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from the who-knew-Office-Depot-was-still-around? dept.
Submitted via IRC for SoyCow1984
Office Depot and a partner company tricked customers into buying unneeded tech support services by offering PC scans that gave fake results, according to the Federal Trade Commission. Consumers paid up to $300 each for unnecessary services.
The FTC yesterday announced that Office Depot and its software supplier, Support.com, have agreed to pay a total of $35 million in settlements with the agency. Office Depot agreed to pay $25 million while Support.com will pay the other $10 million. The FTC said it intends to use the money to provide refunds to wronged consumers.
Between 2009 and 2016, Office Depot and OfficeMax offered computer scans inside their stores using a "PC Health Check" software application created and licensed by Support.com.
"Defendants bilked unsuspecting consumers out of tens of millions of dollars from their use of the PC Health Check program to sell costly diagnostic and repair services," the FTC alleged in a complaint that accuses both companies of violating the FTC Act's prohibition against deceptive practices. As part of the settlements, neither company admitted or denied the FTC's allegations.
The FTC filed its complaint against the companies in US District Court for the Southern District of Florida, while at the same time unveiling the settlements with each company.
(Score: 2) by NewNic on Friday March 29 2019, @05:45PM (18 children)
Would some of the site Libertarians please care to explain how the market did not correct this problem a long time ago?
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday March 29 2019, @06:30PM (17 children)
Brainwashing/coercion to only buy Microsoft products? Educational shortfalls, which failed to teach anything resembling "computer science" in schools? The laziness of the consumer, which forces him to rely on the marketing departments of Corporate America to tell them what they need? I can see a lot of reasons why the market didn't prevent, or correct this problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 29 2019, @06:38PM (5 children)
But the "market" is still perfect right? What a strange deity you have, complete with invisible hands!
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday March 29 2019, @06:50PM (3 children)
Whoa, whoa, whoa - just hold up there, you silly mule! When, and where, have I ever espoused that "free market" nonsense? I'm quite certain that I've pointed out a few times that we've never experienced a "free market" in any of our lifetimes. AT&T and Penn Power were well established monopolies years before I was born. IBM was a near monopoly. The Big 3 automakers shared a near monopoly by the time I was in junior high school.
I would like to test this concept of a "free market", but I'm sure that I'll never have the opportunity.
I suspect that the "free market" might be preferable to our current state of affairs. But, I also see potential pitfalls. Wall Street seemed to be doing well with it's version of "free market" in 1929, right up until the point where they weren't doing so well.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by NewNic on Friday March 29 2019, @07:01PM (2 children)
No true Scotsman, eh?
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 3, Funny) by deimtee on Saturday March 30 2019, @12:40AM (1 child)
True Scotsmen are in aisle six, $199.95 each.
-the Free Market.
If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 30 2019, @12:06PM
TruScot "Real Scotsman" with extra Kilt is in the endcap of aisle 7. Only TruScot can supply you with REAL True Scotsmen!
(Score: 1) by RandomFactor on Friday March 29 2019, @08:17PM
Do we need a new word for trolling with a strawman.
Trollmanning?
В «Правде» нет известий, в «Известиях» нет правды
(Score: 2) by sjames on Friday March 29 2019, @08:02PM (10 children)
Most of the people who go to Office Depot for technical support had no computer classes in school because when they went to school, a computer was and extremely specialized piece of very expensive hardware that as far as they knew at the time, most people would have no need to interact with directly.
The same era when a "car phone" was a device you saw on TV to let you know the character riding in the back seat was an important official.
So, it's back to why did the market utterly and completely fail to take care of the issue?
Claiming that each person should be a domain expert in every field is not a realistic response, that's just not going to happen.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday March 30 2019, @01:29AM (6 children)
Oh man - let me elaborate on that a little bit.
Graduating sixth grade, we went on a field trip to Pittsburgh, to the Carnegie-Melon Institute. We got to see a "modern" computer. We walked into a large public room, which had windows along one wall, through which we could see a working computer. Punch cards being prepared, people feeding punch cards to the machine, der blinkenlights as the computer digested the data fed to it. And we were told that this computer was one of the two most modern and powerful computers in the state of Pennsylvania.
None of us had any reason to suspect that we might ever own our own computers. Scientific calculators were something new and awesome, and Texas Instruments seemed like something far off and exotic.
Yet, here I am today, a member of SN, where I can engage in semi-intelligent conversations about computers.
I'll stick with my theory that people have chosen to be lazy, and allow Microsoft to brainwash and coerce them. "Computers are hard, you can't learn Unix, you can't learn how computers work, so just sit back, relax, and TRUST US!" People who trust car salesmen and horse traders pay a price for their misplaced trust.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Saturday March 30 2019, @02:53AM (5 children)
OTOH, it's quite possible that one of your classmates is currently looking into someone's abdomen removing an appendix before it ruptures. Are you qualified to do that or were you just too lazy to learn a dead-ass simple surgical procedure?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 30 2019, @12:08PM
Probably parents were too poor to afford medical school.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday March 30 2019, @01:20PM (3 children)
LOL - some of my classmates were more successful than others - but none of them became surgeons. Almost all of my male classmates became competent to keep an automobile running pretty smoothly. If one can avoid the Microsoft nonsense, and all the brainwashing about licensing of software, and avoid the educational system brainwashing - keeping a computer running is hardly any more difficult than keeping a car running. Your comparison to surgery just doesn't cut it. Unless, of course, you're talking about rocket surgery.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Saturday March 30 2019, @05:41PM (2 children)
So if it's something YOU learned, everyone should have if they're not lazy or stupid. And if they didn't, they deserve to be ripped off. If it's NOT something you learned, it's perfectly understandable and I presume you'd like some regulatory body to keep you from getting ripped off?
If somebody did devote their time to learning surgery, are they excused from auto mechanics or computer maintenance?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday March 31 2019, @01:58AM (1 child)
I'd have to consider that on a case-by-case basis. Of course, most surgeons are driving new cars, or collector cars, and they have high dollar, reputable garages working on those cars. They don't drive into the shop on the grungy side of town, which serves as a chop shop part of the time.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Sunday March 31 2019, @03:11AM
And they're taking their computer to Office Depot or Geek Squad...
If they're doing their internship, they aren't driving expensive high end cars yet.
But the question remains, where is the market and it's miracle solution that doesn't involve the bad ol' government enforcing those pesky laws?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Saturday March 30 2019, @02:08AM (2 children)
This is the question I'm interested in. How bad does a big business have to screw customers to drive enough away to doom themselves? Why is the free market so unresponsive to such shenanigans? You don't have to be a domain expert to understand that Office Depot lied to and cheated customers. And, they have no monopoly, there still are several competitors even though they merged with their most direct rival, OfficeMax.
By rights, Office Depot should be facing a massive loss of business over this. Why would anyone trust their computers and other devices to them, after this revelation? I'd be wary of buying even basic office supplies such as printer paper. And, yeah, their ink and toner is massively overpriced. Is it that people think other companies are no better? I can sort of understand that, considering the history of the likes of Best Buy, CompUSA (R.I.P.), and even Fry's.
Maybe there will be a massive loss of trust and their customers will abandon them. Just need more time for word to get around. Lot of big box tech stores have failed.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Saturday March 30 2019, @03:06AM
Because for the same reason they don't know how to diagnose and fix their computer, they don't know that OfficeDepot lied to them in the first place. The people who would know don't take their computer to Office Depot in the first place.
Perhaps, if enough people even hear of it, this bit of news will make some people change their minds (that's a big IF, the local news here hasn't said a word about it). But even that wouldn't be the market acting since this is only news because government acted.
The sad part here is that many who DO decide to go elsewhere will probably end up with Geek Squad.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday March 30 2019, @01:39PM
This is the day of big corporate mergers, buyouts, and takeovers. People tend to trust the biggest corporations. It's tough to quit doing business with someone, when they are the only game in town. Back in the day, when there were six different competing businessmen in the same town, it was easy to take your business elsewhere. Today - not so much.
I really don't know HOW badly a corporation can screw it's customers before it is forced out of business. Microsoft is still around?