Your Money's Worth

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Working weekends

Until this week, DVDs I returned to Netflix on Friday's were not acknowledged until Monday, which meant I had to wait until Tuesday for a new movie. This week, however, my Friday mailing was acknowledged on Saturday, so I'll get a new flick on Monday. I haven't seen an announcement about this, but I have to think competition, especially downloads, have forced Netflix to expand its service to better serve its customers.

Cell phone distraction

We've heard complaints (justified) about drivers being distracted while talking on their cellphones, but today I almost got run down in the aisles of the Hackensack ShopRite by a shopper obviously oblivious to the world around him. Opera singer Gabriela Pochinki, who got in trouble at a New York restaurant last week for disrupting other dinners with her loud chatter on her cell phone, had nothing on this guy.

I once asked a woman behind be on the bus if she could turn the volume down a bit as she discussed employee performance at the company at which she worked, obviously as a senior official. Of course, she got bent out of shape that I dared to interrupt her call.

Is it that hard to show some respect for others when using your cell in public places?

More free shipping?

Last year, careful holiday online shoppers could avoid most shipping charges. Many major retailers offered free shipping, and a survey done on behalf of Shop.org indicates we'll see even more free shipping this year, along with more promotions and more use of social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter.

 

Free shipping offers will abound this holiday season, with four out of five online retailers offering it (sometimes with conditions) at some point during the holiday season, Shop.org predicts. And nearly a third of the companies say they'll start offering free shipping earlier than a year ago.

 

At the same time, 47 percent say they will be increasing their use of social media this holiday season, including Facebook, Twitter, enhanced blogs and RSS feeds. In addition, to provide consumers with an extra incentive, one-third of retailers they will offer holiday deals earlier this year.

 

“Retailers know that times are tough so they have created promotions and incentives to help Americans save money this holiday season,” said Scott Silverman, Executive Director of Shop.org. “From free shipping to Facebook, online retailers are combining new initiatives with tried-and-true tactics to make their companies stand out.”

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Supply and demand? who cares?

Crude oil prices keep rising, dragging home heating oil and gasoline prices with them, and no one is quite sure why. Here's a section of an Associated Press story filed yesterday after trading ended on the New York Mercantile Exchange. I added the boldface for emphasis.

 

"Those prices are still well below what they were last year, when worries about peaking world crude demand pushed all energy commodities higher. But energy experts are having a tough time finding fundamental reasons for the recent jump in prices, given the amount of heating oil and natural gas piling up in storage. The government said Thursday that the U.S. has crammed 3.7 trillion cubic feet of gas in underground caverns, the most on record. A day earlier, it said the country has 33 percent more distillate fuel on hand than it did one year ago.

 

Futures contracts may be rising on the expectation that natural gas producers and heating oil refiners will slow operations ahead of what weather forecasters say could be a frigid winter, said Phil Flynn, an analyst with PFGBest. “They’ll stop producing because they’re not making any money,” Flynn said. “But we still have the bulk of the heating season ahead of us.”

 

There you have it. By traditional economic standards -- supplies are up and demand is down -- energy prices should be falling. To keep that from happening, natural gas producers and oil refiners are staging a work slowdown. They're making money; just not as much as they'd like. So they slow down to reduce inventories and make us pay more to drive and to keep warm.

Car donations

My mother wants to donate a car to charity. I have heard from several sources that some of the charities are not reputable, that none of the proceeds goes where promised. Any good ones you can recommend?

K.J., Wayne

There are so many out there that give little to the cause. The thing to remember is that the tax deduction is no longer based on the book value of the car (which was the case until four years ago) but on the sale or use value of the car as defined by the Internal Revenue Service). All the details are here: http://www.irs.ustreas.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=131660,00.html

 

So unless the charity has someone lined up to buy the car, be skeptical of anyone promising "top dollar." Several also promise vacations and, as I reported about a year ago, you can cash in, but have to jump through hoops to do so.

Still, you can help a charity and get a tax break. I suggest you do a Google search for "car donation," along with the name of a specific charity you know, such as American Cancer Society or Salvation Army (both have car donation programs) and pick one you wish to support. Just be careful of sound-alikes that use key words such as cancer, children, animals to make you think they are the better known organizations.

Here's another site with good advice: http://ezinearticles.com/?10-Best-Charity-Car-Donation-Tax-Deduction-Tips&id=1354590

 

 

Up, up and away

The average price of gasoline is up 11 cents a gallon since bottoming out at $2.309 on Columbus Day, but that is misleading. One Delta station I pass each day has raised it price for regular by 20 cents since then, going from $2.15 to $2.35 last night. When I did the Marketbasket Survey last week, more than a third of the stations I visited in the Bergen-Passaic market were under $2.25 and I don't think anyone is that low now.

Part of the blame goes to crude oil that went over $82 a barrel briefly today, due partially to a weakening U.S. dollar (the currency for oil trading). And part is due to speculation, because demand remains low. The experts say these prices can't hold is demand remains weak, but I've given up trying to figure it out.

Take 'em off

Get ready to hold your hat and stash your shades on your next visit to your friendly neighborhood bank. If the name of security, banks across the United States – including at least two based in North Jersey– are “requesting” that customers come clean.

“For security reasons, we ask you to remove hats, hoods, headgear and sunglasses before entering our facility,” says a notice on the door of Oritani Bank branches. At Valley National Bank, the message is similar: “To ensure the financial and physical security of our customers, we respectfully request . . . .”

 

If you think about it, the new “rules” make sense; nearly every security photo you see of bank robbers are practically useless because hats (especially baseball caps) and shades make it almost impossible to recognize the crook. They’re as good as a mask in hiding identities, but don’t attract attention.

 

I put “rules” in quotes because the banks seem to be asking, rather than demanding. Also, when I entered the Oritani branch in New Milford and the Valley branch in Fair Lawn wearing my baseball hat and sun glasses, no one asked me to remove the offending items. Of course, I am so innocent looking, they probably never felt threatened. And without my prescription sun glasses, I might have had trouble finding the exit.

While the rules make sense, the banks are going to have to be sensitive to avoid offending customers whose religious beliefs require head cover, those with medical reasons for wearing hats or folks simply having a bad hair day and would be embarrassed to be hatless.

Quad-play

Another day, another battle in the communications war. As if double- and triple-play packages are not enough, Verizon upped the ante today by offering “quad-play” to customers in Northeast and Mid-Atlantic markets, adding wireless service to its existing TV, Internet and home phone services package.

 

The packages are available to customers who are served by Verizon’s FiOS services or its high speed internet and DIRECTVÒ. Verizon is also offering similar packages without traditional home phone service. All four services will appear on one bill and customers will save from $59 to $179 per year, depending upon which bundle they order, the company says.

 

Existing Verizon Wireless customers can choose to add Verizon broadband or TV services, or both, to complete a bundle; existing Verizon broadband and TV customers can add Verizon Wireless voice service to their bundles. For more information, call (877) 894-7244.

 

Until now, Verizon has been winning the advertising battle with its cutting, long-running campaign built around a bright, friendly service rep and a hapless installer for the cable company. But Cablevision has struck back with a character who looks like the FiOS guy accompanied by his mother when making a service call. When the FiOS guy makes promises, his mother corrects him, a not-so-subtle way for the cable company to contradict the FiOS claims.

 

Obviously, this war is far from over.

The 7 cent solution

Yesterday I got one of those notices fromthe courts saying I could share in a class action settlement of a law suit. This one came from the U.S. District Court in the state of Washington and involved a suit against T-Mobile involving being charged for unwanted text messages. Because my cell plan does not include text messages, I pay 20 cents for each one I get.

Then it explained the likely payout: "The parties estimate that the average potential recovery for a class member . . . would range from approximately $0.07 to $1.17. These are merely average estimates, and some class members may have larger damage claims. . ." The money will arrive some time after March 5, 2010.

So I have to decide whether to join in the settlement or sue on my own to get my 7 cents. And I have six months to dream about how I will spend this windfall.