Christopher Elliott

A funny thing happened about a year ago to the consumer advocacy wiki that I edit. It disappeared. I continued to publish the site, which lists the names, addresses and phone numbers of the executives for most major American companies....

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One of the busiest days of shopping is just around the corner. And if this Memorial Day is anything like last year, chances are you’ll be heading to the mall or out of town on a trip. Either way, you’ll...

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You’ve probably heard of the phone support scam, where criminals call you to warn about a “virus” on your PC. Only by paying an annual protection fee can you avoid a cataclysmic meltdown. But did you know that the scammers...

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If you’re a business owner in Indiana, maybe you received a recent invoice from the Secretary of State’s office. It’s a bill for a $125 annual fee for “record keeping and processing of a company’s annual minutes.” And it’s bogus,...

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How can you tell the difference between a smart consumer and a sucker? Salespeople spend a career studying their customers, trying to understand who makes an easy mark. Businesses study their customers, using test marketing, sophisticated analytics and outside consultants....

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The customer is not always right. The squeaky wheel doesn’t necessarily get the grease. Ignorance is not bliss. Those are just the leading annoying behaviors exhibited by consumers. And that’s not all. Customers make mistakes — lots of mistakes —...

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You’re a smart, enlightened consumer. Otherwise you wouldn’t be reading this. But even smart people sometimes do dumb things. I see it almost every day. There’s no scientific link between intelligence and better consumer behavior, at least none that I’ve...

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The email came from an acquaintance who had a respectable management job in Washington. “I’m sorry for this emergency,” she wrote, “but I just have to let you know about my present predicament.” She’d been called away on a trip...

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How do you spot a fake? If you’re ordering a product online, like Aaron Gold, it’s hard to tell. Maybe even impossible. Gold recently tried to find a spare battery for his Asus laptop computer, and finally located one through...

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If you’ve been alive long enough to collect an allowance from your parents, chances are you’ve been burned by a business. It happens to all of us: We buy something, it isn’t the product we expected, and the company tells...

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