crimedog asked:


I got hurt really bad got a staff infection. I went to the mortgage company 10 mo. Prior asking to refinance but my mortgage company said i was 140,000 upside down and they would not tough my loan. All i needed them to do was lock the rate so i would not lose the home. but all attempts they kept saying maybe up until i lost my home and 20 years of my life i worked for. Now these banks are getting all bailed out but nobody seems to be looking at the full picture. that banks could have prevented all this by just lowering th intrest rates when honest people like me went the the bank before i had a problem not paying. I could make my payment but when it went to 11 % i could not .I told the baks 10 mo. prior but because i was 140,000 upside down they said NO. that was my bank and they should have took action and now they are selling the home for 221,000 and i paid 500,000 and put 60,000 upgrades. and lost it all because their was no equity. so they would not finance. But now the banks are alll getting bail out money and blaming the consumer but alll reality it is there fault becauce the market turned and they should have started locking people in on their loans to prevent all of this. And yes they did encourage their brokers to sell adjustables to people to get more money from their consumers. They should alll be in jail just for encouraging this type of behavior. Is someone willing to try to help sue these people ?

Raymond

brandley_1999 asked:


WASHINGTON – Blacks have been charged higher auto loan rates than other auto buyers, federal research says. But the gap in loan rates could narrow, and possibly disappear, as the result of recently concluded lawsuits.

ADVERTISEMENT

Blacks paid a typical auto loan rate of 7 percent for new cars, compared with a rate of 5 percent for whites in 2004, according to a consumer organization’s analysis of the Federal Reserve Survey of Consumer Finances. That was the most recent survey available.

And blacks were more likely than auto buyers in general to have auto loan rates higher than 15 percent. For used car loans, 27 percent of blacks who buy cars were charged interest rates of 15 percent or more. Blacks were three times as likely as whites — 27 percent to 9 percent — to have auto loan rates at least that high, according to the report released Monday.

Hispanics were paying a typical rate of 5.5 percent for new car loans, while 19 percent of Hispanics had loans for used cars over 15 percent, the analysis found.

Lenders’ suggested quote rates are based largely on the buyer’s credit history, but auto dealers often raise the rate higher than that risk-related rate without discussing the rate with the customer, consumer advocates said. And they question the causes of those rate differences.

“It’s hard to believe that any differences in creditworthiness explain all of these rate gaps,” said Stephen Brobeck, executive director of the Consumer Federation of America. “They size you up, the car salesmen and finance and interest guys. They must think African-Americans are more vulnerable to a markup.”

But a series of legal actions against auto finance firms seeking fair treatment for minorities could help solve that problem.

“We had 11 lawsuits, the last of the cases settled last month,” said Stuart Rossman of the National Consumer Law Center. “We reached a settlement with each of the finance firms. Our cases involved discrimination. We believe the terms of the settlements will eliminate discrimination.”

The first of the lawsuits was filed in 1998 in Nashville, Tenn., against General Motors Acceptance Corporation and was settled in 2004. The last settlement became final in April.

The effects of those legal actions may not be known for some time, however.

The National Auto Dealers Association questioned what accounts for the rate differences, but encouraged auto buyers to do their homework before going to buy a car.

“The question that still is unanswered is why,” said David Hyatt, a spokesman for the dealer’s association. “People should do their homework and shop around. It speeds up the transaction, makes for a smoother transaction and is more likely to result in a satisfied buyer.”

Hyatt said an organization supported by the auto dealers, Americans Well Informed on Automobile Retailing Economics (AWARE), offers tips to potential car buyers.

Chris Stinebert, president and chief executive of the American Financial Services Association, said his group is interested in educating consumers.

“AFSA and its members believe there is no place for discrimination in the vehicle financing system,” he said.

The lawsuit settlements against auto finance companies call for caps on dealer markups, opportunities for blacks and Hispanics to get loans with no markups within the next few years, more information about interest rate terms and consumer education for minorities.

“The lower markup caps have leveled the playing field,” Rossman said.

Consumer advocates say prospective auto buyers should call their bank or credit union for a rate quote to expect on an auto loan. That could protect them from unfair markups.

Other ways to hold down costs.

_Make all loan payments on time.

_Buy a used car, or a less expensive new car.

_Take out a loan over a shorter time.

The survey of 4,519, including 605 blacks, was analyzed by Catherine Montalto, a consumer specialist at Ohio State University for the Consumer Federation of America. The survey was conducted between May and December of 2004.

Christina

ALREYES asked:


If you have been receiving repetitive, demanding, intimidating, threatening, insulting collection calls or if you have received a message from a Wells Fargo Auto Finance collectors/account managers who failed to identify their name and or company they were calling from please report this abusive illegal behavior to:

Federal Trade Commission
Consumer Response Center
600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20580

You can write a complaint and send it via us mail or you can also complain on the website:

http://www.ftc.gov/ftc/contact.shtm

Please report all abusive illegal behavior to the FTC in efforts to establish a trend and hold this company accountable.

Kimberly

holacarinados asked:


OK, what would you do?

I ordered a monitor from one of the very large electronics firms. It arrived, and sat around my place for a month unopened. I finally opened it, and to my surprise I found the invoice for the monitor, but the enclosed item was a new laptop worth four times as much. I checked my CC company and the merchant. The charge is for the lower priced monitor; no record of the laptop anywhere. Would you return the item as a sign of good faith and indicate the error, or keep the higher priced item, and say ‘serves them right. Now I have to go order another monitor.’ Besides no one will ever find out. Perhaps another consumer ended up with the reverse situation. But I’m figuring they already reported it and got THEIR money back.

Footnote: Would your finances (i.e., you make $25,000 a year versus $150,000 a year) make a difference in your decision?

Glenda

Foxtrot_01 asked:


My friend received a dog from her boyfriend last year as a gift, they broke up and now the bf is asking her to chip in the payments for the dog. He told her that if she doesn’t pay the dog shop will take the dog back? Is this possible? My friend received the dog as a gift, the dog is under her exboyfriends name but she has the “official certificate of veterinary inspection for sale of dog or cat” from the dept of agriculture and consumer services of the state of Florida. She also has paid for the vaccines since the dog was given to her as a gift last year. Is there such thing as a proof of ownership on a dog? what if the dog is a gift? how can you prove that it was a gift? she called the pet store and they told her that they have financing thru HSBC(up to 48 months). Her boyfriend did the credit application and his name is on the dog’s microchip. What is necessary to change the name on the dogs microchip? What are the legal ramifications of this? Should she pay if the dog was a gift?

Herbert

LOA asked:


Please read and let me know how you would analyze this article:The Water Crisis: Analysis and Proposals

By Celine Tan

Water and sanitation is the first of five priority action areas under the
WEHAB plan for the post-WSSD implementation of sustainable development.
The challenge of providing safe and clean water and sanitary conditions for
an increasing world population, in the face of rising inequities, is
phenomenal.

Forty percent of the world’s population, in 80 countries, currently suffer
from serious water shortages. A billion people worldwide lack access to
safe drinking water and 2.4 billion people lack access to adequate
sanitation (Global Economic Outlook 2002).

Yet, the biggest threat to universal access to clean water and adequate
sanitation is not mother nature but corporate globalisation. Privatisation
of water is aggressively exported to the developing world under the rubric
of poverty reduction and debt relief strategies, free trade and economic
development. By turning a scarce resource into an economic commodity, the
world’s economic leaders and policy planners claim that existing water
resources can be managed and consumed efficiently in accordance with
competitive market principles. These claims are not only misguided, they
are deceitful. There are two myths being projected: first, that placing a
price on water will encourage conservation and wise water consumption.
Secondly, that market competition will lead to more consumer choice and
better services. In reality, the water sector is monopolistic when placed
in the hands of the market. It is thus alarming that the commodification of
water resources is now heralded as the answer to the world’s water woes.

Monopoly and subsidies for corporations

Water is a US$400 billion global business, controlled by a handful of
European transnational companies and consortiums, namely French
multinationals Vivendi and Suez Lyonnaise, SAUR and British water companies
Thames Water, Anglia Water and United Utilities. The global drive towards
privatisation of water services is thus pursued not by a collective of
democratically elected governments acting in the interest of the world’s
population, but by a cartel of corporations motivated by profit and market
conquest.

To make matters worse, these companies are subsidised by their governments
(and invariably their taxpayers) through support from domestic export
credit agencies, and by multilateral development banks, such as the World
Bank and the African Development Bank. They are also subsidised by
developing countries who raise credit from international financial
institutions to upgrade their water systems prior to private takeover. This
corporate subsidy comes at the expense of consumers, most of them in
developing countries, who are made to pay for what is a necessity of life.
For the poor this means no access to water.

Additional loans to facilitate the privatisation process are raised by
developing country governments from multilateral and bilateral sources.
Often, these loans are also used to finance the creation of an ‘enabling
environment’ for foreign water and wastewater investors. This includes the
drafting of local investor protection legislation to guard against
re-nationalisation of the water industry and to provide for hefty
compensation for any attempt to renege (for good reasons) against the
privatisation contracts.

In many cases, corporate access to a developing country’s water system is
paved by a loan or debt relief conditionality requiring the poor or
indebted country to privatise its water and sanitation services. For
example, the IMF insisted that Tanzania privatise its Dar es Salaam Water
and Sewerage Authority (DAWSA) as a condition of its debt relief package
under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative.

Fallacy of privatisation

Experience shows that the privatisation of water services cannot ensure
universal delivery of safe water and efficient sanitation. Privatisation
imposes additional financial obligations on governments. They may have to
bail out failed privatisation project, and also shoulder the costly legal
risks of rescinding a privatisation contract with a wealthy transnational,
even if the company’s performance is unsatisfactory. Argentina, Hungary and
Bolivia have found that the legal claims for compensation by private water
companies in Tucuman, Szeged and Cochabamba respectively, have made
terminating contracts prohibitively expensive.

The dominance of foreign water companies and the liberalised investment
climate – mostly facilitated by structural adjustment, and now under trade
agreements including those under the WTO Ð in developing countries will
also ensure that a large portion of profits from water privatisation will
not accrue to the countries themselves but are repatriated abroad instead.

The imposition of full-cost water pricing as a result of privatisation will
only deprive more and more people of access to clean and safe water by
forcing poor communities to seek alternative sources of water for
consumption, such as untreated well water and water from sewage-ridden
urban rivers.

Forced upon rich and poor, consumers and industrial producers, similar
rates for water use will also result in greater income disparity and deeper
social cleavages, leading to higher risks of civil unrest. In 2000, martial
law was declared in the Bolivian city of Cochabamba as a result of
city-wide riots precipitated by high water prices. A private consortium led
by International Water doubled the water prices to city residents. Water
bills went up by 35% and some, twice that. The World Bank supported
full-cost water pricing and prohibited any use of its structural adjustment
loans to subsidise water services for the poor.

Future fears and WSSD outcomes

There is no agreement on the text in the WSSD Draft Plan of Implementation
that commits governments to supporting the UN Millennium Development Goal
of halving, by 2015, the proportion of people unable to reach, or afford,
safe drinking water and access improved sanitation (paragraphs 7 and 7[alt]).

However, the most pressing concerns over universal coverage of water and
sanitation services are not expressed in these bracketed paragraphs.
Rather, they are reflected in the general lack of political will
demonstrated by developed countries to address the systemic issues leading
to a crisis of sustainable development in the south, and the alarming
emphasis placed on public-private partnership funding and implementation of
sustainable development programmes. The relinquishing of responsibility by
developed countries is marked by their reluctance to commit to specific
disbursements of ODA and by repeated references to voluntary partnerships
and initiatives as a means of financing WSSD programmatic outcomes.

In the absence of firm commitments by governments, Type II partnerships on
water and sanitation services will only increase private sector involvement
in this crucial area. The private sector is already identified as a key
implementer of the ‘Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) for All
Initiative’ involving 28 countries, six UN agencies, the World Bank, and
the Asian and African Development Banks.

Another major threat to universal access to water and sanitation is
liberalisation under the WTO’s rules. Although Member countries have the
right to liberalise at their own pace, and even choose not to open up a
sector under the WTO’s General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), there
is tremendous pressure especially on developing countries to liberalise.
Thus in the ongoing negotiations at the WTO, developed countries are
submitting extensive ÒrequestsÓ that seek access to every sector in the
developing world, including water services and sanitation.

If developing countries succumb, privatisation of water services initiated
under World Bank and IMF structural adjustment programmes could become
permanent under the binding rules of the WTO. Once a country is locked into
the GATS regime, the right of its government to regulate liberalized
service sectors will be diminished, paving the way for foreign
transnationals to enter the domestic market. Any attempt to reverse the
situation would be subject to WTO disciplines and penalties.

Any real effort to achieve the Millennium Development Goal must therefore
include commitments to review loan conditionalities that impose
privatisation and countries must not be pressured to offer water services
under GATS liberalisation. Essential services should be exempted from GATS.

Conclusion

Privatisation does not address the deeper economic and ecological issues of
water shortages. Questions of why there are water shortages in countries
not under water stress are not resolved by shifting responsibility of
service provision to private companies. Water management and water
distribution are also key factors in determining water supply and universal
coverage. Until and unless rich countries fulfil their commitment to
provide resources for developing countries to build solid, cost-effective
water delivery systems which support the needs of the world’s population
equitably and ecologically, the water woes of the world will not go away.

At the same time, all governments need to recognise and support the
diversity and replication of community water management systems and
practices. These have proven in many countries to be the most sustainable
approach to rural water management for rural populations. The WSSD process
and the last 10 years of the work of the CSD have called for good and best
practices in sustainable development. However, where water resources are
concerned the trend and emphasis are privatisation which has proven
destructive.

Firm commitments must be made at the WSSD to reverse the trend of corporate
takeover in the water and sanitation sector, rather than to accelerate the
process of privatisation and corporate monopoly. Undermining the sovereign
power of governments to regulate supply of water in their countries and
passing the bucket onto private transnationals to steward the world’s water
resources would probably be a most anti-development and anti-ecological step.

George