[QUOTE=Jeep’s Phoenix]
Is it my imagination, or have some magazine subscription companies gotten more aggressive over the years? I got an envelope recently from one of my favorites that proclaimed in big red letters that my subscription will be ending soon!!! And this is the third notice!!! I SHOULD RENEW NOW FOR THE LOW LOW MEMBER’S ONLY PRICE OF $19.95, THAT’S LIKE 6 ISSUES FREE!!!
Of course, my subscription runs out in July of this year. :rolleyes:
[/QUOTE]
I can beat that. In the beginning of 2006, I renewed my subscription to a magazine for 2 years. A couple of months later, I got a renewal notice, telling me I needed to lock in the low, low rate they were offering, and not to wait until the last minute before renewing, since I only had until May 2008.
At work, we get calls from various “publications.” What the publications do is get someone on the phone and get their name. Then they start sending “newsletters” to that person by name. Two or three months later, they send a bill for hundreds of dollars and hope the bill will get paid.
My coworkers now come to me and give me the telephone numbers of such publications so that they can hear me light into them. I give good rage.
Sadly, we haven’t had one of those scams in a while, just toner telemarketers. sniffle
[QUOTE=ZipperJJ]
I ordered some Bacon Salt for my dad for Christmas. It didn’t come in the mail in the suggested timeframe, so I emailed the Bacon Salt guys and said “hey where’s my Bacon Salt?”
They said “The USPS keeps messing stuff up. We’ll send another right away!” and they did. Dad got his Bacon Salt for Christmas and all was well.
A week after Christmas, I got a box in the mail from the Bacon Salt people, which was exactly the same size, shape and weight as the box that contained dad’s gift.
First I thought “Ooh, maybe they sent me some free Bacon Salt for mentioning the SDMB!”
Then I thought “Maybe it was a mistake on their part because of the previous shipping hoo-ha.”
Then “I have learned from the SDMB that I can legally keep anything anyone sends me in the mail. Yay free Bacon Salt!”
Ultimately, my small business heart got the best of me and I emailed the Bacon Salt guys and asked if they’d sent it by mistake and since it wasn’t open should I send it back. They said yes, mark it “return to sender” and put it back in my mailbox.
sigh no free Bacon Salt for me.
(this really has nothing to do with Mama Zappa’s post but it’s about Bacon Salt and this is the SDMB so therefore it is relevant.)
[/QUOTE]
Justin and Dave are two guys who’ve put a lot of sweat and tears into getting bacon salt out there. They happened to be on “The Story”, an NPR interview show, a few weeks back. My experience with them demonstrated this- while on vacation in Seattle this past summer (when the thread was on page 2) I tried to locate a retail outlet, but was misled by their website. They sent out a box of each of the three flavors for free.
[QUOTE=Jeep’s Phoenix]
Is it my imagination, or have some magazine subscription companies gotten more aggressive over the years? I got an envelope recently from one of my favorites that proclaimed in big red letters that my subscription will be ending soon!!! And this is the third notice!!! I SHOULD RENEW NOW FOR THE LOW LOW MEMBER’S ONLY PRICE OF $19.95, THAT’S LIKE 6 ISSUES FREE!!!
Of course, my subscription runs out in July of this year. :rolleyes:
I never realized anyone felt guilty about using those “free” labels.
[/QUOTE]
I occasionally get mail that looks like invoices, telling me that I need to pay up for my subscription to various magazines. Reading the teeny tiny print, I see that they are not actually bills from the magazines themselves, but subscription services which are offering to collect my money and pass it on to the various magazines. These are all magazines that I’ve subscribed to in the past, but have let lapse for one reason or another. I’ve taken to looking up the corporate offices on the internet, and sending them registered letters, telling them to take me off their mailing lists, and that I find their marketing techniques extremely scummy and unethical.
It may make little or no difference, but I feel better for a while. And I DO get taken off their lists.
I have to wonder how the people saying you should pay for or send back the DVD, felt about the AOL floppies and CD’s. Did they feel obligated to return them or pay for the service. I used to format and use them when somebody needed a file. I crossed off AOL and stuck on the sticker. (Your file. Keep the disk.)
[QUOTE=Princhester]
Staff turnover costs money. Employing people to carry out an unpleasant job costs more. If one’s business model involves deliberately having one’s staff be rude to people who are (not unnaturally) rude back, and this makes one’s staff unhappy causing staff turnover, then one’s costs will go up. This makes one’s business model less successful. Boo fucking hoo.
[/QUOTE]
You’re right. The only problem is, the staff that’s turning over is not that of the business you’re trying to annoy. It’s a whole different company, one that’s solely employed to deal with payments and such. I’d doubt that the company you’re trying to send a message even hears about it. So you’re essentially hitting the bagboy at the supermarket because you don’t like the design of the store.
Otherwise I’d agree with the tactic wholeheartedly.
I am OK with you keeping the DVD. I am also OK with them asking for your money. I think you should let them know, politely but firmly, that you do not wish to pay. After that (plus processing time) thy are bing fucktards if they dun you again.
[QUOTE=thirdwarning]
You’re right. The only problem is, the staff that’s turning over is not that of the business you’re trying to annoy. It’s a whole different company, one that’s solely employed to deal with payments and such. I’d doubt that the company you’re trying to send a message even hears about it. So you’re essentially hitting the bagboy at the supermarket because you don’t like the design of the store.
[/QUOTE]
Nonsense. It doesn’t matter how many layers of contractors and employees there are betwen the top and the bottom, inevitably increasing the cost base affects the profitability of the whole shebang.
Furthermore, even if that weren’t true, you’re essentially asking me to give the employees and the “whole different company” a free pass because they are not at the top. They know what they’re doing. They know what they are participating in overall. They know the bullshit that the DVD company is engaging in, and they are happy to make a buck out of it.
I have my priorities. Letting them know as you suggest would rank (on my “to do” list) after “everything I want to do for myself” and “everything I want to do for people who have been nicer to me than a company that engages in the tactics described by the OP”.
Right about now, it is possible that after I retire in a couple of decades and have more time, I would get so far down my “to do” list that I would reach the point where spending a few seconds on your suggestion would occur. It’s possible. It’s not likely.
[QUOTE=ivylass]
By this logic, if one gives you a fugly lamp, you are required to display said fugly lamp in your living room forever and ever.
<snip>
[/QUOTE]
But only if it is shaped like a woman’s leg and was imported from Italy. You can tell it’s from Italy if the crate is marked “FRA-GI-LE”
Are you sure there wasn’t some small print somewhere in the original magazine subscription contract to the effect that you agree they can send you things they think you might like, on approval? - If there was, then I don’t think it can be considered unsolicited goods.
If not, then they’re probably well aware that you have the legal right to keep it as a gift and are just hoping you don’t know that. Personally, I’d look up the relevant piece of law and send them a polite letter:
-Stating that the item was unsolicited and telling them you’re keeping it as a gift
-Quoting, verbatim, the law making this possible
-Instructing them not to send you anything else.
These unsolicited items have a name: BAIT. There is no moral obligation to take the hook with it and, I would agrue, that you are doing a greater good by taking as much bait as possible … as long as you can safely avoid the hook.
[QUOTE=Jeep’s Phoenix]
Is it my imagination, or have some magazine subscription companies gotten more aggressive over the years? I got an envelope recently from one of my favorites that proclaimed in big red letters that my subscription will be ending soon!!! And this is the third notice!!! I SHOULD RENEW NOW FOR THE LOW LOW MEMBER’S ONLY PRICE OF $19.95, THAT’S LIKE 6 ISSUES FREE!!!
Of course, my subscription runs out in July of this year. :rolleyes:
[/QUOTE]
Oh heck, that’s not even the worst of it. A few years ago, I got a trial subscription to a magazine, and decided I didn’t like it, so I wrote “Cancel” on the invoice and sent it back, just as they had instructed me to do. I kept getting bills, but as I wasn’t getting any more magazines, I ignored them, then I got a dunning letter from some shady collection agency, telling me “you don’t get something for nothing,” and dire warnings about ruining my credit if I didn’t pay up. I sent them back a very annoyed letter telling them exactly what I thought about their obnoxious tactics, ending with, “Piss off, I mean it.” It really fucking irks me that they bank on people being gullible enough to fall for that and think that they are obligated to pay when they’ve fulfilled their end of the agreement.
