Thursday, November 20, 2008
WaMu collector gets Trado pitch
Joyce from WaMu just called.
I have GREAT news for you! Check out Trado.info and you can sign up this weekend to claim your T100 account opening credit. You’ll get periodic Trado credits just for being an active Trado member.
Trado.info - check it out and have a great day!
I hope she opens an account. Many of those collectors will soon be unemployed.
Credit - Collection - Economic News • (0) Comments • Permalink
Reader mail: Quicken billed for CheckFree Bill Pay service cancelled years ago
Christine,
We are past CheckFree Bill Pay customers who cancelled service years ago, but last month discovered that Quicken has been auto billing our account the entire time. We contacted them, and they said they’d refund three months of payments. We’ve never granted them permission to access our account and never used their service. Although the loss is not that large--a few hundred dollars--the principle of accessing and billing our account has us enraged. In Minnesota we call it theft.
During a Google search, I found your posted information dated 7-7-05. It seems we are one of those 27,000 CheckFree customers who cancelled and had their accounts reactivated without authorization. Can you tell me if there has been a suit filed or if there are any updates available. We intend to pursue this matter.
Thanks,
...
I’m not aware of any lawsuit and I’ve completely given up on changing how American corporations are allowed to defraud the people.
Due to my own EXTENSIVE legal experiences as well as the complete failure of class actions to have an impact, I can only recommend taking the 3-months refund and forgetting about it.
If somebody actually filed a class action, quite likely you’d get a COUPON giving you a percentage off Quicken software as settlement. It is disgusting.
It bothers me tremendously that I still use Quicken and I PAY for the updates they force you to buy. Maybe as part of the Trado project we’ll come up with an alternative to Quicken and MS Money. When it comes to choosing between paying MS or Quicken, that’s a really tough choice.
Eventually, ALL transactions that are in now in my bank account should be at Trado and I should be able to download the transactions into a program similar to Quicken from Trado. And of course I’ll be able to pay all bills through Trado, I just choose between Trados and Dollars.
The software I’m installing today doesn’t have the feature to use Dollars yet, that’ll have to be an add-on module. But since PayPal can maintain multiple currencies and exchange them, it can’t be too difficult.
I’d like to put Quicken and Metavante out of business along with the banks.
Maybe some of their disgruntled programmers could moonlight for Trado?
Quicken Bill Pay - Metavante • (0) Comments • Permalink
Reader mail: Student loan NOT received ruining credit (school fraud)
Hi Christine,
First of all I would like to thank you for taking the time to read my email. My name is [redacted] I’m 28 years old and I have a big dilemma. I have on my credit report a supposed student loan that I never paid off.
I applied to a computer programming school in Pennsylvania a couple of years ago after they received all my info they invited me to come in and try out there classes for a couple of days and see if I want to go there. I did try it but didn’t like it so I never went there again. When I applied for a car loan some time later I got denied. I got a copy of my credit report and found out something really awful. They took out a student loan on my name for $8,000. Later I found out from a friend that read in a local paper that the school got shut down by the FBI and the owner went to jail because they were doing fraudulent government school loans with different people. (people who like me didn’t even go there) I have had the student loan companies call and harrass me for the money and I have been trying to explain to them the whole story but they don’t listen. My credit now is in upper 500’s and I’m trying to start a familly but its very hard to get anything with a score like mine. I would really appreciate any guidance where or how I should handle this situiation. Thanks again in advance for time and understanding.
You need to dispute in writing. If you need help with that, please subscribe to CreditFactors and I’ll be glad to help you at the CreditFactors forum. Obviously, I need some more info such as your dispute history and who is collecting and reporting, but this SHOULD be very easy to resolve with a few dispute letters.
As of today, all CreditFactors orders for subscriptions and services are available with a 50% TRADO payment. I’m installing software today, but will be out in court all day tomorrow, so it will probably be this weekend until you can sign up to claim your T100 Trado account opening credit.
The new Trado site
I posted a somewhat comprehensive FAQ about the Trado at http://trado.info/
2009: Creating a NEW system - jobs, trade, money • (0) Comments • Permalink
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Judge prohibited lawsuits by disabled man, supreme court refused to hear case
By Carol J. Williams
November 18, 2008
Whether Jarek Molski is a crusader for the disabled or an extortionist who abused the law for personal gain, the vexatious litigant has filed his last lawsuit.The U.S. Supreme Court declined Monday to hear the case of Molski vs. Evergreen Dynasty Corp., owner of a Chinese restaurant in Solvang, Calif., in a legal Waterloo for the 38-year-old Woodland Hills man. Molski filed more than 400 suits under the Americans With Disabilities Act before a federal judge barred him from future litigation.
In a highly unusual action in 2004, U.S. District Judge Edward Rafeedie, who has since died, branded Molski a “hit-and-run plaintiff,” accusing him of systematic extortion of businesses across California.
Molski, who has used a wheelchair since a motorcycle accident two decades ago, sued restaurants, bowling alleys, wineries and other retail outlets for insufficient handicapped parking, misplaced handrails and other violations of the disabilities act, demanding that business owners be fined $4,000 for every day their facilities failed to meet exacting federal standards.
Fear of adverse judgments compelled many to settle out of court, earning the Polish-born plaintiff hundreds of thousands of dollars in less than two years.
Molski was traveling abroad and couldn’t be reached for comment, said a secretary at the San Francisco office of his attorney, Thomas E. Frankovich. The Frankovich firm also was accused by Rafeedie of misusing the courts and barred from filing more suits without the judge’s permission.
The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in April denied a rehearing of the Evergreen case by the full court. But nine of the court’s 28 judges, including Chief Judge Alex Kozinski, dissented, arguing that the 1st Amendment right to petition the government for redress of grievances is “one of the most precious of the liberties safeguarded by the Bill of Rights.”
Courts have the right to shield their dockets from abuse by frivolous litigation, said Peter Eliasberg, managing attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California. “But this is a remedy that should be used very sparingly, especially with regard to a statute that is disobeyed a lot,” he said of the disabilities act.
Williams is a Times staff writer.
At least 9 of the 28 judges DISSENTED. In my case, NONE thought that your credit report is PRIVATE and that perjury is a problem. But this case also confirms that when you’re wronged MANY times, you lose your legal rights.
But I also don’t understand why the ADA calls for $4,000 in fines PER DAY. The laws just make NO sense. All people should be able so sue and get statutory and punitive damages. A business really may not have known about a rule, so the first time, they pay legal fees and maybe a couple thousand to the plaintiff, depending on how much actual damages were and how much time was wasted on the litigation.
The NEXT time the punitive damages ought to be MUCH higher.
The legal system makes NO sense.
The other question is why the REGULATORS don’t enforce ADA rules. When you open a restaurant, the health department inspects, probably the fire department, what about requiring ADA compliance?
How can it be that after 400 lawsuits, businesses STILL don’t comply with the ADA?
It’s a completely dysfunctional system. Time to create a new one.
