[HN Gopher] From airlines to ticket sellers, companies fight U.S...
___________________________________________________________________
From airlines to ticket sellers, companies fight U.S. to keep junk
fees
Author : ctoth
Score : 133 points
Date : 2023-11-19 16:25 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.washingtonpost.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.washingtonpost.com)
| fbdab103 wrote:
| >The fees together may cost Americans at least $64 billion
| annually, according to a rough White House estimate, underscoring
| its efforts to deliver financial relief to families grappling
| with high prices.
|
| At ~$190/person, that honestly strikes me as low. A single last-
| second convenience fee to an entertainment venue can be tens of
| dollars. Monthly, it feels like almost every service I use has an
| unstated fee above and beyond the quoted sticker price.
| jwagenet wrote:
| I'd guess that something like 80% of fees are shouldered by 20%
| of folks (or maybe 60/40, 70/30). The bottom quarter to half of
| Americans probably don't have large entertainment and travel
| budgets.
| bmmayer1 wrote:
| The junk fee legislation seems like a great way to make companies
| waste millions of dollars in resources rebuilding their backend
| systems just to result in the exact same fees being rolled into
| the remaining SKUs or charged to more customers than necessary.
| fbdab103 wrote:
| At least as a consumer, I can actually price compare my options
| if the out-the-door price is made public.
|
| Nobody made companies hide the prices in the first place. It
| was a deliberate tactic to trick buyers.
| vanviegen wrote:
| Systems built to operate in the EU will already have that
| capability.
| loeg wrote:
| No, the junk fees were the wasteful change to backend systems.
| No one forced companies to do that.
| megaman821 wrote:
| Never thought I would find a cheerleader for non-transparent
| pricing.
| fbdab103 wrote:
| Maybe they work for Ticketmaster or another fee-heavy
| industry?
| matsemann wrote:
| The fees aren't the problem, it's that they're hidden until the
| very end. Makes it impossible to compare services, feels like
| extortion when asked for after you've already eaten, and is
| just misleading.
|
| In the EU the advertised price has to be with all fees
| included. No surprises, and I don't have to care if the hotel
| is EUR75 + EUR25 service fee, or just EUR100.
| terminous wrote:
| Found the lobbyist
| a-dub wrote:
| if their backend systems are such brownfield crap that they're
| unable to easily make these kinds of simple changes to their
| pricing structure, then they deserve to pay millions in
| incompetent leadership tax.
|
| if prices are presented side by side or are otherwise compared
| by consumers, they should not have hidden post-comparison
| mandatory additions that distort that process. price comparison
| is pretty much the bedrock of a market economy, allowing market
| participants to distort that process for unfair advantage is
| clearly a problem.
| acdha wrote:
| > just to result in the exact same fees being rolled into the
| remaining SKUs
|
| Yes, that's the stated goal: if I'm looking for plane flights,
| I don't want to think United is cheaper because I haven't
| gotten to step seven of the checkout flow where they say that
| oxygen is billed separately and the bathroom takes all major
| credit cards.
|
| Companies are adding these fees instead of raising prices
| precisely because it makes comparison shopping harder, and
| that's never good for society as a whole. They're keenly aware
| of the psychology here: once people start putting in the cost
| of filling out forms, etc. they're less likely to abort halfway
| in even if the additional fees bring the total higher than they
| would have picked at the beginning. The companies have spent a
| lot of additional time and money redesigning their systems to
| exploit this, and you're paying for all of that.
| oivey wrote:
| It's going to cost millions of dollars to set the fees to zero
| and increase the sticker price? Why would anything new need to
| be built?
| noodlesUK wrote:
| These fees seem to be particularly prevalent in the travel and
| entertainment industries. I stayed at a hotel in NYC relatively
| recently, and I booked and pre-paid through hotels.com. When I
| arrived, the hotel sprung me with a $50/night "resort fee", which
| was apparently required to stay at the hotel (though I am sure
| they would tell regulators that it's optional).
|
| I also don't understand the US practice of not including relevant
| sales tax charges in the cost of a good. I know that many US
| states operate a sales tax (which seems like a bad idea as
| opposed to a VAT or similar system).
|
| I don't mind having actually optional extras be charged
| separately, but if they aren't really optional (like a service
| fee), it should be part of the price.
|
| I'd be very interested if someone has a link to the text of what
| is actually being proposed.
| phantom784 wrote:
| Not including sales tax kind of makes sense, because it varies
| so much state to state (and often within the state). This
| allows companies to advertise one price nationwide.
| wepple wrote:
| Yeah, what the above says
|
| I also don't hate the side effect that it somewhat points out
| to you that it's the govt taking a cut
|
| It sure is nice in most of the rest of the developed world to
| buy a product or service and immediately know how many
| dollars have to go from me to them because it's the one
| price, though.
| noodlesUK wrote:
| > I also don't hate the side effect that it somewhat points
| out to you that it's the govt taking a cut
|
| In every place I have been to, the receipt or invoice has a
| line item saying how much tax was payable on the
| transaction. Not least so that business customers can
| reclaim VAT in countries that have VAT. Different items
| also often have different tax rates, which is especially
| noticeable at somewhere like a supermarket where you might
| buy food, other goods, and alcohol in one transaction.
| wepple wrote:
| Sure, of course it does. How often do you look at it, and
| think through what portion is actually going to the
| business? Tax-not-included prices do that automatically.
| noodlesUK wrote:
| Surely your inventory/POS systems need to know what price/tax
| rates to charge anyway. I understand your point in the
| context of an ad in a magazine offering a good at a
| particular price, but I don't think it makes sense at all in
| the context of a store with tickets on items that don't
| actually correspond to the price at the till.
| kshacker wrote:
| When was the last time we found same hotel prices across
| states or counties? Oh it is 300$ plus tax in new York and it
| is 300 inclusive in Philly but ... I am not going to Philly.
| McDonald's maybe but not a hotel since so much depends on the
| location and amenities.
| iteria wrote:
| Some cities range across counties. Some cities have taxes
| that the county itself doesn't, so literally crossing the
| street into the unincorporated part of town can save you on
| sales tax. Sometimes sales tax is suspended based on who
| you are. Sometimes sales tax is suspended on what time of
| year it is.
|
| Sales tax is complicated. I get why companies would rather
| outsource that to the register to look up at the end.
| jopsen wrote:
| > This allows companies to advertise one price nationwide.
|
| I think most stores prints their pricing labels locally.
|
| Maybe, there could be a case for national TV to be exempt.
|
| But for prices listed in a store, on a menu card, I don't see
| any excuse.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| It can also vary street to street, due to intersecting county
| and municipal lines, and based on time, _e.g._ tax brackets
| that change depending on sales volume or special taxes on
| certain items.
| shortcake27 wrote:
| Does having different levels of tax between states, and
| between municipalities within those states, actually benefit
| the public?
|
| I just don't see how this is better than literally every
| other country in the world which sets sales tax at the
| federal level.
|
| And please don't hit me with ridiculous hypotheticals "if
| it's set at the federal level, the government could just
| increase the tax to 7000 billion trillion percent to steal
| everyone's money".
| krallja wrote:
| If the federal government set the tax, the states and
| cities wouldn't get any of it.
| shortcake27 wrote:
| So using your logic, in almost every other country in the
| world where sales tax is set at the federal level,
| states/counties/equivilant/cities don't get tax money.
|
| Do you genuinely believe this, have you done any
| research, and are you happy to stick with this argument?
| WirelessGigabit wrote:
| It's because the feds actually don't have any sales tax.
| Sales tax is set at State level (unless you live in Alaska,
| Delaware, Montana, New Hampshire or Oregon).
|
| Then the County you live in can levy a sales tax. This is
| to serve the people who live in unincorporated places.
|
| Lastly, Cities levy a sales tax.
|
| So yea, it really isn't that simple in the USA.
|
| Hell, how many countries do you know that have different
| income taxes based on where they live?
| shortcake27 wrote:
| > So yea, it really isn't that simple in the USA
|
| It isn't that simple in the USA. Yet it literally is that
| simple in every other country in the world.
|
| I don't understand why the average American has such main
| character syndrome that they genuinely believe their
| country is so unique that they are unable to solve
| problems every other country in the world has solved.
| Ridiculous.
| ars wrote:
| Really? Taxes in France are exactly the same as in
| Switzerland?
|
| States in the US are analogous to countries in the rest
| of the world.
| shortcake27 wrote:
| > States in the US are analogous to countries in the rest
| of the world.
|
| But they aren't. States are states, it's literally in the
| name. Almost all countries in the world have states or an
| analogy to states.
|
| Again, only an American would consider each of the United
| States as seperate countries. Totally disconnected from
| reality.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| Many countries do not, in fact, have lower-level
| sovereignties with general powers with selective negative
| limits and a top level sovereign with limited, positive
| powers.
|
| Very many countries are more like many US states are with
| their subordinate counties: that is, a top level
| sovereign with general powers and negative limits with
| subordinate non-sovereign entities with limited positive
| powers granted by the top-level sovereigns.
| shortcake27 wrote:
| The United Kingdom, which unlike the United States is
| quite literally comprised of different countries, has
| managed to solve this problem.
|
| Australia also has a similar setup to the USA, and has
| also managed to solve this problem.
|
| I don't know the inner workings of every country, but I
| assume there are more in the same position.
|
| I'm sorry, but the USA is not in some crazy unique
| position that no other country has ever faced before. You
| just choose believe this inaccuracy.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > The United Kingdom, which unlike the United States is
| quite literally comprised of different countries
|
| "State" is the usual legal term for sovereign juridical
| entities with territory, while "country" is a less formal
| term that often corresponds to a state.
|
| (And the "countries" that make up the UK aren't sovereign
| even in theory, though some of them have some degree of
| home rule _granted_ by the central sovereign.)
|
| > the USA is not in some crazy unique position
|
| Unique? No.
|
| But common? Also no.
|
| And it structurally does make solving some problems quite
| hard, and it makes changing the structure to resolve
| those problems _also_ hard.
| Zpalmtree wrote:
| It's a feature not a bug that states can charge different
| sales tax rates..
| miki123211 wrote:
| You could set the same price, and then your actual revenue
| would vary state-to-state.
|
| European companies sometimes have a "No VAT" promotion, which
| of course doesn't actually mean "No VAT", merely that prices
| are reduced by what VAT usually is.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _When I arrived, the hotel sprung me with a $50 /night
| "resort fee"_
|
| If you voice your objection, follow up in writing, and have a
| decent credit card, you can almost certainly get it charged
| back. Because the hotel is not going to say, in writing, it
| isn't optional. (You may not be welcome back.)
| StanislavPetrov wrote:
| Most if not all hotel/casinos I've stayed at in Vegas and
| Atlantic city have added a mandatory "resort fee" for many
| years, and will happily tell you to go pound sound if you try
| to argue about it!
| jopsen wrote:
| > and will happily tell you to go pound sound if you try to
| argue about it!
|
| Perhaps it's better to leave a review about deceptive
| pricing on Google Maps, TripAdvisor, etc.
| ezfe wrote:
| Booking.com includes resort fees at checkout. If the website
| you booked on said it was the final cost, then you can fight
| it.
| rapind wrote:
| > I also don't understand the US practice of not including
| relevant sales tax charges in the cost of a good.
|
| Here in Canada too, but I don't mind. When I feel the pain in
| my wallet, I want to know where to direct my bitterness. Credit
| card processing fees should be broken out too IMO.
| blincoln wrote:
| Wow. I actually always assumed that the "resort fee" was to
| cover a hotel-specific tax, but I see that you're right.[1]
| Seems like a textbook case of manipulative business practices
| to me. I already felt like the anti-junk-fee law(s) couldn't be
| passed soon enough, but even more so now.
|
| > I also don't understand the US practice of not including
| relevant sales tax charges in the cost of a good.
|
| Sales taxes in general are a horrible can of worms, and IMO
| every area should migrate to income tax exclusively.
|
| [1] https://www.cnn.com/cnn-underscored/travel/how-to-avoid-
| reso...
| gamblor956 wrote:
| Indirect taxes (sales taxes, GST, and VAT) are more efficient
| than income taxes, both from a compliance perspective and a
| fairness perspective.
|
| Compliance-wise, it's easiest to calculate and collect the
| tax on economic activity when an economic transaction occurs.
| From a fairness perspective, it's clear when an indirect tax
| applies; with income taxes you need a convoluted code to
| address the many types of income possible in a modern
| society.
| Zak wrote:
| > _with income taxes you need a convoluted code to address
| the many types of income possible in a modern society._
|
| Do you? You could tax all income the same way, but
| governments seem to like having the ability to use the tax
| code to incentivize certain ways of making money over
| others.
| michaelmrose wrote:
| When traveling cross country years ago with 3 cats I booked a
| budget at a fleabag motel for like 70 bucks based on part on it
| being listed as accepting pets. They tried to charge 50 bucks a
| head non-refundable for the felines then disclaim
| responsibility for listing these costs because the third party
| ran the ad.
| CSMastermind wrote:
| > I also don't understand the US practice of not including
| relevant sales tax charges in the cost of a good.
|
| The idea is that if it's just baked into the price, customers
| will ignore it but if it's applied separately customers will
| consciously recognize the amount of money the government is
| taking from them and presumably apply pressure not to increase
| that amount.
| nitwit005 wrote:
| It's not a result of government policy, but corporate policy.
| The corporations prefer to list the lower price.
| xrd wrote:
| I'm in a hotel in Clearwater Florida right now.
|
| The coffee shop added an automatic and mandatory 19% gratuity. I
| always thought I was only forced to pay 18%!
|
| The buffet this morning did the same thing. The receipt says "18%
| is gratuity, 1% is for operating costs."
|
| I thought paying for a meal included the operating costs. I'm
| shocked to find out those were provided for free up to this
| point, I feel so grateful that the restaurants didn't need to
| pass these on to me.
|
| And, I'm a little surprised that neither of these two experiences
| required anything from the servers other than handing me or my
| kids a drink.
|
| I assume this is because this hotel probably has a lot of
| tourists from countries where they don't tip. And, I always tip
| my barista at least 20% but that's because I go to the same place
| and know them beyond just as a server, and a hotel in Clearwater
| will never foster that relationship between anyone.
| lsaferite wrote:
| Mandatory gratuity for a non-tipped employees should be 100%
| forbidden.
| Analemma_ wrote:
| Who is a "tipped versus non-tipped employee"? I think for
| servers coming to your table it's actually spelled out in
| law, for everything else it's a social convention that
| businesses can try to shove in one direction.
| jfengel wrote:
| It is a legal distinction. In most places there is a lower
| minimum wage for tipped employees. The law says what jobs
| qualify for the tipped minimum.
|
| (Legally, they have to make up the difference if you didn't
| make enough in tips. But most servers make more than that
| via tips, which is why they often fight efforts to
| eliminate tipping.)
| bobthepanda wrote:
| Also, wage theft is one of the most common things that
| happens to restaurant workers, because a lot of employers
| try to avoid making up the difference.
| shortcake27 wrote:
| In the UK, where minimum wage is OK (not great, but OK), and
| we don't have those garbage US shenanigans where tipped
| employees can get paid a pittance, many payment terminals add
| a 10% tip automatically (especially at bars). Many
| restaurants also add a 10% tip to the bill (For everyone, not
| just parties of > 6).
|
| I really wish it were outlawed. The price paid should be the
| price displayed, unless the circumstances are exceptional.
| You cannot display prices without VAT so how it is allowed to
| display prices without the forced tip?
|
| "It's optional". Sure, if you enjoy having your food spat in
| the next time you return.
| qwytw wrote:
| > those garbage US shenanigans where tipped employees can
| get paid a pittance
|
| Unless you're in California and some other states where
| there is "tipped" minimum wage and you get both a full wage
| and the tips.
|
| And even in other states I got the impression that most (or
| at least many) waiter and other tipped stuff prefer the
| current system to getting the minimum wage and barely any
| tips
| shortcake27 wrote:
| I haven't lived in the US so I can't really comment on
| the situation there. But my point is, the US model is
| infecting other countries which already have minimum
| wages and don't suffer from problem tips in the US solve
| (AKA, insanely low minimum wages in some states for
| tipped servers).
|
| Why should the minimum wage bartender at Brewdog get an
| automatic 10% tip when the minimum wage employee at Tesco
| doesn't?
| qwytw wrote:
| > wages and don't suffer from problem tips in the US
| solve (AKA, insanely low minimum wages in some states for
| tipped servers).
|
| Well many waiters earn considerably more than the minimum
| wage in the US. In large part because of this system. I'm
| not sure why does the society value their work that much
| (in relation to most other service workers which is of
| course unfair). However, essentially what you're
| advocating is lower wages for some service workers just
| because the rest are possibly overpaid?
| bobthepanda wrote:
| in other countries, server is just a position like any
| other that has wage competition. a fancy restaurant will
| try and spend to get the high quality servers it wants.
| wdb wrote:
| Most fun are those places where you need to order via the
| website or an app and still have this automatic tip
| that's a pain to opt out off
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| That is the law in the entire US. You _have_ to receive a
| normal minimum wage if your tips don 't bring you to that
| level on the lower tip worker's wage.
| warner25 wrote:
| You're right, but he's talking about states where tipped
| employees receive the same minimum wage, paid by the
| employer, as anyone else _plus_ tips. See my comment /
| question about how this works out in practice.
|
| [Edited because I find the terminology of "tipped
| minimum" confusing.]
| warner25 wrote:
| Regarding the "tipped minimum" vs. full wage _and_ tips,
| I 've been wondering for a while how this works out in
| practice, and I've yet to find an answer.
|
| Like do waitresses in California, earning the full $15.50
| minimum wage _plus_ tips (and tipping is no less
| prevalent in California), really end up making 50%+ more
| money than waitresses in Massachusetts where employers
| can claim a $8.25 tip credit to cover more than half of
| the $15 tipped minimum?
| pb7 wrote:
| It's universally 12.5% in London.
| ezfe wrote:
| it can't be called a gratuity if it's mandatory
| zeristor wrote:
| That would be gratuitous.
|
| A word that means, both free and unjustified.
| newZWhoDis wrote:
| >I always tip my barista at least 20%
|
| I'm sorry but tipping 20% for coffee is nuts.
| grishka wrote:
| I'm sorry, but the US tipping culture as a whole is nuts.
|
| (I'm Russian who lurks in the English-speaking segment of the
| internet way too much)
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Czechs think so, too. Rounding up to the closest convenient
| monetary value is fine (like 50 CZK from 47), but the US
| rules could as well be from another planet.
|
| Everybody I know who visited the US was bewildered.
| jghn wrote:
| As much as I like the advent of things like square and toast
| to provide convenient checkout, they've added a lot of
| tipping in places where it wasn't as common. There are all
| sorts of things I buy now where I get that little electronic
| checkout screen and options for 18/20/22/25% tipping. When
| before there *may* have been a tip jar. If that.
| LeafItAlone wrote:
| Why can't this person spend their money how they want?
| blincoln wrote:
| Most people seem not to tip baristas at all. I make my own
| coffee 99% of the time, so on the few days per year when I
| buy it, I tip around 20% because it's a luxury, and if
| everyone who could easily afford the extra few dollars did
| so, baristas might actually have fair income. Same for eating
| at restaurants, etc.
|
| I acknowledge that it's a workaround for a larger problem,
| but I have low confidence that the US will actually address
| that problem within my lifetime.
| michaelmrose wrote:
| If their employer raised their rates 10% they could
| increase the wages of all low wage front line employees by
| 1/3. Instead in general we see prices going up in some
| cases several times actual inflation and wages that at best
| track it.
| adolph wrote:
| The nice things about tips is that it adds voluntary
| price discrimination. If you want to pay more you can. A
| raised price on the other hand raises a price floor which
| may disuade customers who are more cost sensitive.
| bluedino wrote:
| A general rule is to tip at least a dollar a drink, whether
| it's beer or beans
| 10u152 wrote:
| The weirdest part of this for me (not American) is that my
| local daily coffee shop throws in free items for me -
| sometimes comps the coffee or gives banana bread or something
| to reward a frequent customer. The idea that a frequent
| customer feels like they need to tip extra as the OP says
| blows my mind.
| Teever wrote:
| I don't understand how this isn't considered fraud.
|
| A reasonable person would look at the price on a menu and
| conclude that this is the price that they will be paying.
|
| And no an asterisk and a tiny piece of writing somewhere does
| not make this not fraud.
| _huayra_ wrote:
| Mandatory gratuity and the "operating cost" charges can be
| declined unless it is clearly listed and displayed before
| ordering (and even then it can arguably be declined). This is
| why you see "mandatory X% gratuity for Y reasons" on menus
| (e.g. for large groups). If you knew this terrible gratuity
| beforehand, then you're basically stuck (or can walk away
| before ordering). However, if they sprung this on you without
| clear notice, _you don 't have to pay it_.
|
| This comes down to the same reason why when you click "buy" on
| some website, they can't say "oh look we added a secret X% f**
| you fee!". Similarly, this is the reason why when you negotiate
| a rate with a lawyer, accountant, gardener, or other
| professional, they can't add random fees that weren't
| discussed. My climbing gym has had big signs up and has sent
| myriad emails over the past few months leading up to a new
| credit card processing fee for this very reason.
|
| If you had great service, I would still recommend fighting this
| and then tipping the server directly with cash. These
| "mandatory tips" don't go to the server, but are usually pooled
| and mostly taken by management. If the restaurant is one of the
| few ones that is equitable between the staff members (e.g. if
| the tip gets automatically split between front and back of
| house), then that might be the one exception where paying a
| surprise mandatory fee would be okay.
| yieldcrv wrote:
| default opt-out should be illegal
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Please file a complaint with the FTC. They need every data
| point possible. I'll Venmo you for your time (a coffee ;) if
| needed (currently sitting in a bar on St Pete Beach).
|
| https://reportfraud.ftc.gov/
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| Businesses do this to hide the cost of inflation by presenting
| lower fees than they are willing to accept for their services.
| jopsen wrote:
| > "If a consumer is led to believe something costs $10, and it
| costs $20, they've been misled."
|
| This is nice. But the US will also need sales taxes included in
| the advertised price.
|
| The EU have generally driven a lot of transparency around fees.
| Usually under the banner of fostering competition.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _the US will also need sales taxes included in the advertised
| price_
|
| This is totally separate from junk fees, which are controlled
| by the seller.
|
| Sales tax exclusive is a common complaint from visiting
| Europeans. It is seldom an issue for Americans because most
| aren't paying with exact change or calculating budgets to the
| penny. Go to low-income neighbourhoods, where incomes are
| closer to those in Europe, and you'll find tax-inclusive
| pricing.
| jcbrand wrote:
| > Go to low-income neighbourhoods, where incomes are closer
| to those in Europe, and you'll find tax-inclusive pricing
|
| This is a pretty funny but largely ignorant dig at Europeans.
|
| Every country I've ever been to except the US includes VAT in
| their prices and I've been to over 30. It's not just a
| European thing but a world thing, where the US once again is
| the odd one out.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _It 's not just a European thing but a world thing, where
| the US once again is the odd one out_
|
| I agree. That doesn't make it an issue.
|
| It also doesn't negate that the U.S. is the odd one out on
| (a) income and (b) local government. Those are the factors,
| together with less cash use (though this bucket is less
| exclusive), behind the phenomenon. My life would literally
| not change in any tangible way for having keeping menus and
| price stickers up to date; if another store gave me better
| service for forgoing that work, I'd probably notice that
| first.
|
| Put another way: I've travelled a lot in the world, and I
| genuinely hadn't noticed tax-inclusive pricing until a
| German friend pointed it out in Frankfurt.
| jopsen wrote:
| Across Europe you'll find many small countries with
| similar incomes, less cash use and more transparent
| pricing.
|
| Transparent pricing is a fundamental necessity for the
| free market.
|
| More importantly not having puts an additional burden on
| those with smaller incomes (they most certainly also
| exist in the US).
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _you 'll find many small countries with similar
| incomes, less cash use and more transparent pricing_
|
| How many tax regimes do they contain within themselves on
| account of local governments?
|
| I'm not saying America _can't_ do it. I'm saying we don't
| care to. This is literally a non-issue for most
| Americans. I understand the aesthetic preference. But
| it's such a strange hill to die on.
|
| > _Transparent pricing is a fundamental necessity for the
| free market_
|
| Transparent pricing doesn't mean pricing with no math.
|
| Junk fees, on the other hand, are _not_ transparent and
| not set by the state. (Though I haven't yet seen the
| business lobby try to distract by shifting the debate to
| tax-inclusive pricing, which would be admittedly clever.)
| SeanLuke wrote:
| > Every country I've ever been to except the US includes
| VAT in their prices and I've been to over 30. It's not just
| a European thing but a world thing, where the US once again
| is the odd one out.
|
| Only for local purchases, at least in Europe. In fact for
| non-local purchases, the US is much simpler.
|
| I am, right now, in Italy, ordering an item from Germany,
| and it priced at N euros "plus 19% VAT". Because receiving
| countries differ in amount of VAT, vendors outside those
| countries cannot include it in their prices.
|
| But it's "0% VAT" shipping to US -- that is, the primary
| country where you pay the vendor exactly what's stated is
| the _US_.
| Gare wrote:
| Most large EU-wide online stores just ask you where
| you're from and calculate VAT accordingly.
| rescbr wrote:
| Until the recent explosion on direct online shopping from
| China, you, the importer, were responsible for collecting
| import duties/VAT. To avoid tax evasion the customs
| authorities started requiring import duties to be paid in
| advance.
|
| The US is one of the counties where the value that is
| duty free is high, and as I understand it, there's no tax
| collection in advance. Most/all purchases will be 0% tax
| from the vendor side, but you are still responsible for
| assessing and collecting this tax yourself.
| cycomanic wrote:
| Well the shop you're ordering from is crap. Many of the
| shops I order from calculate vat based on where you ship
| to. So what you see is what you pay. I think even if the
| advertise the wrong VAT you still pay what is on the
| sticker. How is that not better than having to always add
| some value yourself whose percentage differs based on
| where you are atm?
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Many of the shops I order from calculate vat based on
| where you ship to_
|
| This is a good illustration of valid trade offs between
| two cultures. I find it absurd to have to enter my
| address before even being shown pricing (let alone
| deciding to purchase). You, on the other hand, prefer
| all-in pricing.
|
| These are both reasonable takes! They're just different.
| cycomanic wrote:
| But you don't have to put in your address, just your
| country. For many websites you likely have to do that
| anyway because you might not speak the default language.
|
| Moreover, most of the websites change the location based
| on IP addresses anyway.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _you don 't have to put in your address, just your
| country_
|
| In America, you would. Various municipal and county lines
| can create separate sales tax obligations based on
| address. Even barring that, I would find it intrusive and
| absurd for someone to demand my state of residence prior
| to even being shown price. (My IP address only loosely
| correlates with my residence.)
|
| But again, that's a preference. One most Americans share.
| Multiple equilibria.
| tpm wrote:
| > Because receiving countries differ in amount of VAT,
| vendors outside those countries cannot include it in
| their prices.
|
| They can and they do; smaller shops who don't sell as
| much abroad use their country VAT while larger ones
| include buyer country VAT. Works fine.
| jcbrand wrote:
| VAT isn't charged on goods exported outside of the EU, so
| it has nothing to do with the US except for the fact that
| the US isn't part of the EU.
| jopsen wrote:
| > Sales tax exclusive is a common complaint from visiting
| Europeans. It is seldom an issue for Americans because most
| aren't paying with exact change or calculating budgets to the
| penny.
|
| I know it's true -- when I loved in SF the fact that I
| couldn't tell what things cost just made me give up looking
| at the price altogether :)
|
| I just picked things in safeway and payed without even
| listening to what the amount charged was...
|
| But it's probably a bad idea to encourage this kind of
| behavior.
|
| If you want the free market to work, you'll need engaged
| customers who at-least reads the price tag.
| terminous wrote:
| > know it's true -- when I loved in SF the fact that I
| couldn't tell what things cost just made me give up looking
| at the price altogether :) I just picked things in safeway
| and payed without even listening to what the amount charged
| was...
|
| I'm sorry that it's so hard for you to multiply by 1.1
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| 09:00 - you're in Santa Fe, NM. What's the sales tax
| rate? OK, good, you've figured it out.
|
| 12:00 - after a delightful morning checking out the
| history of genocide in North America, you decide to drive
| the Turquoise Trail (NM14), a national scenic byway,
| south to Albuquerque. You stop to wander and eat lunch in
| Madrid, NM. What's the sales tax rate? Wrong, you're no
| longer in the city of Santa Fe, but Santa Fe county.
|
| 17:00 - you arrive in Albuquerque and go to buy something
| at a regular store. What's the sales tax rate? Ah, now
| you're getting it: you don't know, because now you're in
| Bernalillo County, NM.
| quickthrowman wrote:
| Indeed, state and local sales tax in the US is complex.
|
| There are around 15-20 different tax rates in my metro
| area, between state, regional (multiple county
| metropolitan council), county, and city specific taxes.
|
| From the central city area, you can reach all of the
| 15-20 different sales tax rate areas within 30-45
| minutes.
| terminous wrote:
| You estimate at 1.1x and you'll be good, especially if
| paying by card. Unless you're literally penny pinching,
| you don't even notice paying 8.75% vs 8.85% or whatever.
| But if you really just want to hate the US, I can't stop
| you.
|
| > the history of genocide in North America
|
| Ah, I see where you're coming from.
| PaulDavisThe1st wrote:
| > Ah, I see where you're coming from.
|
| You almost certainly do not.
| rescbr wrote:
| As a foreigner, I just multiply everything by 1.1, so I
| know the average upper limit on what I'm buying.
|
| If the sales tax rate ends being less than 10%, it's
| money saved. If it ends up being more than 10%, that
| would be my new multiplier that I'd use as baseline.
| gnicholas wrote:
| FYI many items in Safeway are not taxable, due to the
| exclusion for certain types of food (grocery, not
| restaurant).
| gnicholas wrote:
| Yeah it's super annoying when companies have a "taxes and
| fees" section that contains mandatory taxes alongside fees
| that they decide to impose. Uber and DoorDash come to mind.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Some of the jurisdictions I have businesses in require all
| taxes to be shown on the receipt, and individually. We have to
| show 4 different taxes for each night of a hotel stay, that is
| 5 lines of charged breaking down the cost of a hotel room
| might. A week long stay is a multiple page receipt.
|
| My ATT receipt for my mobile phone shows 8 different state and
| city and county taxes, from general sales tax to 911 specific
| ones to mental healthcare tax.
|
| Zero reason for all this to be broken down for the end
| customer.
| pdntspa wrote:
| As an end customer I want to know when I am being swindled
| with unnecessary fees. As a business owner you want to hide
| them.
|
| So yeah, there's plenty of reasons. Oh no, a long receipt.
| Won't somebody think of the ... ignorant people?
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| How would you know what an unnecessary fee is? No one goes
| around and examines the taxes applicable at every business
| they patronize.
|
| The amount of money coming out of your pocket is the only
| number worth caring about. The rest is for government
| auditors to worry about.
| pdntspa wrote:
| I want to know if it could be less but for "fees", and
| there should be a mandatory amount of transparency in all
| pricing. Opaque pricing is anti-customer.
|
| I especially love it when business types tell me what I
| should be caring about with regards to _my_ money.
|
| We can take this even further and demand cost-plus
| pricing for all things (with a regulated and controlled
| definition of 'cost'). This idea that pricing should
| scale to the customers' means needs to die. Good business
| means leaving money on the table, sometimes lots of it.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| That would be a ridiculous overreach of government, not
| to mention a political disaster.
|
| > with a regulated and controlled definition of 'cost'
|
| Perhaps we can start with a breakdown of your quality of
| life and come up with what is and is not necessary.
|
| I can start by suggesting getting rid of your detached
| single family house, greater than 3 liter engine car,
| restrict eating out to once per quarter, and foregoing
| vacations involving flights. And that would still be
| better than how the majority of people in the world live.
|
| Obviously, I mean that as a rhetorical device to show the
| futility in trying to define what costs are and are not
| acceptable. The market is capable of figuring that out.
| The businesses that have the better price will have the
| appropriate costs.
| pdntspa wrote:
| Of course it would. Capitalists scurry when sunlight is
| shined on them, much like cockroaches.
|
| People are not businesses, we do not exist to generate
| money for shareholders. The logic does not apply. Quite
| the opposite: business serves customers, and an
| expectation of servant leadership should apply here.
| Ekaros wrote:
| Just advertise the price with highest possible sales tax and
| then everyone else will get discount. Simple enough.
| lastofthemojito wrote:
| Seems like lobbying groups don't have a good argument for this.
| The argument I'd always heard was "shady businesses started
| having these resort fees or fees for choosing your seat, etc, and
| we needed to do similar or else they'd each our lunch when folks
| compare prices". If the government is suggesting banning the
| shady fees, then we're back to a level playing field, no?
| techsupporter wrote:
| Nobody wants to raise prices but everybody wants more money. In
| the past week, I've seen under the line mandatory fees from a pet
| grooming service ($5.99 required "materials fee"), a large
| apartment operator ("technology package fee" to have mandatory
| access to the resident portal), and a bookstore ($2 order
| handling charge).
|
| Hiding the actual cost with sneaky fees is getting out of hand
| and I have zero sympathy for "oh the poor merchants" or "showing
| the proper price is too hard." They made the decision to impose
| the fees, they can make the decision to put them in the price
| where they belong.
| davchana wrote:
| even thr USPS Government website charges handling fees on $100,
| and more fees on $100+ orders. I love USPS, but simply add
| these to stamp prices.
| gnopgnip wrote:
| There are no fees for shipping or handling or sales tax
| buying $100+ in stamps from usps.com Also no fees buying a
| single book of stamps for $13. Are you sure you are looking
| at the real government website?
| RandallBrown wrote:
| There are extra fees when buying things that aren't stamps.
| If USPS.gov isn't the right website, I'd like to know what
| is.
| ed_elliott_asc wrote:
| I went for dinner tonight and for some reason they decided to
| charge an extra pot of gravy at PS1 when it always used to be
| free - this is extremely irritating.
| jrockway wrote:
| This is not a junk fee. You bought a pot of gravy for PS1.
|
| Being nickeled and dimed [1] never feels good, but it's
| somewhat fair. Why should you pay to check luggage if you're
| not checking luggage? Why should you pay for two pots of
| gravy if you only want to eat one?
|
| [1] I realize this expression probably doesn't translate well
| to speakers of English that use the Pound as their currency.
| I apologize.
| bigiain wrote:
| > "showing the proper price is too hard."
|
| And yet somehow it's always possible to have the proper price
| ready when billing your card.
|
| Here (Australia) if a manufacturer or dealership advertises a
| car at a price, they have to sell the car for that price and no
| more if someone shows up at your showroom. In practice this
| does make life complicated, I worked on Toyota's website a
| decade or so back, and there was a quite complex attempt to geo
| locate users so we could know which state they were in, because
| each state has different registration/insurance/on-road-costs,
| so depending where you were, we had to show a different final
| price. (It was usually only a few hundred dollars difference,
| and we also went out of our way to ensure we listed how much
| was state government fees and how much was the dealership
| pricing.)
|
| (There was an "incident" before my time there, where the web
| agency fucked up and advertised RAV4s for way below the real
| price, and half a dozen people worked it out and showed up at
| dealerships with printouts of the web advertised price and got
| a RAV4 for a _lot_ below retail price. Toyota ended up making
| the web agency pay to difference, which was well into 6
| figures. But they were getting billed close to 7 figures a
| month for the website, so...)
| RadixDLT wrote:
| these companies are acting like vultures, they will scam the
| customers until they are stopped
| 1024core wrote:
| What got me recently was the fee to select a seat on a flight.
| I'm traveling with my family, including a 12 yo kid. Am I going
| to let her sit between two strange men for the flight? Of course
| not! So I have no choice but to pay the $50/seat (or whatever the
| amount was) so we can all sit together. This is criminal! Who
| will be held responsible if my kid gets assaulted in the flight?
| 4bpp wrote:
| The assailant, one would hope and expect?
| ezfe wrote:
| Airlines will book you together if seats still remain
| together...They're not gonna split you up just for the fun of
| it.
|
| Only way to guarantee seats remain together is to select seats
| ahead of time. People complain about "junk fees" because
| they're mandatory parts of the cost. If a website is upfront
| about a benefit you're losing, it's not a junk fee.
|
| Lastly, these basic fares are really designed for single
| travelers on a tight budget with fixed plans. Delta's website
| makes this clear, and websites that don't make it clear really
| should.
| gnicholas wrote:
| The question is whether it is understood up front that there
| is a type of ticket that doesn't allow seat selection, and
| that the customer has selected that type of ticket.
|
| Until the last few years, this wasn't even a thing in the US
| on major airlines. Then United launched their Basic/Shitty
| Economy and it's been a race to the bottom ever since.
| cycomanic wrote:
| Are you sure the people complaining didn't prbook seats. I
| recommend you look at the fine print. Selecting seats does in
| no way guarantee you the seat that you have selected. I have
| seen cases where people who prebooked seats got split up, and
| didn't get a refund for the selection either.
| jghn wrote:
| This leads to another awful behavior. Have seen too many
| instances, including by friends of mine, where instead of
| paying the uncharge they let the airline assign seats. And then
| they put up a fuss when people won't swap seats with them when
| they board. What's worse, often the flight attendants will side
| with these people.
|
| As someone who always pays extra to choose my seat, no. It is
| not my problem if people can't be bothered to do the same
| thing.
| fbdab103 wrote:
| Assaulted on a flight? Stranger danger, I guess, but this seems
| like a very low odds event.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| It may be rare, but it absolutely does happen. https://amp.mi
| amiherald.com/news/state/florida/article279873...
| fbdab103 wrote:
| Sure, anything can and does happen. But how many similar
| assaults happen annually by strangers at a
| Starbucks/bus/library/school? Life is a risk.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| How many of those assign you to sit next to a stranger
| for many hours unless you pay an additional fee?
|
| Kids sitting alone on a plane is a very solvable problem.
| It used to be unheard of just a few years ago.
| jghn wrote:
| When I was in either 4th or 5th grade a friend of mine
| living in another state flew by himself to visit my
| family. For obvious reasons he was sitting by himself on
| a flight.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| Under a certain age, this requires a fee and coordination
| with the airline. I did it too; a flight attendant was
| tasked with supervising me and I was escorted to my
| connection and pickup. It's not the same thing.
| 1024core wrote:
| Those are called "unaccompanied minors". The airline
| takes full responsibility for them; including having the
| flight attendants check on them regularly. And at the end
| of the flight, they are handed over to a pre-determined
| adult.
|
| There's a whole protocol followed.
| jghn wrote:
| People also get struck by meteorites, most people do not
| change their behavior to take this into account.
|
| It may be rare, but it absolutely does happen. https://www.
| dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-12311871/The...
| ceejayoz wrote:
| That's substantially _more_ rare, and substantially less
| _preventable_.
|
| Until a few years ago, an extra fee for a child to sit
| next to their parent on a plane was not the norm. Safety
| is being reduced for profit.
| jghn wrote:
| Sure, I went with it because it was amusing.
|
| Insert basically every other dangerous event that for
| practical purposes will never happen. People worry too
| much.
| 1024core wrote:
| Just in the past few months alone:
|
| https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/airlines-flight-
| sexua...
|
| https://www.miamiherald.com/news/state/florida/article279873.
| ..
|
| https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/woman-
| groped...
|
| https://nypost.com/2023/06/07/doc-allegedly-gropes-woman-
| on-...
|
| https://abc7chicago.com/delta-airlines-flight-lawsuit-
| sexual...
|
| https://www.deccanherald.com/india/karnataka/bengaluru/51-ye.
| ..
|
| https://news.yahoo.com/alaska-based-army-officer-
| charged-220...
|
| https://www.clickorlando.com/news/local/2023/06/23/californi.
| ..
|
| I could go on...
| jghn wrote:
| How many of those involve unattended kids?
| terminous wrote:
| > This is criminal! Who will be held responsible if my kid gets
| assaulted in the flight?
|
| I was with you until you went off the deep end here.
| lodovic wrote:
| They should advertise it as a $50 discount if you let them
| assign your seat instead.
| Throwfi44 wrote:
| Yet another reason to skip US on travel. In EU I may get like
| extra 3 euro council tax for staying at hotel.
|
| In US even basic stuff, like going to restaurant for dinner, is
| "an experience" that requires reservation and generous bakshish.
| jopsen wrote:
| > In EU I may get like extra 3 euro council tax for staying at
| hotel.
|
| I do hate those taxes not being included in the price, and I
| complain every time :)
| nobodyandproud wrote:
| This is a classic example of market failure. Consumers will
| choose the lowest rates--all else being equal--and this leads to
| artificially low prices.
|
| What I don't understand is whether doing this really protects
| their profits. If everyone does it, then it's a race to the
| bottom anyway. Is it during this "transition period" where
| profits are made?
|
| And if everyone in the US does it, then the natural outcome is
| for everyone and anyone to avoid doing any business or travel in
| the US.
| fullshark wrote:
| Just seems like false advertising to me
| Zak wrote:
| I think in many cases, companies want to keep it because it
| makes comparison-shopping by price more difficult. There may
| also be some psychological trickery wherein customers are more
| likely to accept a higher price after they've started the
| purchase process.
| nobodyandproud wrote:
| Yeah, I agree that's what the businesses are doing.
|
| It's the psychological trickery where I wonder: Is there
| really value there in the long term?
| rescbr wrote:
| > There may also be some psychological trickery wherein
| customers are more likely to accept a higher price after
| they've started the purchase process.
|
| At least for me, I get very incensed when merchants pull
| those tricks on me, to the point that I abandon carts on the
| last stage and start comparing prices everywhere else.
|
| Price changed at the last minute? The seller is being
| dishonest.
| dalbasal wrote:
| Tweaking and twiddling with pricing structure... It's just what
| happens in a mature market.
|
| Every year, you need new ideas to make business better. This is
| something that you can usually futz with, and maybe get a
| little bit of bang.
|
| It's not necessarily about pricing template being better
| universally. It's just that these are factors you can move
| around, "optimize."
|
| Having multiple levers is just helpful.
|
| This is also an orthodox negotiation model. It's always helpful
| to negotiate multiple items simultaneously. Salary, benefits
| separately, pension separately from that, days off, personal
| days etc.
|
| It's very common that one is a hard no, but others are not.
|
| I know it seems to make sense to transparently aggregate
| everything.. but... The phenomenon exists regardless.
| nobodyandproud wrote:
| Right.
|
| I know what you mean, but some behaviors have a chance of
| destroying an industry (think US auto industry or China's
| melanin scandal).
|
| Yet businesses are forced to adopt because others in the
| vicinity do this.
|
| Some additional ground rules seems like it would beneficial.
| rr808 wrote:
| You can't blame the provider. Eg if you were the only hotel in
| town without the fee and your rate is higher than everyone else
| you'll likely be empty. I'm sure most hotels are only too happy
| if everyone is banned and the playing field is flat.
| raincom wrote:
| https://archive.ph/8RLsB
| udhh776 wrote:
| All extra fees contribute to GDP growth. Just like cleaning up
| pollution after spewing it everywhere, selling bombs and
| rebuilding things they destroy. Its called American genius.
| orasis wrote:
| Hotel taxes in many cities has become insane. The hidden fees
| aren't just coming from the businesses themselves.
| jopsen wrote:
| Yeah, but why are hotels not forced to include these taxes in
| the price?
|
| They could, but choose not to.
| dalbasal wrote:
| This is the sort of thing, we have to have an adult in the room.
|
| When complex, confusing pricing structures exist.. fiddling with
| them becomes a salesman / marketers main tool. It's what they do
| everyday, how they operate, the wins bring to the table.
|
| These are the knobs that they twiddle, and have for decades been
| producing reports quantifying the value of their work. They are
| now panicking, that they won't know how to do their job.. and
| reporting to CEOs that profits/sales in all those reports will
| disappear.
|
| Irl, this is pulling a Band-Aid. You could make all service
| charges illegal, from cafes to airlines.. and the industries
| we'll have forgotten about it within weeks or months.
| m_ke wrote:
| I'm currently 60 minutes in, waiting on hold for American
| Airlines support, because I clicked on the cancel flight button
| on my trip details page hoping to get a warning page with details
| of my cancellation options, but instead it just canceled it on
| the spot with no refund/credit. I've never seen this before from
| any other airlines, nor any other products that cost thousands of
| dollars.
|
| For some reason they also have no other way to reach support
| other than phone.
|
| EDIT: Googling around it looks like it's standard operating
| procedure for some airlines:
| https://www.reddit.com/r/frontierairlines/comments/10svdqb/a...
| shortcake27 wrote:
| Wow. I'm very careful with clicking Cancel/Modify buttons for
| this reason. Never actually thought it would happen. Now I feel
| my paranoia has paid off.
| acheron wrote:
| "Junk fees" is obviously manipulative language that has no real
| definition, which makes me automatically oppose whatever this
| "ban" is.
| everybodyknows wrote:
| Right, it should be "hidden", or "deceptive".
|
| The irony being that by figuratively speaking _marketing_ this
| effort as being against "junk fees", the government itself
| perpetrates a deception.
| gnicholas wrote:
| If these fees are outlawed, I wonder what the new equilibrium
| will be.
|
| The govt talks about how this costs Americans hundreds of
| billions of dollars, which makes it sound like the money will
| magically be transferred back to consumers.
|
| But the reality is more complicated, and likely involves
| businesses migrating these fees into their base prices.
|
| More transparency is good, for sure, but I wonder how much money
| will actually be saved.
| wnc3141 wrote:
| which I think is fine, consumers will have a transparent and
| readily available price figure with which they can make a
| choice
| gnicholas wrote:
| That's true, and I guess what I wasn't accounting for is that
| some people on the margin will choose not to purchase, and
| have a staycation instead of shelling out for airline tickets
| and hotel stay, if the fees are all displayed upfront. Right
| now, those people see artificially lower prices and end up
| being the proverbial boiled frog, as price increases are
| revealed through the checkout process.
| quickthrowman wrote:
| I just want all costs and overhead to be priced into the price
| of the good or service. I'd rather pay an advertised
| $200+tax/night for a hotel room than $150+$50 resort
| fee+tax/night. You're paying the same amount in the end, but
| the $200 lump sum price is more honest.
|
| I sell services and I give my customers one lump sum price,
| where all of my costs (including taxes), overhead, and profit
| are included with no gotcha fees.
| gnicholas wrote:
| I'd actually want the taxes to be enumerated for hotel rooms,
| since the rate can be much higher than regular sales tax, and
| varies greatly by location. I generally assume hotel taxes
| will add 20-25% if it's not shown otherwise.
| Crunchified wrote:
| IF the fees are just "fluff" that adds pure profit to the goods
| or services rendered, then these new fees regulations will have
| the government's desired effect. But if the fees are needed to
| cover costs and expenses, they WILL be incorporated into the
| bottom line prices, and the regulations will force the
| advertised prices to rise in lieu of the fees.
|
| As in any "free-market" system, the cost structures of each
| business will govern its competitiveness and the amount of
| profit that competition will allow.
|
| And, as usual, the government will find out that further
| regulating free markets (a three-word oxymoronical phrase) will
| not achieve the stated goals of lowering the public's costs of
| goods and services. It might, however, level the playing field
| in ways that appeal to voters who rely on government to solve
| all their woes.
| Espressosaurus wrote:
| If it just causes prices to rise to their actual level so we
| can make an informed decision instead of being surprised by
| the price changing when we go to check-in, check-out, or
| whatever, that's a win.
| xoa wrote:
| > _And, as usual, the government will find out that further
| regulating free markets_
|
| Free Markets _require_ information symmetry to function
| properly and efficiently. The sticker price is ideally
| supposed to include _every_ cost along with profit margin,
| such that the buyer pays exactly that price and receives the
| product /service that's the end of the transaction.
| Externalities and hidden fees are anti-Free Market, they
| distort the core fundamental incentive that is supposed to
| make it work, allowing more expensive products/services to
| deceive people into buying them over less expensive ones they
| would have chosen otherwise.
|
| > _(a three-word oxymoronical phrase)_
|
| Only if you have an extremely understanding of how these
| tools work. Free Markets are meta-stable constructs without
| any inherent service to humans, without regulatory
| maintenance keeping them functional and linking them to
| people they'd collapse in various ways, or at least be
| extremely inefficient which defeats the whole point.
|
| > _will not achieve the stated goals of lowering the public
| 's costs of goods and services_
|
| That is a systemic, long term goal, not just the next week or
| month. Information symmetry allowing people to make more
| efficient decisions is the basic driver of competition and
| sellers improving the value of their offerings. That is what
| creates lower costs/high value over time, in the same way
| that breaking up monopolies or monopsonies might well
| temporarily increase the price of goods/services in certain
| cases, but leaving them be indefinitely always results in
| lower efficiency/productivity long term.
| dkjaudyeqooe wrote:
| The whole point is to hide the price so you can't compare so
| they can neuter competition.
|
| Companies can charge whatever they like, but you have to be
| told. If it's a mandatory fee it has to be disclosed upfront.
| Money will be saved when competitive pressures save money for
| consumers.
|
| I don't agree with regulating late fees, especially since there
| are cards without late fees at all. I did agree with banning
| over limit fees since there was no way to instruct your bank to
| decline transactions that would take you over the limit.
| bastard_op wrote:
| It seems like any fast food moves to some sort of ipad-based cash
| register deal, they all ask for a gratuity if it's a burger or a
| coffee as though it's built-in and expected. I know no one is
| getting a tip in those places that I don't put cash into their
| pocket, and they'd probably be fired if they did for stealing.
| It's usually the first and last time I go to them as I feel weird
| them even asking me for fast food.
|
| No one asks for a tip at my preferred dirty old fast food spot of
| choice still using a cash register from the 80's.
|
| As a result, I mostly never eat out anymore, fast food or
| otherwise with costs gone absurd with or without tips. Let the
| fools that tip 20% for their coffee keep murica great.
| m1sta_ wrote:
| Safety, health, corruption, personal freedoms, misleading
| business practices (imho). The US is a shadow of what it should
| be.
| bojangleslover wrote:
| Looks like pretty much everyone has fallen victim to such fees.
| Next time you should consider disputing the charge because it's
| basically all we can do at the individual level.
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