New Hampshire Real Estate & Consumer Resources

Archive for the ‘Consumer’ Category

That appears to be the case. I cannot say exactly how I came to possess this particular piece of mail, but all I will say is that it was not addressed to me. Yeah, the economy has been lousy for a while, and we’ve certainly not been living the high life, but we have not quite reached this point yet.

I did think it was rather extraordinary to discover that debt collection agencies are actually offering people gifts to settle their debts. This was new to me and I thought it was worth sharing.

Maybe this is old news, but it made me wonder if these are the new extreme measures collection agencies are taking to collect debts. Is that how bad this economy is now?

Pay your debt and we’ll send you a free gift! Wow.

Anyway, check out the lovely letter and free gift catalog that RJM Acquisitions LLC sent – complete with postage-paid return envelope!

Who knew debt collectors could be so nice?

(Click each image for the larger view)

With the sad state if the economy these days, I’m seeing my share of ads on TV and online that tout the benefits of credit counseling services. I don’t know a whole lot about that industry, but I presume their stated intent is to assist consumers who want to reduce their debt and learn how to better manage their finances.

It’s easy for many consumers to end up in financial trouble during times like this when some of them are forced to rely on credit cards to pay bills and cover other expenses after losing their jobs.

I suppose I should not be terribly surprised to hear a story like the following in the age of “It all depends on the meaning of what the word is is,” but at the very least, some might find it amusing.

A story from the Orlando Sentinel not long ago described the credit card trouble that a credit counseling company called Breakthrough Credit Counseling Inc. is having with Bank of America.

Bank of America alleged that the company ran up about $18,000 in credit card debt and then failed to make the payments. The bank has filed suit against the company for the alleged non-payment.

Hearing news like this about a credit counseling company could surely give pause to anyone who had been considering contacting them for help with their debt. One might wonder how a company can counsel others regarding financial matters when they cannot pay their own bills.

Apparently, this is not the only trouble the owners of Breakthrough Credit Counseling Inc. are having. The article also states that a mortgage company sued to foreclose on their home during 2008 and that their their homeowners’ association filed a lien against them.

It seems as if the only “breakthrough” that they need to concern themselves with at this point is breaking themselves through to a debt-free life themselves.

It’s not uncommon to hear stories about stupid criminals. There are even television programs devoted to the subject. I suppose it’s bad enough being exposed as a crook, and even worse for earning a reputation as a stupid crook.

This description seems to fit Maria Elena Booker, a 40-year-old woman from Arizona who actually used a credit card she had stolen to pay a find imposed on her in a court of law. How she imagined she could get away with that one is anyone’s guess!

Booker is alleged to have stolen a purse from an unlocked vehicle as it was parked in the victims driveway. The victim reported the stolen purse to the police and later realized that someone was using one of her credit cards.

In addition to the court fine, Booker stands charged of using the credit card to pay her car insurance and telephone bill.

I must admit I am a bit baffled by the whole situation. If someone attempts to pay a bill or a fine with a credit card that does not bear their name, doesn’t that make the service provider, or in this case, court officials, a little suspicious?

Perhaps I’m just not savvy enough when it comes to the intricacies of credit card crime. I guess that’s because I tend to use only those that have my name printed on them.

For more on this story, visit The Daily Courier.

Now here’s something I had never heard of before. Who would have imagined that closing a credit card account could have a negative impact on your credit score? One would think it would be a positive move, since you certainly would not be using that card to rack up more debt.

But, like the Wall Street crooks whose slight-of-hand maneuvers helped push the economy to the brink of disaster, I don’t suppose we should expect things like FICO scores to make a whole lot of sense either.

A FICO score is just another way of saying credit score. We’ve all seen the ads on TV or online that advertise services that allow you to find out what your credit score is. FICO score and credit score are pretty much synonymous.

Anyway, an piece in USA Today surprised me a bit when it was revealed that closing a credit card account might actually lower your credit score a bit. It appears that the extent of the damage is pretty minimal – perhaps a couple of points – but if you have been working hard to build yours back up after enduring some financial hardships, those hard-earned couple of points may mean a lot to you.

This may put some credit card customers between the proverbial rock and a hard place, since some credit card issuers are coming up with new ways to generate profits after new regulations were enacted recently that stripped away some of the sneaky tricks used by some of them to fatten their coffers.

One might just decide to pay a card off and then stop using it. It was the first option that popped into my mind. However, with the effort to raise new revenue, some issuers are now instituting annual fees and inactivity penalties (I think “penalties” is the best word in this case), which make it impossible to just stop using your card and avoid sending money to the card issuers.

This Discovery (hint, hint!) comes at an interesting time for me, since a credit card company has managed to recently land itself on my bad side. My intent is to pay it off as soon as possible and close the account.

For me, shaving a couple of points off my FICO score will not be a serious problem, and if it happens, I’ll just live with it. Despite new regulations designed to protect consumers, you can be sure the credit card companies will come up with innovative new ways to extract money from consumers.

Your best bet, if at all possible is to simply use your credit cards for purchases that you can pay off in full as soon as the bill comes in. Since having no credit cards actually diminishes your credit score, that seems like the best way to keep your score as high as possible and also stay out of troubling debt.

Ever since I decided to get my own cell phone and give the one that we shared to my wife for her exclusive use, I’ve been getting strange calls. Actually, they all end up being strange voicemail messages, since I very rarely use my cell phone. and it spends the vast majority of its time sitting in a drawer with the power turned off.

It didn’t take long for me to start getting calls for the individual that had been assigned that telephone number before it was assigned to me. Some of the calls sounded job-related, as if someone was seeking this guy to do technical support work or something.

I then started getting calls that sounded like typical telemarketing calls, but most of them would mention the guy’s name. It got to the point where I changed the voicemail greeting for my phone so that it announced to whomever was calling for that other guy had not reached the person they were looking for, and to stop calling my number looking for him!

The calls stopped for quite some time, and I figured that might have been the end of it. Today I ran an errand – one of the few occasions I turn on my cell phone and was a little surprised to hear the tell-tale beeps that alerted me to the fact that I had new voicemail or text messages.

This time it was a series of three voicemail messages claiming to be from a “Mr. Martin” at “Integrity Financial Partners” (got to love that name!), which is apparently some kind of collection agency. Each of the messages was automated, and was obviously intended to lure the former owner of my cell phone number to call them back and discuss a debt they were attempting to collect.

I got a real good laugh from the second one, which stated that if I was not [insert name of guy who previously had my number], I should hang up immediately. It then said, this message will pause for three seconds and then proceeded to emit three beeps – no doubt counting down the vital three seconds. You can imagine my breathless anticipation!

It then proceeded to tell me that by continuing to listen to the message, I was acknowledging that I was indeed [insert name of guy who previously had my number]; a statement that resulted in great amusement for me. Naturally, I continued to listen.

As expected, it was just another request for the guy to call and talk about the money that this outfit claims he owes to someone.

A little research on the web resulted in a lot of nasty comments about “Integrity Financial Partners,” including one that says the owner of the company is a registered sex offender in the state of Florida. Others claim that the company has attempted to scam money from them.

I have no idea if any of those accusations are credible, but that’s what I found out there.

I decided to call the number and see if I could get these people to stop calling and leaving messages on my cell phone voicemail. I dialed up 866-851-8055 and after a short wait, was talking to a young guy who seemed a bit clueless. He was surely polite enough and all, but seemed a little uncertain of himself.

In the end, he did tell me he would record the fact that my number is not the correct number for the guy they are seeking, and that I should not hear from them again. Time will tell.

I’ve used this space to talk about the advantages of shopping around in the past. Some people shop around diligently and always make sure they are getting the best deal possible.

Me? I was never like that. It always seemed like too much of a hassle to be calling different retail outlets or businesses to see who was able to give me the best deal. The internet has taken a lot of the hassle out of shopping around, but the trusty old telephone still has its place.

For retail items you can do pretty well on the internet when you want to find the best deal on a given item. With auto insurance, I found the experience to be a little different.

When I became dissatisfied with my previous auto insurance company a few years ago, I actually made out pretty well by looking around the internet and filling out one of those quote forms that you see advertisements for all over the place. The problem I had was that the choices I was offered were pretty limited and I was able to get quotes for just three or four companies.

You can tell how fiercely competitive the automobile insurance business is just by watching a little bit of television. It does not seem that I can watch too long before seeing an advertisement for Geico, Progressive, State Farm, Amica or a host of other well-recognized names.

I also receive advertisements in the mail from the above companies on a fairly regular basis. I got one from Amica just a few days ago despite the fact that I signed up with them about two or three weeks ago! I guess it takes them a while to compare their customer and non-customer databases or something!

Anyway, to get more back to the point of this post, I would recommend that consumers call around or at least spend a little time on the internet comparing auto insurance rates every year or two. This recent switch to Amica was the second time I have been surprised by the amount of money I was able to save by switching companies.

The deal I got from Metropolitan a few years ago was a lot better than the one I had previous to that and it took a while to find a company that could match or beat them but I did.

And what’s really interesting is that the companies that constantly claim that they can save you money rarely can. At least that’s how it has worked out for me.

I consider myself a pretty hard sell. I’m skeptical and cynical to boot! I absolutely hate it when I feel like someone is trying to sell me something. Well, to Amica’s credit, it was their advertising that prompted me to call them when Metropolitan ticked me off enough to start me shopping around again.

I had remembered that the focus of their TV advertising was customer service and how they had received various awards for customer service.  Geico and Progressive beat the drum endlessly about how much money they can save for customers, but I have not personally found their rates competitive. However, it’s probably well worth checking with them if you are shopping around since insurance rates vary depending on a whole host of factors.

So, I gave Amica a call and had such a pleasant experience with the person I talked to that I started to believe their claims about superior customer service were genuine. To tell you the truth, it was such a pleasant experience talking to the Amica rep that I was really hoping the quote I was going to hear at the end of the call would be a good one because I wanted to sign up with them!

In the end it all worked out for the best since I was able to tell Metropolitan to take a hike and I got a nice quote from Amica, which I took advantage of.

Although I really appreciate my pleasant experience with Amica, my main concern is always price where auto insurance is concerned. However, when I decide to do some shopping around again in a year or two, it will probably take a pretty impressive savings to lure me away from a company that connects me to someone in my own state when I call their toll-free telephone number as opposed to a company that has shipped a bunch of jobs out of this country to some overseas call center.

Yeah, I know, ‘global economy’ and all that crap, but as long as I have a choice to do business with companies that keep jobs here, it will remain an important factor in my decision-making process when I am shopping around.

I know I’ve talked a bit about overseas call centers in the past, and voiced my displeasure about dealing with them, but I wanted to cover the issue more in-depth this time.

I’d also like to lay to rest any notion that I am a racist or bigot and don’t like people from other countries. That’s simply not true.

In my two previous posts, I explained in some detail my experience with MetLife insurance. They, like so many big ‘ and no doubt very rich ‘ corporations employ overseas call centers to handle incoming customer service calls.

This is a practice I dislike and here is the truth behind why I do.

Firstly, call center jobs are most certainly jobs that Americans want. Yes, you might be able to argue that a company is not able to find and ample supply of Americans to hire for certain jobs like picking produce in the hot Sun for hours and hours.

Make no mistake, those that are willing to do those jobs work their asses off and it is hard work. There is no arguing with the tremendous work ethic those people have. They work hard and probably do not get paid much to do it. If they are willing to do the job and they are in this country legally, they have every right to be hired to do whatever job it is they want.

On the other hand, there is no way I could be convinced that Americans don’t want call center jobs. There are, in fact, still U.S. call centers taking calls for customers every day, which proves that point.

That wraps up my first point, which is: Big, wealthy U.S, companies are taking jobs away from Americans by ‘outsourcing’ to overseas call centers. They say they do it to cut costs or remain competitive, but I don’t buy that. See my last post that proves hiring Americans to answer phones does not bankrupt companies. If Amica can do it, why can’t others?

Another problem I have is the language and culture barrier. When I call a U.S. company for customer service I want the CSR (customer service representative) to understand me and any cultural references, slang or vernacular that is common in my country.

On the other side of the coin, I also want to be able to clearly understand what the CSR is saying to me. I readily admit that some CSRs in overseas call centers spoke English extraordinarily well and I had no problem whatsoever understanding them.

There have also been occasions where the overseas CSR had a very thick accent, which made it extremely difficult for me to understand them. It is likely that I already have a problem. That’s why I an calling for customer service! The last thing I need is for the problem to be compounded by talking with someone I cannot understand or who cannot understand me.

My old ‘friends’ at TracFone were absolutely notorious for this kind of thing. Their call center was the absolute worst I have ever had to deal with it. That’s why I don’t carry a TracFone cell phone and never will again. Oh yeah, the text spamming was a big reason as well!

As a result of this language/culture barrier, my calls to overseas call centers are invariably very dry, impersonal and purely business-oriented. No laughs. No jokes. No small talk. No fun. That sucks. (Gee, I wonder if someone in an overseas call center would even know what that means!)

Adding to the potential language problems are the nearly universal poor connection problems I have when I am talking with someone in an overseas call center. Their voices are often distorted and I can hear what sounds like hundreds of other conversations on the line at the same time in the background. Really gives a company a great image, don’t you think?

It’s reached the point where I am surprised and delighted when I call for customer service and get someone from the U.S. on the line. For example, my conversations with the Amica CSR yesterday was actually fun! I was able to joke around with her, jokes that she understood and even laughed at! We even talked briefly about politics and the local weather. It was great!

She was raised in the same country I was. The same culture. We could relate to each other on many levels. That makes for a superior customer service experience and elevates the consumer’s opinion of the company as a whole. Like I indicated in my last post, so far, I love Amica and have already told my oldest son he should call them for his new auto insurance policy.

Big, rich, American companies listen up: A lot of us don’t want to talk to someone overseas when we call you! If you are a U.S. company I want to talk to a U.S. citizen when I call. If you are a German company, I will not complain if I get a call center in Germany on the phone when I call. Same goes for India or Costa Rica or wherever!

For my fellow consumers who may think badly of me for complaining about talking to people in other countries when I call for customer service I have this to say.

I do not blame the people on the telephone, and I am never rude or mean to them. If I were in their shoes I would probably jump at the chance for a good job as well. They cannot be blamed. I place the blame on the U.S. companies that choose to give jobs to people overseas rather than in the country where their customers are and where they are making their money.

People need jobs more than ever in this lousy economy and giving jobs to Americans should be the first priority for American companies that depend mostly on American consumers to stay in business.

That’s my opinion. Race, ethnic origin or geographic location has nothing to do with it. OK, I’ll concede that geographic location may be a factor due to those terrible telephone connections I so often endure when I am connected to an overseas call center.

This whole ‘outsourcing’ started a number of years ago. I didn’t like it then and I don’t like it now. From the very beginning I’ve said that if they start giving American jobs away to people overseas and we end up with a lot of unemployment in this country (sound familiar?) there eventually be no Americans left with enough money to buy the goods and services that these companies with the overseas call centers are offering.

Perhaps China and India will be wealthy enough to start buying a lot of stuff from American companies and their problems will be solved! Then they can move the call centers back here and we can all start learning to speak the different languages of the world so we can sit in a call center and answer calls from overseas customers all day for $3 an hour. Sounds great, doesn’t it?

Bring the call centers back to the U.S. Sure, maybe a few CEOs would have to give up an extra vacation home, private jet or luxury yacht to do it, but wouldn’t that be a worthy sacrifice in order to provide some struggling families right here in the U.S. a chance to keep their home or feed their kids?

In my quest to escape the unreasonable policies of MetLife insurance (see previous post) I decided to give Amica a call. I had seen their advertisements on television which featured their customer service awards and happy, satisfied customers.

I’m not the type to be taken in by a lot of promises and am usually doubtful regarding advertising in general. There’s just so much incompetence and deception out there that it’s hard to trust anyone these days.

So I dialed up the contact number from the Amica website and was connected to a friendly woman who was eager to help me. I could tell she was here in the U.S. and not in an overseas call center. The quality of the call was good and her accent and use of English left no doubt that she was here in the U.S. and even closer than I expected.

She began to gather my information and when I reached the part where she asked me what town I am in, I asked her if I should spell it for her. I’d have to say that 99% of the time, the answer is ‘Yes,’ but this time, she said, that I did not have to, and that she was familiar with it. That aroused my curiosity because we live in a small town that is not well-known beyond the local area.

When I asked her where she was located, she told me she was in Concord. Not only was she in the United States, she was right here in New Hampshire. Extra points to Amica for that one!

I must have spent at least 30 or 45 minutes on the phone and the Amica rep was a pleasure to deal with. She could not have been more helpful, friendly or patient.

The best part was when she quoted me an annual auto insurance premium of around $950. A substantial savings compared to MetLife. I was shocked due to my previous experience when I tried to get a quote that would beat or at least match MetLife previously. It had seemed impossible.

I was beginning to think that the claims made during those Amica TV commercials might actually be the truth!

I then asked her about my homeowners insurance, since I knew it was possible that I may get a discount by insuring both auto and home with them. That was indeed the case and she worked up a quote for me that was close to $100 above my homeowners policy from MetLife. However, combined with the auto policy, it was still a nice savings compared to MetLife.

I told the Amica rep to go ahead and start the process. I had found my new insurance company and was relishing the thought of my next task. Calling MetLife and telling them not to bother renewing my policies.

Once again I dialed up MetLife and waded trough the automated menu system that is so standard these days. After punching a number of buttons on my phone, I was finally connected to a person.

Once again I noticed the poor quality of the telephone connection and again, I was connected to a fellow with a Hispanic accent, but not the same one as before. I was beginning to think that I was not talking to someone here in the United States. You know, that country where MetLife is headquartered and probably does most, if not all of their business. Just where was the MetLife call center?

I told the gentleman of my intentions to cancel my policy. As expected, he asked if I would tell him why I was cancelling and I explained my displeasure with my attempt earlier that day to simply remove my oldest son from our policy since he no longer lives with us. He came back with the usual scripted response about how ‘sorry’ they were to see me go, etc. He then asked if he could put be on hold so he could start processing the cancellation.

A short while later he came back on the line and informed me that I was all set and my current policy would not be renewed. He then said "Is there anything I can do to convince you to stay with MetLife’? or something to that effect.

My answer was a simple and direct ‘No.’

He did not push any further. I thanked him for his help and mentioned that I thought our phone connection seemed a little weird and asked if he was in the United States.

‘No, Costa Rica,’ was his response. I told him I had heard that it was very beautiful there. He responded by saying the weather was nice and we ended our conversation.

So, in this case I end up with a win-win-win situation. Not only did I get to tell MetLife what to do with their policy, I got a better rate on a new policy and did it through someone who was sitting about an hour’s drive from my home as opposed to another country.

This early in the game it may be premature for me to make a glowing recommendation on behalf of Amica, but thus far, my experience with them has been outstanding.

Note to MetLife: Don’t make it hard for customers to do simple things like remove vehicles or people from a policy. Sure, I know with insurance you have all kinds of risks you are worried about and a legion of lawyers that are tasked with crafting your anal-retentive policies. But here’s the deal:

Let’s play devil’s advocate and say I was lying when I said my son moved out (for the record: he really did move out) and was just trying a sneaky way to save some money. Then, my son gets in an auto accident. Well, guess what? Deny coverage and don’t pay for it! Pretty simple if you ask me. I would clearly be a liar and clearly be at fault under those circumstances, and would (or should) be subject to some kind of legal penalty.

If I don’t pay to insure it, you don’t cover it. What is so damn hard to understand about that?

Anyway, back to the today’s lesson for the likes of MetLife. We, as customers of the insurance industry have a lot of choices, and an industry that is extremely competitive to boot. I think I could build a substantial bonfire with all the ads I have received in the mail or in magazine and sales flyer inserts from Geico alone!

It might be a good idea to make things as easy as you can for your customers and not make them jump through hoops for reasons that don’t make sense to us. Some of us don’t like jumping through hoops and are more than happy to ditch you in favor of another company.

Sure, for a huge company like MetLife, losing one customer may not be a big deal, but in this economy, I think one customer is more important than it used to be and you just lost one yesterday. That’s $1400 or so that MetLife won’t be collecting next year.

Note to readers: Please wait for my next post on overseas call centers before anyone decides that I am a racist or that I don’t like Costa Ricans or Hispanics or people from India or the Philippines or whatever.

Well, it’s been about three years since I dropped OneBeacon auto insurance and signed on with MetLife for a substantial savings. It was a great deal at the time and saved us a nice chunk of change.

A year or so ago, when my youngest son got his license and his own car, I finally let all those Progressive and Geico commercials get to me and I decided to call around to see if I could get an even better deal on insurance than I was getting from MetLife.

Although I cannot remember exactly which companies I called for a quote at the time, I called at least four different companies that offer auto insurance here in New Hampshire and none of them could even come close to the MetLife price. I was a bit disappointed, but at the same time, felt as though I was probably getting the best deal available.

As renewal time rolled around again this year, I got the usual packet of policy information and first bill from MetLife and noticed a substantial increase in my auto premium for the coming year.

The increase was likely due, for the most part, to the addition of my youngest son to the policy. I expected it to go up, but not quite as dramatically as it did. In fact, it shot up to around $2100, which was close to the amount I had been paying OneBeacon three years ago, and was the factor that prompted me to drop them in favor of MetLife.

I did not recall the exact figure I got for the yearly premium I was quoted when I added my youngest son to the policy, but the number I was staring at for the coming year was a bit of a shocker.

Well, the good news on the auto insurance front is that my oldest son has just moved out and is living on his own now. That meant I could remove him from my MetLife policy and save about $760 a year, which should have dropped the premium down to around $1340. A lot better than $2100!

So I got on the phone with MetLife and told him I wanted to remove my oldest son and his car from the policy, since he had moved out on his own. I thought this would be a simple matter, but not so.

Just to set the scene a bit here, the gentleman I talked to at MetLife was polite and professional and had a Hispanic accent. I also noticed that the telephone connection had that quality (or lack of!) that I so often notice when I end up connected to an overseas call center. But, figuring we have plenty of folks right here in the U.S. that have come from Latin American countries, I figured that perhaps it was just a bad connection and he was located in some MetLife call center here in the U.S.

He began the process of removing my son from our policy and then he spoke the words that ground the process to an abrupt halt. He told me that I would have to send them ‘proof’ that my son has moved out. Something like a utility bill with his name and new address shown on it.

As it stands now, my son is simply renting a room in a nearby city and does not get any kind of utility bills or otherwise with his name on them. But I was in no mood to explain that to the fellow on the phone.

What irked me was that this policy is something we are paying for, it’s not like MetLife is doing us a big favor by insuring us. I should also note that we had our homeowners insurance through MetLife as well, since that usually results in further savings.

As I was saying, this is something we are paying for. This is a service we have purchased from MetLife. and if I tell them I want to cancel a portion of that service (in this case, my oldest son’s coverage) they should simply do it. Instead they want us to jump through hoops and send them ‘proof’ that he has moved out ‘ which, under the circumstances, is not a simple matter.

At that point I indicated to the fellow on the phone that perhaps it was time for me to start calling other companies for a quote because I did not think it was reasonable for me to have to provide ‘proof’ to cancel a service we were paying them for.

His response, as expected, was to stick with the corporate script and reiterate that proof was required before my son could be taken off the policy. I told him I would be checking with other companies for a quote and would get back to them and then hung up.

At that point I started to think about which companies I would call. I remembered I had called Geico before and discovered that all their bragging about saving money on car insurance sure didn’t result in a saving for my family when compared to MetLife. I believe I had also talked to Progressive and Travelers and perhaps a couple more and none of them could beat or even match MetLife at the time.

I did not recall talking to Amica, however, and decided to give them a call to see what they could do. If you have any interest in how that turned out, check out my next post.

Here’s a bit of news that’s bound to bring a tear to the eye of any current or former customers of Pipeline Data, Inc. whose experience may have been similar to mine.

In it’s latest quarterly ’10-Q’ report, which the company must publicly release by law, they reveal that things didn’t go so well during the first three months of this year. The company’s revenue decreased by $1.9 million, which is almost 17%. Those figures are in comparison with the first three months of last year.

The company states that their poor performance is due to a reductions in transaction volume which was due in large part to ‘the attrition of customers’ and the current state of the economy.

I’m sure that the state of the economy has had a negative impact on their business, just like it has had for many others, however that’s not what stood out when I read the report.

I was more interested in the ‘attrition of customers’ revelation.

Dictionary.com defines ‘attrition’ thusly: ‘a reduction or decrease in numbers, size, or strength: Our club has had a high rate of attrition because so many members have moved away.’

There are other meanings, but I believe this is the one that the statement from Pipeline is eluding to.

To put it simply, they have lost customers ‘ a significant number I’m guessing, and something that I do not find the least bit surprising.

Here’s something else that was extremely interesting to me. The company reports that ”seven members of the Board of Directors resigned and a new five member Board was formed. Daniel Nenadovic serves as the new Chairman of the Board.’

This may actually be good news for current and future customers of Pipeline Data, Inc. Perhaps the new board will bring positive changes to the company that are sorely needed. Time will tell.

I was a little disappointed to see that the fictional $99 that the company claimed I owed them and hired a collection agency to collect from me was not mentioned in the ’10-Q’ report. I presume it would have been a ‘loss,’ since it must have appeared somewhere on their books as an uncollected debt until they realized it was a fantasy. A fact I made aware to them after I heard from the collection agency.

Anyway, I really did not expect to see that $99 on the ’10-Q.’ That was a joke, and probably not a very good one.

Here’s are some more fun facts from the ’10-Q’ report.

Pipeline owns a number of other companies, which they refer to as ‘wholly owned subsidiaries.’ I think they are worth mentioning:

• SecurePay.com, Inc.
• Northern Merchant Services, Inc.
• Pipeline Data Portfolio Acquisitions, Inc.
• Aircharge, Inc.
• PayPipe, Inc.
• Paynet Systems, Inc.
• Valadata, Inc.
• CardAccept.com, Inc.
• PayPassage, Inc.

Speaking solely for myself, of course, I know that this will be a list I will check through if I ever find myself in need of a merchant account again in the future.

A careful consumer should always do their research.

If you would like to read the ’10-Q’ yourself, you can find it at Yahoo! 

It’s also kind of interesting to see that this company’s stock is currently trading at around 14 cents, making it a true ‘penny stock.’

Wow, 14 cents is not a lot of money, is it?