Scott On Money

I decided to cancel my Blockbuster movie rental subscription recently for two reasons. I have a very busy life and hardly have time to watch movies anymore. I also haven’t felt very compelled to see anything that has come out recently.

Yeah there are a few movies that look interesting but certainly not enough to see several movies a month. A while back my girlfriend (hi) went in with my free monthly coupons. We couldn’t find a single movie both of us wanted to see.

I went to there site to cancel my subscription and was a surprised to see a cancel button. Clicking it asked me for a reason why. I picked “I’m not using it enough”. The next screen offered me three cheaper deals and a button to cancel. That was it.

While I didn’t like the extra step it was no where as annoying as many other cancellations I’ve been through.

This makes me that much more likely to rejoin Blockbuster when my (and Hollywood’s) circumstances change.

Posted by Scott at 11:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Subscribe | Digg | del.icio.us | Technorati

I had a reservation with a local Marriott for some weekend guests. Plans changed and so I called to cancel the reservation. The clerk was cheerful and helpful. Within half a minute she had cancelled the reservation and given me a confirmation numbers. No up selling, no trying to talk me out of canceling or asking to help with alternate plans.

That is excellent service. Great job Marriott. I’ll remember this, thank you.

Posted by Scott at 11:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Subscribe | Digg | del.icio.us | Technorati

I have to use credit cards. I am not a spendaholic. I don’t pile up tons of credit card debt. But I have to use the plastic.

Why?

I keep my money longer. I earn money on the money that I keep. I have more flexibility if my life hits a rough spot.

I get protection from merchants. Some merchants don’t care about their customers. When I use my credit card I have an 800 pound gorilla on my team. When I call attention to the fact that a credit card company is on my team businesses become far more cooperative.

I get protection from criminals. If someone commits fraud with my checking account I have to duke it out with my bank to keep from being held responsible for the fraud. With my credit card I simply let the credit card company security department take care of it.

I get perks. Rental car protection, flight insurance, cash rebates and so on. My checking account and the Federal Reserve don’t offer these deals.

Don’t pile up credit card debt. Don’t spend money you don’t have. Do use your credit cards wisely.

Posted by Scott at 08:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Subscribe | Digg | del.icio.us | Technorati

I was disillusioned by the service Experian provided after the trial of their Triple Advantage product. I must admit I loathe companies that are ever willing to take your credit card and start a service online but not allow online cancellation.

Experian is one of these companies.

Their service seems to provide no value at this point as they don’t seem to be reflecting updates that are occurring to my credit. To avoid their never ending stream of charges I had to call them. Once I got on the line with a person things got bad. Their people are not customer service but merely mindless robots that read from a sales script. I grew ever more frustrated as they would read their sales script and I would say I just want to cancel. They read point after point about how I need them. I don’t.

Not only do I not need them I’ll think twice before ever doing business with them again because they didn’t try to satisfy me as a customer, they just tried to prevent me from leaving.

I’m trying myFICO for now. We’ll see if their service is more useful.

Posted by Scott at 09:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0) | Subscribe | Digg | del.icio.us | Technorati