A site that advocates for you
There’s a lot to watch out for when you’re planning your estate.
Bad advice. High fees. Trust mills.
“Death brings out the worst in people,” says Francine Kent, an estate appraiser from Sarasota, Fla.
Unscrupulous advisors prey on the elderly and their heirs with questionable legal advice, unnecessary bills, and the ever-present living trust come-ons.
Judith Levine was happily looking forward to her trip to Peru when disaster struck, and she had to cancel for medical reasons. Although she had travel insurance coverage, she couldn’t get a hotel refund. ¡Qué lástima!
A Minnesota couple on an Overseas Adventure trip to Latin America got more than they bargained for when they requested a tour refund. Susan Sanger and her husband, Henry Solmer, abandoned a trip with the company in February when he became ill.
There are many things to consider when deciding whether to take your baby on a cruise. But as a first time cruiser, Julie Belben didn’t realize just how complicated it could be to cruise with a baby. That is until the family was already out on the ocean. Now she has a long list of complaints about the experience and she wants a refund from Royal Caribbean. But is she owed anything?
When I tell people I have a National Parks Pass, they usually ask: Is it worth the cost?
My answer? Yes, the $80 a year I spend on my America The Beautiful card, which offers unlimited access to the National Parks, is worth every penny.
Now it’s time to reveal the most ridiculous hotel theft charge ever: pillow thievery at a two-star hotel.
During a recent stay at a Quality Inn, it never crossed Tim Kendall’s mind to steal the luxurious pillows in his room. But that didn’t stop the manager of this Choice Hotels franchised property from branding the elderly man as a pillow thief. And you won’t believe the outrageous value that this guy placed on two standard pillows.
Why did United Airlines cancel Lauren Daly’s flight from Monterey to Los Angeles? And why does it want her to pay $900 for a new ticket? Looks like a job for the Travel Troubleshooter.
Leah and John Tall book code-shared business class flights on British Airways. But their itinerary doesn’t provide the minimum connection time required during their return trip. They find themselves seated in economy class, and the airlines involved won’t refund their involuntary downgrade. Can our advocate help the Talls get their money back?
A nationally syndicated column that solves your travel troubles.
When Angela Chen arrives late in the evening to her scheduled motel, she is surprised by the locked front door. Eventually, some other guests allow her in, but that’s just the beginning of this nightmare hotel experience. Now she wants American Express to give her a refund for this stay. Should it?
A nationally syndicated feature that fixes your problems.
When Panda Express loses Benjamin Alpert’s catering order, the guests at his daughter’s birthday party have to eat cake. Now the company won’t refund part of his undelivered meal. What gives?
Our advocates have a lot to say. Read it here.
If you’ve bought a travel insurance policy, here’s the next logical question: What could possibly go wrong?
That’s a question Squaremouth set out to answer as part of its campaign to promote real life claims — a topic that’s near and dear to my advocates, too.
A column about our favorite kind of consumer advocacy.
Bohdan Boytsov won his credit card dispute with Hertz, but he lost. In doing so, he perfectly illustrated one of the consumer world’s greatest contradictions: You can be right and still be wrong.
We can't help these readers. But maybe they can help you.
Our advocates would normally be happy to try to help someone like Charles Kampinski. But then we saw the specifics of his American Airlines refund request. And we concluded that any attempt at advocacy — whether ours or his — for the costs he wants refunded has no chance of getting off the ground.
Should our advocates get involved here?
Next time you’re in a tourist town and you think about renting a scooter, remember Shasteana Wikenheiser. She’s the reader who crashed a scooter on a recent visit to Playa del Carmen, Mexico.
These cases didn't end like we expected. Find out why.
This hotel complaint sounds like a bad joke.
Tales of absurdity from the consumer world.
When Mai Le contacted us concerning her recent “near-fatal’ injury on Hawaiian Airlines, we were surprised to hear that the airline appeared to be unsympathetic to her plight. We suspected there was more to the story. That was a correct assumption.
The places we go when we're not advocating for you.
Can we talk about the most dangerous place to vacation? It’s not necessarily some far-off banana republic immersed in a civil war. It can be right here, in your own backyard.
