customers

A company offering a special discount on ordering flowers on line -- just in time for Valentine's Day -- was forced to shut down the deal a day early because customers complained the "offer" meant they saved little if any money. The offer came from ... Groupon, which issues a daily deal from retailers aimed at users in a particular geographical area. The way the deals work is that the offer is only good if a set number of people sign up to take advantage: that encourages more retailers to take part as they know they'll pick up enough extra business to make it worth their while. The all-or-nothing ... (view more)

Both Hewlett-Packard (HP) and Lenovo have been forced to admit they unknowingly shipped laptops and desktops equipped with faulty Intel chipsets. Both companies are working on compensation for affected customers. Lenovo last Thursday told the media ... it had stopped shipping IdeaPad laptops and IdeaCentre desktops equipped with Intel Core i5 and i7 processors using the Sandy Bridge chipset design. It's not yet clear how many faulty PCs were shipped up to this point, however, since the company has only noted that the affected units are "limited" in number. Free Replacement or Refund Offered ... (view more)

It's likely going to be many years before people stop buying movies on DVD. But rental giant Netflix is not only preparing for that day, but attempting to bring it closer. The company has announced that it will, for the first time in the US, be ... offering a special package that only allows users to stream rented titles over the Internet, with no option to obtain discs. To encourage users to make the switch, the new package will be $7.99 a month (the lowest ever offered by the company), while the price of the packages that include getting discs by mail will rise by at least $1 a month. The price ... (view more)

If regulators have their way, cellphone companies will have to warn customers before they incur unusually high charges. It's a new program designed to prevent situations where a customer unexpectedly receives a bill for $68,505, as was the case for ... one customer in the first quarter of 2010. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which oversees the mobile industry, is proposing three new rules regarding how and when companies should tell users about potential charges beyond their normal fees. Cell Phone Bill Shock: Shocking Statistics In May, the FCC released a report suggesting that ... (view more)

Verizon will issue refunds to around 15 million customers after mistakenly charging them for non-existent data use. But the company may wind up paying a bigger price for the error. Phone Users Victims of 'Technical Errors' in Billing In a statement ... attributed to deputy chief counsel Mary Coyne, the company said the mistaken bills were issued over the past several years. It said the customers did not have data plans, but were victims of technical errors, either with phone software sending and receiving "minor" data, or being billed for following web links that shouldn't have incurred data ... (view more)

Wal-Mart will soon compete with the major cellphone networks by selling its own calling plan. The world's largest retailer will offer exceptionally low rates on voice calls and texts, though its data charges may be too expensive for many users. The ... chain will be acting as a virtual operator, meaning it licenses bandwidth from a mobile network (T-Mobile in this case), and resells it to customers. Its plan, dubbed "Family Mobile", costs $45 a month for one line and $25 a month for each additional line, with unlimited US calls and texts. That's substantially lower than what major networks ... (view more)

PC maker Dell is helping to usher in a new age by announcing that it will no longer offer PCs downgraded to Windows XP after the end of this month. It's a deadline well ahead of that set by Microsoft: October 22nd, which, coincidentally enough, ... marks the first birthday of Windows 7. Windows XP Driver Support to Continue Although Dell will continue offering driver support for Windows XP for another two years (December 2012, in fact), the company is determined to stop selling the OS well before October 22. "This means that we will stop offering XP as an option for customers starting this month ... (view more)

Just in time for the launch of a new iPhone model, AT&T Inc. is reportedly reigning in data usage by its customers using smart phones and iPads. A recent AT&T press release introduced new wireless plans, which says will make it much "more ... affordable" to enjoy the benefits of mobile Internet. AT&T customers will now be able to pick a plan that best meets their needs: a $15/month entry level plan or a $25/month plan that allows 10 times more data. Current customers will not be required to switch to the new plans, but can choose to do so without a contract extension. ( ... (view more)

Microsoft has decided to remove its "Bing cashback" feature after a lack of interest among retailers. The scheme allowed users to search for products and then get a rebate for buying from a selected seller. The scheme originally launched as part of ... Microsoft's Live search engine, before being rebranded when Live merged with MSN to produce the new Bing site. The launch of Bing arguably made the cashback tool more useful for both Microsoft and customers, as Bing is based around providing results in a variety of categories depending on the subject of a search. For example, people ... (view more)

A barely-noticed letter from Yahoo to the U.S. Marshals Service has revealed surveillance policies that allow the US Justice Department to request wiretaps of its users. The 12-page letter (in PDF format), in response to a Freedom of Information Act ... request, claimed that Yahoo couldn't provide the information on their policies because their pricing scheme would 'shock' customers. (Source: rawstory.com ) A Yahoo lawyer wrote that if the pricing information was disclosed, it would be used to shame Yahoo and other companies and to traumatize their customers. (Source: rawstory.com ) Yahoo: ... (view more)