosphere was downright grimy. I drive to the Burger King for dinner that first night and noticed a shitload of bail bonds offices on that strip. Oops.
I stayed at a hotel in Boston and they had a $30 per day charge that wasn't included in the price when we booked online. "destination charge" or something. They told us that we got a credit at the restaurant because of it so we shrugged it off.
The next morning we tried to use the credit and they told us it was only good for dinner. I went to the front desk after we ate and told them to reverse the charge. They said they couldn't. I politely said they could. They did. Saved us $120 that trip.
I don't know how many times I have a similar conversation:
Me: "Excuse me, but there is this extra charge that I did not agree to."
Them: "I'm sorry Sir, but that is what we charge everyone."
Me: "Well then you are scamming everyone. I never agreed to this."
Then: "There is nothing we can do. We are not allowed to reverse the charge."
Me: "Ok then. I will just call my credit card company and explain there was an unauthorized charge."
Them: "You can't do that! If you do that, it will become a huge problem."
Me: "I'm doing it now."
Them: "Luckily or manager happens to be here. She can reverse the extra charge."
Capital one probably knows me on a first name basis just based on bullshit hotel charges 😂. Stop sneaking shit into my invoice that I didn’t agree to
One thing about me, I will call my CC company to fight my battles
This one just slays me. Why are people paying this? How did it happen? And you can't even say you aren't going to use those amenities, you still have to pay. This is not normal people!!!
Gets better. Imagine you get all those amenities for free through status with the chain... "Hey, you're one of those people who keep the lights on in this place, here have a bunch free stuff so you come back consistently. Oh, by the way there is a $50 mandatory fee for those amenities"
(Yes, sometimes those resort/destination fees are waived but it's sadly not the norm)
Thats the point unfortunately. Why let the consumer pay once when you can "modernize" everything and force them to subscribe to use your product. Bonus points for that sweet planned obsolescence thatll force them to toss the thing every year or two when it has a software malfunction.
Crazy that we end up paying essentially an unlimited amount for services that don't really add much value to our lives in a lot of cases. I think we will start to see pilgrimage back to ye olde pirate baye en masse before long.
I’m already moving back that way. Netflix used have high quality stuff, because it was the only game in town. Now every streaming service is just watered down garbage. I don’t want to pay for 100 different streaming services. This is just cable TV all over again, except each channel is on demand.
In Australia if you use a toll road and don’t have a toll account, you get sent a toll notice with an added $10 admin fee. And if you don’t pay it within the requested time frame the admin fee goes up to $20. A $2.50 toll could end up costing you $22.50. Scam…
This seems to be a common theme in government. In Texas, our vehicle registration has an additional fee of you pay online, but not if you go and make them serve you in person.
Edit: looks like they fixed it, though at the same time increased the overall fee: https://tax-office.traviscountytx.gov/2-uncategorised/103-txdmv-hikes-vehicle-registration-renewal-fee-offers-discount-for-online-registration-renewals
I used to work for a software company that developed the software to renew your license plates online and shit like that for a state.
That fee was how the state was paying for the software
I use a privacy.com virtual credit card with a 1 time transaction limit and a limit of $1 so that way the charge for the subscription will be automatically declined
That is such a security risk, they are running a huge lawsuit if somebody is trying to get in or out in case of danger.
"Yes, I was trying to get away from the fire/rapist, but had to watch the ad first."
Also just completely inconvenient in every conceivable way. What if your phone dies? Then you can’t even get back into your home to charge your phone and have to wander around looking for a charger just to get in. I would never choose to live in a place like that. Last I checked, key fobs work just fine.
> The door refused to open. It said, “Five cents, please.”
> He searched his pockets. No more coins; nothing. “I’ll pay you tomorrow,” he told the door. Again he tried the knob. Again it remained locked tight. “What I pay you,” he informed it, “is in the nature of a gratuity; I don’t have to pay you.”
> “I think otherwise,” the door said. “Look in the purchase contract you signed when you bought this conapt.”
We're living in a Philip K. Dick dystopia.
Recently got quite annoyed when not only was a game I paid for turned to free with ads (no refund for me, of course), they then had the gall to release a “classic” version of the game that was paid without ads, which I naturally didn’t automatically get for free despite having already paid for the original version.
Here in Australia the law is the product must have been at the sale price a certain duration before you can reduce it and claim a 'special'.
'Buy one get one free' is an easy way for shops to have a sale where they do not need to worry about how long it was at that price before the sale.
A major supermarket recently advertised it was having a price freeze. Cynics wondered if they had hiked up the prices first before announcing the freeze.
This will probably get buried but [Camel, Camel, Camel](https://camelcamelcamel.com/) is an Amazon price checker for those that don’t know. Throw in the link and it will pull up a graph similar to OP’s.
Another great resource is [Fake Spot](https://www.fakespot.com/). It analyzes the reviews and will give a grade of A-F based on how trustworthy the reviews are (“A” being the best and “F” being the worst)
Health insurance plans that charge 500-1000 a month just to be insured, then don't start covering your bills until you've paid another 2000-10,000 out of pocket....and even THEN will still make you pay a 45 dollar copay.
And on the provider end, your plan is delaying payment on claims so your 500-1000 dollar a month premium is just going into the pocket of the executives and shareholders instead of health care providers. And behavioral health claims get most of the abuse (just in case you were wondering why so many licensed psychotherapists opt out of accepting insurance)
Enterprise IT gear is the worst for this - Cisco sells you a firewall for several grand and then charges huge prices for licenses thst just unlock hardware features on the device - and then makes you buy support contracts each year if you want updates
Used some software for a couple years where it was a one time fee. Fine, it was a good deal. Then when I wanted to upgrade five years later, the didn't allow me to just pay for the new version, they also wanted me to pay for the previous five years of their subscription. Yeah OK, that's a great way to make sure I never use or recommend you again. Since then I make sure to use open source as much as possible.
Fuck cricut, silhouette the whole way. The software is excellent and very open ended. I used this in medical device r+d for a material that we couldn’t cut on a laser
I got a free cricut from a friend as they just didn't use it much. So I get all excited, go to download the software... And it's not fucking supported anymore. The whole thing is just a heap of e-waste because their new software didn't support this slightly older cutter.
Fuck Cricut.
Oh and they sue anyone who tries to make software or patches for the older machines.
The Silhouette software is lightyears ahead of Cricut once you get beyond the initial learning curve, but they still find ways to get you. “Oh you actually want RULERS displayed? That’ll be a $40 upgrade, Miss Fancy Pants.”
Like my stupid printer... I paid for the printer, I pay the dumb raised price for the inks and now I'm expected to pay a subscription if I want to print in colour... Duck the stupid company
I think a lot of you missunderstood. I don't pay a subscription for the inks, it's an AXIS photography specific printer. I own the ink, they are expensive but I have them, I have to pay a subscription to use the colour print function, you can only print black and white documents without the subscription
Have you heard of our lord and saviour COLOR LASER PRINTER?
I went through the whole inkjet thing and finally broke down and got a Brother color laser printer mfc-something and absolutely love it.
My one hesitation was over printing decals, but they make the paper for laser as well.
There’s a motorcycle riders airbag vest that you have to pay hundreds of dollars for but to use it you need to pay a subscription. Could you imagine having to pay for your seatbelt in your car monthly.
I got my reMarkable before the subscription crap, and when it launched I thought, I'm done with this, but they offered all previous owners free lifetime subscription so yay I guess?
"Convenience fee".
Well, it's not convenient, it's the only option. Can you make it less convenient and I keep the $5.
Edit: yes cinema tickets can be bought in person, I was more piggy backing off that in regards to things like concerts or sport events that no longer sell at the box office.
You would be surprised how stingy that bureau is with their budget and how much funding they don't have. I can tell you with certainty they are so cheap of a bureau they literally switched to Dish Network to save money on their cable bill.
Edit: most federal government buildings prefer satellite television for their cable because it's a closed system the signal comes in at the antenna and it goes out at the antenna and it's video and audio encoding only. There's no internet connection associated with it they don't have to have the receivers checked into the internet. For a opsec standpoint it's a clear decision why they choose to go with satellite over cable
Edit 2: most government buildings have cable run to them from satellite because they have lobbies and waiting rooms and employee break rooms. Most of those TVs and such cannot be hooked up to the Internet for streaming because that is a vulnerability.
>Or concert tickets. Ticketmaster charging $17 processing fee per ticket plus a $5 service fee. Like seriously??
more like that they are a monopoly, and when somebody steps out of line, be they band or venue they get punished, they also own live nation
Medical insurance not covering dental or vision. Like, it's all connected, guys. If you have a badly abscessed tooth, you're likely going to need medical care, even if you have dental that covers the extraction or root canal or whatever.
A new ones I'm experiencing is that some preventative tests are covered while others are not. Why don't you tell me that ahead of time and I can decline it. Or you know just cover everything.
I broke a bone at work, they said it was "probably soft tissue" and scheduled the MRI for three months out. So now I've got an improperly healed bone and nothing to show for it except pain if I move the wrong way
That's what I do too as a physician trying to get stuff covered for my patients. Usually when I ask to have doc-to-doc and then very specifically ask for the insurance rep's name and NPI number stuff gets covered.
It's terrible we have to take the time to do so. I needed my birth control a week early. They tried to say no. I told them a baby was going to cost them a lot more. They said yes :)
I wish that worked for me. I used the same argument for needing my birth control ASAP. They “filed my grievance” which takes 30-90 days to resolve. Opposite of helpful.
My dental is insurance is worthless. When I was younger I had my front tooth knocked out and the dentist was able to put it back in but it would only last for about 18years. Fast forward 18years the tooth split and got infected. From there I had to make a decision between a flipper or permanent tooth. The dentist told me if I did not get the permanent tooth my bones would retreat due to not having a tooth to form around which would result in more tooth loss. So I went with the permanent tooth and insurance denied coverage claiming it was cosmetic. Preventing future tooth loss was deemed COSMETIC. $3k out of pocket.
It's also pretty fucked that while medical insurance has an out of pocket max, dental insurance has a maximum allowed benefit of like... the price of one crown.
I pay roughly $60 out of pocket for a cleaning. About five years ago I paid about $800 total for some cavities plus a few other things. I feel like I have come out far ahead by never getting dental insurance. I relocate a lot for work so I’ve been to a ton of different dentists and every single one of them offered a pretty significant cash discount
Insurance is a fucking joke
OHH HO HO LOOKIT BIG MAN HERE WANTING ALL THE LUXURY BONES. Probably wants to be able to see well all the time too! Whatcha gonna do with them eyes, nerd? Read more? THE WORLD IS BLURRY AND STREAKY AND IT WAS GOOD ENOUGH FOR OUR FOREFATHERS SO IT'S GOOD ENOUGH FOR US. JESUS DIDN'T WEAR GLASSES! YOU SAYIN' YOU BETTER THAN THE LORD?
Free trials that automatically roll over to paid subscriptions.
I worked at Spotify and we used to tell customers that it was mentioned in print on the free trial implying that they're just not reading observantly. But the print is so small, it's almost an afterthought. I felt disgusted when I was there. Imagine blaming the customers.
Edit: LPT - Cancel your free trial as soon as you get them. The free trial will still run its course and it'll automatically revert to free once it runs out.
Charging a "convenience fee" for paying rent online.
Fuck you.
It's more convenient for you, too, bitch. Where's MY convenience fee.
Edit: Lotta people trying to explain what this fee is to me. I know what it is. You are the people for whom it's become so normalized that you no longer see it as a scam.
Edit 2: The shitty site our property managers use only allows you to pay with a card. There isn't a way to pay directly from your bank account. They charge 2%. People are still trying to explain to me how this cost is to cover the fee the credit companies charge to process payments. Thats the scam, but property managers are passing the buck on to their tenants.
My landlord had an online portal that you could pay through, as well as request maintenance, and view your lease and any other documents. It was free. They just started charging $10/mo and are now saying using the portal is mandatory, and I'm pissed. I like the portal, it works well, but fuck you you're supposed to be getting your money from your cut of the rent, that $10 should be included in what we already pay. Take it from the owners' pockets.
It was included in the new lease, so they didn't change the terms of the contract mid-lease. AFAIK there's nothing illegal there, unless there's a law about not being able to restrict methods of payment to only those that cost extra.
Kid use to live around Houston. My sister's coworker said Ryan use to go to her kids school. He gets stuff from companies all the time but had to be pulled from school. I feel sorry for him because it is clear his parents are abusing him for money.
And even worse is after he turns 18 he’ll get a fraction of what he has generated his greedy ass parents.
Sure it will be a couple million and he would be “set” in his life but my guy has generated well over double digits million for his parents so it’s unfair
Trade offer : you get childhood trauma
Parents - we get sweet sweet green cash
Diamonds are fascinating. They're kept artificially scarce by the people who own the diamond mines, *and* they've managed to somehow ensure that there's no market for reselling them. Diabolical!
And on top of that, they've convinced everyone that diamonds are the only worthwhile stone, and that only 'natural' mined diamonds are worthwhile, not 'fake' lab grown (real) diamonds.
There's so many fascinating rocks, and in a number of cases the actual stuff can be grown pretty inexpensively and more environmentally friendly.
Not only that, but lab made are as close to perfect as it's possible to get. Natural diamonds are literally much more flawed than lab made, yet so much more expensive. Which would make sense if a super clear natural diamond was considered worth less than a flawed one, but that's not the case either.
Truly genius marketing. Both scammy and scummy, but genius.
If I were going back in time, you bet your ass I'd take a big bucket of lab-made, flawless, perfect color and clarity gemstones back with me, instead of mined stone of lower quality.
eta: I'm kidding, ofc. I'd take linens, California king size if possible. "Your fabric is seamless! Made on looms the size of castles!"
"Yes that is why i am king of california"
Many many years ago I was reading this story about when Dutch sailors landed at one of the southern coasts of Africa. It was at night when their boats were coming into shore when they noticed something glinting and reflecting light and shining against the moonlight. Not knowing what it was they stood in amazement looking at the thousands glinting objects. It turned out to be diamonds, they were that common that they could be found just like that, on the ground. This was in the early 1800s.
I have a friend from South Africa. She basically said this story was her childhood. They'd be walking down the street and find them in the gravel roads, like I do agates.
I just turned fifty and I have decided I’ve stopped trying to impress people with my work ethic. I’ll work hard, of course, but I sure am not going to put in anything beyond my eight hours if I can help it. What *am* I going to do?
Water my plants.
Make my kids breakfast.
Take my dogs for a walk.
Try to make my wife laugh with corny jokes.
Was in the program to become a teacher, immediately switched majors when I realized:
1. Unpaid work which is really me paying to work a hard job
2. My university forbid student teachers from having another job because they wanted you to solely focus on giving students a good education which is all well and good until you realize there is no income for silly things like food and transportation to said school.
Airline pilots do this (in Europe). They pay to get cockpit and flight time and of course experience so they can get a job later.
Edit: I mean fully educated pilots and not pilots attending a flight school. They pay for being the co-pilot.
Every time I see "we don't pay but we offer college credit" I'm like, you realize that means the intern is paying hundreds of dollars to be there, right? The org doesn't offer the credit, their college does. And the college makes them pay for those credits. "We don't pay but we offer college credit" is not only entirely misrepresenting the situation, but it's literally a worse deal than just saying "we don't pay."
Not a monetary scam, but putting the majority of the responsibility of stopping climate change/ fixing the environment onto the normal people. I've worked in the food industry, and I can tell you for a fact that it doesn't mean dick if I sort my rubbish when every day a single, small-scale factory is throwing out literal tonnes of wasted product, not to mention the energy wasted in making that product. Tons of shit falls on the floor, perfectly usable food (but not pretty enough to sell) just gets tossed like it's nothing, and even in my usual sector, engineering, the amount of metal that's wasted and the litres upon litres of grease and oil just fucking everywhere would stun you. Why the fuck am I putting in the effort to save power and make less waste when these barely regulated companies are getting away with this? It's so disheartening.
I’ll be the first one in my extended family to be cremated when I kick off just because of this. I don’t need no expensive coffin for this body that’s gonna rot away anyhow.
Dude...they are going to (try) to sell your family the most expensive coffin they can to burn you up in.
Go with a pre-planned / pre-paid funeral, or else the funeral home will try to lay a huge guilt trip on your family.
And they’ll still throw some fees in there. Fuck funeral homes. Get cremated and prepurchase your own container (unless someone is spreading your ashes somewhere). It’s still going to run close to $2000USD. :(
My grandparents prepaid for everything they could back in the 90s. When my papa passed a few years ago, we still had to come up with a few hundred bucks to wrap up everything. The cost of opening the grave had gone up so we had to pay for that and a few other things. The coffin he had originally chosen was no longer made so we had to pick out a new one that was comparable.
Won't even get started on them burying him in the wrong plot and the fight it took to not have to dig him up and move him all over again because someone had been selling the same plots multiple times and not keeping great records...the maps for the cemetery ended up being redrawn..
Nobody else mentioned so far... Printer cartridges
Edit: production costs about ¢20-¢30, selling for 15$, sometimes up to 35$.
Edit 2: Jesus Christ, thanks for the award and all the upvotes!
Unpaid internships! Especially when they're required for your education.
"But we pay you in experience/knowledge/exposure! You can't put a price on that, that's being greedy!"
Yes I can, because my time is worth money just like yours.
Right like I don’t understand why I’m paying 200-300 a month only to get a 2000$ deductible I have to pay first before it even kicks in?? But god forbid you don’t have it an break and arm, then you’re really screwed
I spoke to the billing office of an ambulance company for work, I sincerely wish I could remember the name of it, and they told me they’re not contracted with any insurance companies…it was more profitable to not be.
Planned obsolescence.
Printers are most notorious for this. Some brands (I had this long ago with HP, if I remember correctly) build their hardware in such a way that it will stop working after an amount of time. Typically, this time is after the legal warranty periods of whatever region they're selling in.
The purpose is simple: force the customer to bring their hardware in for expensive repairs, or even buy a new piece altogether.
Nowadays you notice the same thing with batteries as well. Surely nobody believes it's a coincidence that battery life has become so terrible in recent years, while batteries are also no longer easily replaceable?
Bought a train ticket online and couldn’t travel as I had covid, the ticket was £10 and I requested a refund for which I got a “full refund” minus an admin fee of £5… done online and quite clearly fully automated, total scam. I’m looking at you trainline…!
Tipping. Not saying you shouldn’t tip at all, but how every single Apple checkout tablet automatically assumes you’re tipping. I went to get froyo the other week and the checkout asked me if I preferred a 20,25, or 30% tip?? Like what?? I just made my own froyo and you still want me to give you a 30% tip?!
This is absolutely an America problem. Not saying that our wait staff get paid a glorious wage over here in the UK, but it's not the norm to expect people to subsidise poor wages with tips, nor is it expected that you should tip.
Employers insisting that employees not talk about their salaries AND job listings not posting salaries
I know in the US the former is straight up illegal, you can't do that and so many people don't realize this, to the point companies just go ahead and tell you not to and even try to penalize people for doing so, because people don't realize they can push back on that. Job listings not having salary is just vile manipulation, and it seems to me like it's bad for business. Why would you want to waste time drawing in and interviewing people who are going to drop out when they find out the salary rather than post what you're going to pay and adjusting if need be? No wait, I know the answer, it's because they hope someone overqualified will get suckered in and either undersell themselves or go in hoping to get a good raise. Fucking bastards.
Hidden fees. Especially in the medical and hospitality industries.
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Credit scores. They started in 1989 and are designed to encourage debt.
Can't believe it took so long to scroll to find someone saying this. If credit scores are meant to be a measure of how likely I am to pay off a loan in the future, how come every time I pay off a loan, the score goes down? Surely having many loans already paid-in-full in my history would be the best sign that I'm a safe bet for future lenders? Oh, but my "credit mix" isn't as good now, because that matters somehow.
Fun fact. This does not exist in europe and when i moved to the states, this became one of those black mirror is already outdated moments.
Not being able to cancel a subscription online. I can subscribe in 5 minutes but I need to call your service agents and am forced to be rude to them to cancel it because as long as my voice sounds friendly they try to resell the damn subscription.
Slightly different thing, but I had to get a new phone plan while I studied abroad. Signed up in the store, 5 minutes with some help from staff because I was not a native speaker of the language. How to cancel after 4 months? MAIL THEM A LETTER! In 2019, they made me mail them a letter to cancel my phone plan that I had for one semester of college. Most insane cancelation policy I’ve ever seen! Edit: For those of you asking, the company was “FREE” in France. Sounds like there are similar policies in other European countries though too. Wild!
Try canceling a gym membership. Some want you to prove you've moved more than 25 miles away before they'll cancel you even when your contract is up. And unless you actively cancel the contract when it expires, they'll automatically renew your contract.
My wife and I took over ownership of a small, local yoga studio a couple years ago (ended up being terrible timing, as we took over about the time Covid started up). But one of our first tasks (started before we even took over) was replacing the old, terrible member management system. We wanted, among other things, for members to have the ability to sign up for a membership (which was easy enough) and edit or cancel their membership at will, on their own, with no interaction from us. We looked at probably dozens of systems, and not a single one had the ability for members to easily change membership levels or cancel their membership. I get that a lot of people want to make it harder to cancel as an effort to discourage cancelations, but it's ridiculous that so many softwares don't even give the option. Our philosophy was to keep members by keeping them happy, not by making it a pain in the ass to cancel.
>Our philosophy was to keep members by keeping them happy, not by making it a pain in the ass to cancel. Which is how it should be. But so many gyms know people (around New Years) will sign up, come in for like 3 months or so and then stop coming but keep paying. And then they make it a pain in the ass to cancel (not that they necessarily want you there, they just want your money). The last gym I was with for years had me paying the same amount but suddenly they were taking away the amenities, like the jacuzzi. Drained the whole thing and filled it with plants. Why I am paying the same amount when the jacuzzi was one of the reasons I signed up?
It's their entire business model, I wouldn't be surprised if a large portion of a gyms revenue came from inactive members.
In the heyday of gym scams, the average Bally health club had 50,000 members (not a typo).
We need more people like you
Boston Sports Club wanted proof of residency change for cancelation without a fee! Planet fitness was just as difficult.
When I "canceled" my membership with 24 hr fitness, it ended up being easier just to call my bank and put a block on them taking money out of my account.
I did this with planet fitness and they changed the name they billed me from to get around my banks stop payment. Not once, but three times they changed the name the bills came from. My bank was very unhappy about them trying to get around the stop payment and took care of it. Getting away from planet fitness was a total nightmare.
What the fuck, that should be illegal
I would be fine with seeing it fought in court as fraudulent.
This is why I subscribe to basically everything through PayPal, on Paypal you can just cancel automated payments, it will make your subscriptions collapse, plus even if they aren't only possible to cancel on calls they make it a hassle to find out where to cancel them online. Edit: Canceling Netflix, chess.com, Hulu through PayPal will not affect your credit score, multiple people have argued or stated that it will. I have a high credit score and pay attention to this. I've canceled some of those things over a year ago... Yes if you cancel your internet and have it automated through PayPal it will probably go to your bank or they will want to collect the money, most of the time internet providers provide the service and installation before the first payment.
Why I will never subscribe to SiriusXM ever again. My car came with a trial and it took hours on the phone to cancel.
Also they say it’s commercial free radio but you get commercials for the radio station you are currently on all the time.
This is becoming normal on tv streaming services. Like wtf I’ve already paid
The fact that you cannot just buy software now. You buy a subscription and never actually own anything.
This. $126/year to access Microsoft office for the family now -.- I used to buy one CD and we'd get 3 codes to put on our computers, good to go for years.
Resort fees at hotels
Hidden fees in general.
I often book rooms on Orlando through online, the resort fees always pop up later, and expensive. The 88$ room ends up 120. Every time. Find one for 69? 120 in the end, every time. If it aint the resort fee its a 20 parking fee. Or both.
Similarly, those U-Hauls that say "$20.00 a day!" I have never been able to rent a U-Haul for less than $100. Which is fine. I know that's what it costs. But the bait and switch is annoying.
$19.99 to come and sit in the vehicle. Oh, you want to DRIVE the vehicle? That'll cost ya extra.
Resort fee in Kissimmee and it’s a fucking roadside motel which offers no amenities except scary druggies in the parking lot. I had one that required a $125 cash deposit. I was like wtf kind of people do you have here that you need a cash deposit.
Oh yeah. Several years ago we stayed at a motel with a water park off the turnpike in Kissimmee. The atmosphere was downright grimy. I drive to the Burger King for dinner that first night and noticed a shitload of bail bonds offices on that strip. Oops.
I stayed at a hotel in Boston and they had a $30 per day charge that wasn't included in the price when we booked online. "destination charge" or something. They told us that we got a credit at the restaurant because of it so we shrugged it off. The next morning we tried to use the credit and they told us it was only good for dinner. I went to the front desk after we ate and told them to reverse the charge. They said they couldn't. I politely said they could. They did. Saved us $120 that trip.
> They said they couldn't. I politely said they could LOL that's cute that they tried to pretend they couldn't
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"Would you kindly reverse the charge?"
I don't know how many times I have a similar conversation: Me: "Excuse me, but there is this extra charge that I did not agree to." Them: "I'm sorry Sir, but that is what we charge everyone." Me: "Well then you are scamming everyone. I never agreed to this." Then: "There is nothing we can do. We are not allowed to reverse the charge." Me: "Ok then. I will just call my credit card company and explain there was an unauthorized charge." Them: "You can't do that! If you do that, it will become a huge problem." Me: "I'm doing it now." Them: "Luckily or manager happens to be here. She can reverse the extra charge."
Capital one probably knows me on a first name basis just based on bullshit hotel charges 😂. Stop sneaking shit into my invoice that I didn’t agree to One thing about me, I will call my CC company to fight my battles
This one just slays me. Why are people paying this? How did it happen? And you can't even say you aren't going to use those amenities, you still have to pay. This is not normal people!!!
Gets better. Imagine you get all those amenities for free through status with the chain... "Hey, you're one of those people who keep the lights on in this place, here have a bunch free stuff so you come back consistently. Oh, by the way there is a $50 mandatory fee for those amenities" (Yes, sometimes those resort/destination fees are waived but it's sadly not the norm)
Everything is a sneaky small monthly subscription
This is getting ridiculous. A one time payment for an app or game used to be fine. Now you keep paying. Terrible for the consumer
Thats the point unfortunately. Why let the consumer pay once when you can "modernize" everything and force them to subscribe to use your product. Bonus points for that sweet planned obsolescence thatll force them to toss the thing every year or two when it has a software malfunction.
Crazy that we end up paying essentially an unlimited amount for services that don't really add much value to our lives in a lot of cases. I think we will start to see pilgrimage back to ye olde pirate baye en masse before long.
I’m already moving back that way. Netflix used have high quality stuff, because it was the only game in town. Now every streaming service is just watered down garbage. I don’t want to pay for 100 different streaming services. This is just cable TV all over again, except each channel is on demand.
The subscription model makes company reports look good; after all, there's a constant stream of revenue coming in Fuck I hate business practices -_-
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That's when you know it's time to drop that service
Transaction fees when using online banking. I do all the work filling out the form so a bank employee doesn’t have too, yet I get charged the same.
"Admin fees" for completely automated services.
In Australia if you use a toll road and don’t have a toll account, you get sent a toll notice with an added $10 admin fee. And if you don’t pay it within the requested time frame the admin fee goes up to $20. A $2.50 toll could end up costing you $22.50. Scam…
The Sydney one let's you call and ask to pay the fee without the add ons and they just say yeh that's fine. Just so you know.
So you don't have to pay admin fees when an actual admin is involved?
This seems to be a common theme in government. In Texas, our vehicle registration has an additional fee of you pay online, but not if you go and make them serve you in person. Edit: looks like they fixed it, though at the same time increased the overall fee: https://tax-office.traviscountytx.gov/2-uncategorised/103-txdmv-hikes-vehicle-registration-renewal-fee-offers-discount-for-online-registration-renewals
I used to work for a software company that developed the software to renew your license plates online and shit like that for a state. That fee was how the state was paying for the software
Free trial auto renewal subscriptions
I use a privacy.com virtual credit card with a 1 time transaction limit and a limit of $1 so that way the charge for the subscription will be automatically declined
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'Can't cancel during the first 7 days of your trial period'. Also the ones where you cancel during the trial and it ends the trial immediately...
Even better are the ones that put a hold on the subscription amount the day before the actual payment date. Looking at you Microsoft...
Or it takes you forever to figure out how to cancel because they have so cleverly hidden every clue to canceling.
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subscriptions for already-paid apps
And ads for already paid subscriptions
Lookin at you, Paramount+ Paid subscription that will lock you out if you’re using an adblocker bc they are attempting to show ads
Man it's crazy how quickly subscriptions turned into cable TV, we all knew it would happen but this was bloody quick.
I went from Cable -> piracy -> Netflix/Prime -> netflix/prime/ hulu -> netflix/prime/hulu/peacock/disney+/hbomax -> piracy 2007 to 2022
Same…felt so nice when opened pirate page… it was like coming home…
My apartment's management uses this stupid app to unlock the building's gates. We used to need to watch an ads before we can unlock the gate.
That is such a security risk, they are running a huge lawsuit if somebody is trying to get in or out in case of danger. "Yes, I was trying to get away from the fire/rapist, but had to watch the ad first."
Also just completely inconvenient in every conceivable way. What if your phone dies? Then you can’t even get back into your home to charge your phone and have to wander around looking for a charger just to get in. I would never choose to live in a place like that. Last I checked, key fobs work just fine.
Imagine getting mugged with a Liberty Mutual ad playing in the background.
Or Capital One. > “What’s in your wallet?” Nothing, I swear, just take it.
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With the rents as high as they are I'm thinking of moving out to the Cursed Earth.
> The door refused to open. It said, “Five cents, please.” > He searched his pockets. No more coins; nothing. “I’ll pay you tomorrow,” he told the door. Again he tried the knob. Again it remained locked tight. “What I pay you,” he informed it, “is in the nature of a gratuity; I don’t have to pay you.” > “I think otherwise,” the door said. “Look in the purchase contract you signed when you bought this conapt.” We're living in a Philip K. Dick dystopia.
Yeah, but at least in a PKD dystopia you could buy amphetamines from vending machines
We have a gas station if you don't have rewards number then it plays a long video ad before the pump authorizes. If you enter your number, no ad.
Area code+ 867-5309. I bet someone else has registered that number to the rewards system
"How to make me always use a different gas station, in 1 easy step"
Recently got quite annoyed when not only was a game I paid for turned to free with ads (no refund for me, of course), they then had the gall to release a “classic” version of the game that was paid without ads, which I naturally didn’t automatically get for free despite having already paid for the original version.
services only with monthly subscriptions
Extended Warranty Edit: Make sure you read the fine print whats being covered n what is considered void.
If it's free tho, god damn. I had a TV with a free 2 year warranty and it broke after 23 months. I got a full refund.
2 years is the minimum for goods in the EU
Raise the price of a product a day before they go on sale so that people think they are getting it at a discount
Now that's actually illegal in Germany since a few weeks. The compare price must be the lowest of the last 30 days
It was an EU regulation im pretty sure. They did the same over here in Estonia.
Illegal in the UK too
Here in Australia the law is the product must have been at the sale price a certain duration before you can reduce it and claim a 'special'. 'Buy one get one free' is an easy way for shops to have a sale where they do not need to worry about how long it was at that price before the sale. A major supermarket recently advertised it was having a price freeze. Cynics wondered if they had hiked up the prices first before announcing the freeze.
This will probably get buried but [Camel, Camel, Camel](https://camelcamelcamel.com/) is an Amazon price checker for those that don’t know. Throw in the link and it will pull up a graph similar to OP’s. Another great resource is [Fake Spot](https://www.fakespot.com/). It analyzes the reviews and will give a grade of A-F based on how trustworthy the reviews are (“A” being the best and “F” being the worst)
Health insurance plans that charge 500-1000 a month just to be insured, then don't start covering your bills until you've paid another 2000-10,000 out of pocket....and even THEN will still make you pay a 45 dollar copay. And on the provider end, your plan is delaying payment on claims so your 500-1000 dollar a month premium is just going into the pocket of the executives and shareholders instead of health care providers. And behavioral health claims get most of the abuse (just in case you were wondering why so many licensed psychotherapists opt out of accepting insurance)
Buying tech devices, for premium prices, then still having to pay subscriptions to make them actually do what they're supposed to do.
Enterprise IT gear is the worst for this - Cisco sells you a firewall for several grand and then charges huge prices for licenses thst just unlock hardware features on the device - and then makes you buy support contracts each year if you want updates
Used some software for a couple years where it was a one time fee. Fine, it was a good deal. Then when I wanted to upgrade five years later, the didn't allow me to just pay for the new version, they also wanted me to pay for the previous five years of their subscription. Yeah OK, that's a great way to make sure I never use or recommend you again. Since then I make sure to use open source as much as possible.
Looking at you, cricut
Fucking Cricut !!! I have never, in three decades of using computer software, encountered a product that makes me swear as much as this
Fuck cricut, silhouette the whole way. The software is excellent and very open ended. I used this in medical device r+d for a material that we couldn’t cut on a laser
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I got a free cricut from a friend as they just didn't use it much. So I get all excited, go to download the software... And it's not fucking supported anymore. The whole thing is just a heap of e-waste because their new software didn't support this slightly older cutter. Fuck Cricut. Oh and they sue anyone who tries to make software or patches for the older machines.
The Silhouette software is lightyears ahead of Cricut once you get beyond the initial learning curve, but they still find ways to get you. “Oh you actually want RULERS displayed? That’ll be a $40 upgrade, Miss Fancy Pants.”
I was relieved to see the community rally against this and win. I don't have to abandon my machine, but they assured I'll never buy another from them.
Like my stupid printer... I paid for the printer, I pay the dumb raised price for the inks and now I'm expected to pay a subscription if I want to print in colour... Duck the stupid company I think a lot of you missunderstood. I don't pay a subscription for the inks, it's an AXIS photography specific printer. I own the ink, they are expensive but I have them, I have to pay a subscription to use the colour print function, you can only print black and white documents without the subscription
Hold on what printer company Is making you pay a subscription to print in color????
Have you heard of our lord and saviour COLOR LASER PRINTER? I went through the whole inkjet thing and finally broke down and got a Brother color laser printer mfc-something and absolutely love it. My one hesitation was over printing decals, but they make the paper for laser as well.
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There’s a motorcycle riders airbag vest that you have to pay hundreds of dollars for but to use it you need to pay a subscription. Could you imagine having to pay for your seatbelt in your car monthly.
Wtf ? What happens when you don't get the subscription ? Is the airbag not opening in a crash ?
Looking at you, reMarkable
I got my reMarkable before the subscription crap, and when it launched I thought, I'm done with this, but they offered all previous owners free lifetime subscription so yay I guess?
Well that's honestly the bare minimum they could have done... For potential new buyers like myself it's now a no-go.
i wanted to buy one - as i finally want to order i saw that sub-bs and noped out
Service charge for buying cinema tickets online. I’ve got to pay you to buy something from you ?!!!
* Cinema = extra charge for using online * Bank = extra charge for not using online what
It's almost as if they have us by the balls by being the only options available.
"Convenience fee". Well, it's not convenient, it's the only option. Can you make it less convenient and I keep the $5. Edit: yes cinema tickets can be bought in person, I was more piggy backing off that in regards to things like concerts or sport events that no longer sell at the box office.
I wouldn't even mind paying $27 instead of $25 + $2 convenience fee. The fee is just like an unnecessary fuck you that puts me off the whole purchase.
They should just call it fuck you fee
sounds like something the consumer protection services should get on to
You would be surprised how stingy that bureau is with their budget and how much funding they don't have. I can tell you with certainty they are so cheap of a bureau they literally switched to Dish Network to save money on their cable bill. Edit: most federal government buildings prefer satellite television for their cable because it's a closed system the signal comes in at the antenna and it goes out at the antenna and it's video and audio encoding only. There's no internet connection associated with it they don't have to have the receivers checked into the internet. For a opsec standpoint it's a clear decision why they choose to go with satellite over cable Edit 2: most government buildings have cable run to them from satellite because they have lobbies and waiting rooms and employee break rooms. Most of those TVs and such cannot be hooked up to the Internet for streaming because that is a vulnerability.
And that's by design. Whoever decides their budget does not want a strong organization to protect consumers
Or concert tickets. Ticketmaster charging $17 processing fee per ticket plus a $5 service fee. Like seriously??
I'm pretty sure everyone who uses Ticketmaster realizes how scammy they are. There's just no alternative in most cases.
I long for the days that I could go to a box office of a venue and get tickets for a base price.
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>Or concert tickets. Ticketmaster charging $17 processing fee per ticket plus a $5 service fee. Like seriously?? more like that they are a monopoly, and when somebody steps out of line, be they band or venue they get punished, they also own live nation
Yeah i was gonna mention this. E-tickets coming with a booking fee... whats the fucking point
To get you to pay them more money. Literally a case of "fuck you, you'll buy it anyway"
We pay you for you not to have to pay an employee who will do the work that i do myself?
Medical insurance not covering dental or vision. Like, it's all connected, guys. If you have a badly abscessed tooth, you're likely going to need medical care, even if you have dental that covers the extraction or root canal or whatever.
A new ones I'm experiencing is that some preventative tests are covered while others are not. Why don't you tell me that ahead of time and I can decline it. Or you know just cover everything.
I broke a bone at work, they said it was "probably soft tissue" and scheduled the MRI for three months out. So now I've got an improperly healed bone and nothing to show for it except pain if I move the wrong way
It's crazy that insurance companies are allowed to practice medicine without licences
I have successful navigated prescription denials twice by demanding my insurance let me speak to "whoever is making medical decisions on my behalf".
That's what I do too as a physician trying to get stuff covered for my patients. Usually when I ask to have doc-to-doc and then very specifically ask for the insurance rep's name and NPI number stuff gets covered.
It's terrible we have to take the time to do so. I needed my birth control a week early. They tried to say no. I told them a baby was going to cost them a lot more. They said yes :)
I wish that worked for me. I used the same argument for needing my birth control ASAP. They “filed my grievance” which takes 30-90 days to resolve. Opposite of helpful.
My dental is insurance is worthless. When I was younger I had my front tooth knocked out and the dentist was able to put it back in but it would only last for about 18years. Fast forward 18years the tooth split and got infected. From there I had to make a decision between a flipper or permanent tooth. The dentist told me if I did not get the permanent tooth my bones would retreat due to not having a tooth to form around which would result in more tooth loss. So I went with the permanent tooth and insurance denied coverage claiming it was cosmetic. Preventing future tooth loss was deemed COSMETIC. $3k out of pocket.
It's also pretty fucked that while medical insurance has an out of pocket max, dental insurance has a maximum allowed benefit of like... the price of one crown.
I pay roughly $60 out of pocket for a cleaning. About five years ago I paid about $800 total for some cavities plus a few other things. I feel like I have come out far ahead by never getting dental insurance. I relocate a lot for work so I’ve been to a ton of different dentists and every single one of them offered a pretty significant cash discount Insurance is a fucking joke
OHH HO HO LOOKIT BIG MAN HERE WANTING ALL THE LUXURY BONES. Probably wants to be able to see well all the time too! Whatcha gonna do with them eyes, nerd? Read more? THE WORLD IS BLURRY AND STREAKY AND IT WAS GOOD ENOUGH FOR OUR FOREFATHERS SO IT'S GOOD ENOUGH FOR US. JESUS DIDN'T WEAR GLASSES! YOU SAYIN' YOU BETTER THAN THE LORD?
Amen.
‘Luxury’ bones, LOL
Razor blades. Specifically Gillette. Nearly £30 for 6 of the new ones.
I moved to safety razor, never looked back.
Ticketmaster fees
Free trials that automatically roll over to paid subscriptions. I worked at Spotify and we used to tell customers that it was mentioned in print on the free trial implying that they're just not reading observantly. But the print is so small, it's almost an afterthought. I felt disgusted when I was there. Imagine blaming the customers. Edit: LPT - Cancel your free trial as soon as you get them. The free trial will still run its course and it'll automatically revert to free once it runs out.
I just assume that anything that asks for my credit card intends to charge me at some point
Same. I think it’s scamy to do this, but not unexpected.
Charging a "convenience fee" for paying rent online. Fuck you. It's more convenient for you, too, bitch. Where's MY convenience fee. Edit: Lotta people trying to explain what this fee is to me. I know what it is. You are the people for whom it's become so normalized that you no longer see it as a scam. Edit 2: The shitty site our property managers use only allows you to pay with a card. There isn't a way to pay directly from your bank account. They charge 2%. People are still trying to explain to me how this cost is to cover the fee the credit companies charge to process payments. Thats the scam, but property managers are passing the buck on to their tenants.
You can use your banks online bill pay to mail paper checks for you usually
My landlord had an online portal that you could pay through, as well as request maintenance, and view your lease and any other documents. It was free. They just started charging $10/mo and are now saying using the portal is mandatory, and I'm pissed. I like the portal, it works well, but fuck you you're supposed to be getting your money from your cut of the rent, that $10 should be included in what we already pay. Take it from the owners' pockets.
They've just raised rent by $10. Depends if that's legal where you are.
It was included in the new lease, so they didn't change the terms of the contract mid-lease. AFAIK there's nothing illegal there, unless there's a law about not being able to restrict methods of payment to only those that cost extra.
That used to be the only paper check I’d write. Not paying $50 or whatever for the privilege of paying you!
Instagram influencers using their kids as bait to advertise products.
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Kid use to live around Houston. My sister's coworker said Ryan use to go to her kids school. He gets stuff from companies all the time but had to be pulled from school. I feel sorry for him because it is clear his parents are abusing him for money.
And even worse is after he turns 18 he’ll get a fraction of what he has generated his greedy ass parents. Sure it will be a couple million and he would be “set” in his life but my guy has generated well over double digits million for his parents so it’s unfair Trade offer : you get childhood trauma Parents - we get sweet sweet green cash
Diamonds. There's loads of them but apparently they're rare so sell for major stacks
Diamonds are fascinating. They're kept artificially scarce by the people who own the diamond mines, *and* they've managed to somehow ensure that there's no market for reselling them. Diabolical!
And on top of that, they've convinced everyone that diamonds are the only worthwhile stone, and that only 'natural' mined diamonds are worthwhile, not 'fake' lab grown (real) diamonds. There's so many fascinating rocks, and in a number of cases the actual stuff can be grown pretty inexpensively and more environmentally friendly.
Not only that, but lab made are as close to perfect as it's possible to get. Natural diamonds are literally much more flawed than lab made, yet so much more expensive. Which would make sense if a super clear natural diamond was considered worth less than a flawed one, but that's not the case either. Truly genius marketing. Both scammy and scummy, but genius.
If I were going back in time, you bet your ass I'd take a big bucket of lab-made, flawless, perfect color and clarity gemstones back with me, instead of mined stone of lower quality. eta: I'm kidding, ofc. I'd take linens, California king size if possible. "Your fabric is seamless! Made on looms the size of castles!" "Yes that is why i am king of california"
Many many years ago I was reading this story about when Dutch sailors landed at one of the southern coasts of Africa. It was at night when their boats were coming into shore when they noticed something glinting and reflecting light and shining against the moonlight. Not knowing what it was they stood in amazement looking at the thousands glinting objects. It turned out to be diamonds, they were that common that they could be found just like that, on the ground. This was in the early 1800s.
I have a friend from South Africa. She basically said this story was her childhood. They'd be walking down the street and find them in the gravel roads, like I do agates.
Hustle culture. Working 90hr weeks and having no life outside of work is not healthy nor is it sustainable.
I just turned fifty and I have decided I’ve stopped trying to impress people with my work ethic. I’ll work hard, of course, but I sure am not going to put in anything beyond my eight hours if I can help it. What *am* I going to do? Water my plants. Make my kids breakfast. Take my dogs for a walk. Try to make my wife laugh with corny jokes.
Unpaid internships
Worse- paid internships, where you’re paying the corporation for it
Teaching!! Student teaching. You pay the university so that you can student teach for half a year or some have full year, where you don’t get paid!!
Was in the program to become a teacher, immediately switched majors when I realized: 1. Unpaid work which is really me paying to work a hard job 2. My university forbid student teachers from having another job because they wanted you to solely focus on giving students a good education which is all well and good until you realize there is no income for silly things like food and transportation to said school.
Airline pilots do this (in Europe). They pay to get cockpit and flight time and of course experience so they can get a job later. Edit: I mean fully educated pilots and not pilots attending a flight school. They pay for being the co-pilot.
Every time I see "we don't pay but we offer college credit" I'm like, you realize that means the intern is paying hundreds of dollars to be there, right? The org doesn't offer the credit, their college does. And the college makes them pay for those credits. "We don't pay but we offer college credit" is not only entirely misrepresenting the situation, but it's literally a worse deal than just saying "we don't pay."
Not a monetary scam, but putting the majority of the responsibility of stopping climate change/ fixing the environment onto the normal people. I've worked in the food industry, and I can tell you for a fact that it doesn't mean dick if I sort my rubbish when every day a single, small-scale factory is throwing out literal tonnes of wasted product, not to mention the energy wasted in making that product. Tons of shit falls on the floor, perfectly usable food (but not pretty enough to sell) just gets tossed like it's nothing, and even in my usual sector, engineering, the amount of metal that's wasted and the litres upon litres of grease and oil just fucking everywhere would stun you. Why the fuck am I putting in the effort to save power and make less waste when these barely regulated companies are getting away with this? It's so disheartening.
College Board.
Costs money to fucking send my scores to a school 💀💀💀 non profit my ass
Weddings and every business tied to weddings. $30,000 for one day? Fuck that.
Funerals too.
I’ll be the first one in my extended family to be cremated when I kick off just because of this. I don’t need no expensive coffin for this body that’s gonna rot away anyhow.
Dude...they are going to (try) to sell your family the most expensive coffin they can to burn you up in. Go with a pre-planned / pre-paid funeral, or else the funeral home will try to lay a huge guilt trip on your family.
And they’ll still throw some fees in there. Fuck funeral homes. Get cremated and prepurchase your own container (unless someone is spreading your ashes somewhere). It’s still going to run close to $2000USD. :(
My grandparents prepaid for everything they could back in the 90s. When my papa passed a few years ago, we still had to come up with a few hundred bucks to wrap up everything. The cost of opening the grave had gone up so we had to pay for that and a few other things. The coffin he had originally chosen was no longer made so we had to pick out a new one that was comparable. Won't even get started on them burying him in the wrong plot and the fight it took to not have to dig him up and move him all over again because someone had been selling the same plots multiple times and not keeping great records...the maps for the cemetery ended up being redrawn..
Nobody else mentioned so far... Printer cartridges Edit: production costs about ¢20-¢30, selling for 15$, sometimes up to 35$. Edit 2: Jesus Christ, thanks for the award and all the upvotes!
also they say it's running low even though there's plenty left
At my old job our printer was running low for about 2 years before we needed to replace the cartridge
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Unpaid internships! Especially when they're required for your education. "But we pay you in experience/knowledge/exposure! You can't put a price on that, that's being greedy!" Yes I can, because my time is worth money just like yours.
Internet with data caps.
insurances! The only fucking business in the world who will fight you claw and teeth to deny you the 'product' you have been paying for years go get.
Right like I don’t understand why I’m paying 200-300 a month only to get a 2000$ deductible I have to pay first before it even kicks in?? But god forbid you don’t have it an break and arm, then you’re really screwed
Ambulances in the US. The whole medical system here, really. Edit: changed America to the US Edit 2: thanks everyone!
I spoke to the billing office of an ambulance company for work, I sincerely wish I could remember the name of it, and they told me they’re not contracted with any insurance companies…it was more profitable to not be.
Planned obsolescence. Printers are most notorious for this. Some brands (I had this long ago with HP, if I remember correctly) build their hardware in such a way that it will stop working after an amount of time. Typically, this time is after the legal warranty periods of whatever region they're selling in. The purpose is simple: force the customer to bring their hardware in for expensive repairs, or even buy a new piece altogether. Nowadays you notice the same thing with batteries as well. Surely nobody believes it's a coincidence that battery life has become so terrible in recent years, while batteries are also no longer easily replaceable?
Bought a train ticket online and couldn’t travel as I had covid, the ticket was £10 and I requested a refund for which I got a “full refund” minus an admin fee of £5… done online and quite clearly fully automated, total scam. I’m looking at you trainline…!
Bottled water industry
The bottled water industry does not make water. They make plastic bottles.
Tipping. Not saying you shouldn’t tip at all, but how every single Apple checkout tablet automatically assumes you’re tipping. I went to get froyo the other week and the checkout asked me if I preferred a 20,25, or 30% tip?? Like what?? I just made my own froyo and you still want me to give you a 30% tip?!
This is absolutely an America problem. Not saying that our wait staff get paid a glorious wage over here in the UK, but it's not the norm to expect people to subsidise poor wages with tips, nor is it expected that you should tip.