Publix Corporation has just purchased 49 Albertsons stores in Florida ridding itself of the primary viable competition (at least in this area). For many including myself this eliminates any viable alternatives. Albertsons had much better quality and services and uniformly better prices.

In th not too distant past if you bought off your primary competition to create an exclusive market and eliminate competition it was a felony. Today a great many economic felonies are legalized or unenforced, but food hits close to home and world food prices are rising anyway. Further price gouging by monopolistic business practices will only make things worse

If Albertsons had moved out, or gone out of business (as say Winn Dixie or Food Lion did), that would be one thing, but Albertsons was much busier and a better all around store. Now the local Albertsons will be a Publix and what was for me a closer Publix (though I bypassed it to go to Albertsons) will be closed.

Do you know that if you have Washington mutual credit card counts interest in different way. You would have to read fine print to know it. Here's what they do. Let say you have taken $100 for balance transfer. You also make a purchases of say $50. In the middle of the month if you pay $150, it will first pay to purchases made, then at the end of month if anything extra is left then, it goes towards balance transfer. The balance transfer will be at much higher rate than purchases. Hence, if happen to make another $80 of purchases also, it will pay off $20 towards balance transfer and you will still have to pay finance charges for remaining balance. Hence, even $100 balance transfer or cash withdrawn, will go on for months drawing finance charges. I think that is fraud.

We moved into our property the 1st of December and immediately signed up online - or tried to. I had to call the customer service center. Despite not receiving a bill, I made 2 electronic payments in anticipation of a bill arriving soon.

We were flooded out of our home in mid-March. When I called to have the electric turned off for safety reasons they assured me it was not a problem. I also asked for a final bill at that time as the house was destroyed and we could not move back in.

After still not receiving a bill after 10 days I called again only to be told they had never received payment so would not be closing my account until it was current AND the electricity was still LIVE. We had been walking around in 2 feet of water trying to save a few valueables with LIVE ELECTRICITY after asking it be disconnected. I complained loudly about that one but did not even receive an apology.

I explained two payments had been made electonically via my bank and could provide printouts showing how much and when. I had to fax it twice before someone responded saying my proof was not good enough and that it had to be from the bank itself.

I was also told there were 2 accounts with my name on it and my payments had been made to the wrong account. How can they go to the wrong account when I paid the only account I was aware of?

3 WEEKS later and I am STILL trying to get Duke to move the payments to the correct account. They keep misplacing the faxes. I cannot get the same person to deal with my query when I call so I have to explain EVERY time I call the situation and get told by each representative that it was MY FAULT the payments went to the wrong account. Sure. Uh huh.

I just had a conference call today with a manager from my bank, someone from the electonic payments department from the bank as well as the company that process the payments for the bank and Duke. Duke is STILL refusing to acknowledge my payment even though the bank and processing company have verbally agreed it was made as well as provided faxes several times to the effect.

Duke has VERY poor customer service. Accuses its customers of creating the problem and refuses to assist in rectifying the situation.

I am NOT holding my breath even though the rep today promised it would be resolved.

BEWARE OF DUKE ENERGY.

First of all, this company does not clean their bathrooms everyday so the urine stench is disgusting. The base pay was the lowest I have scene! You can't pay that low and expect to have good talent; hence, the revolving door. Respect? There wasn't even an ounce of it. The management at RTTEMPS was so inconsiderate of their employees it was a shame. There was never a regard for a job well done. Can we say sweat factory? New employees were not permitted to take a single paid day off until after 6 months! For crying out loud, how can you expect a person not to take a day off for sickness, death, life problems, mental health, etc. What's the point of accruing personal time off if you can't use it? Even more, since no one ever met the company’s expectations, then one would perpetually be on probation; which meant after 6 months you may still not have the opportunity to take a paid day off - which was so common with this company. That's just tipping the iceberg. Let's talk about micromanagment. Expect management to call you on the hour every hour to only stress you out and tell you how much you failed at your efforts! How can one ever build confidence in their abilities when your efforts are always squashed? Let’s just say one can never leave this company on good terms. If you give 2-3 weeks notice you will be guaranteed not to be able to fulfill your notice, your pay will be cut along with your commission and accrued PTO. It’s always personal. And, don’t ever expect to receive a letter of recommendation. The irony is that RTTEMPS expects all of their recruiters to get 3 letters of recommendation on everyone they hire claiming that if they were a good employee it should be easy. But no, RTTEMPS can’t even deliver on their own principle! I was told that a letter of recommendation could be used in a fraudulent way! Can we say paranoia? Why wouldn’t you give acknowledgement for a job well done? Benefits were essentially non-existent. You were expected to either pay
$35 per week with a $2,000 deductible or pay $95 per week without a deductible! If you do the math – there is no coverage! Not only that, but your expected to work evenings and weekends and be on- call without pay. Is that even legal? Please give it some thought before accepting a job with RTTEMPS!

We usually have store credit cards like Best Buy, which we don't use frequently. But from Best Buy we never receive the statement on time and always receive late fee charges in next months statement. It had happened to me so may time.

I gave my laptop to get repair estimate. On receiving the estimate I asked them to return my laptop, because I wanted sometime for my credit card warranty processing and to think over it. They asked me to leave my laptop with them. At this time they never mentioned about any policy for the time period.
Later, I tried to called them but they never responded to my messages. Then one day I went to their shop, within 2 months of giving my laptop, to get it only to find that they have "supposedly" disposed my laptop. They showed a policy in fine prints that they will dispose computers that are not picked in 45 days.

I was so surprised and angry. But the person dealing with me was equally blunt.

I even contacted BBB, but no use.

Now you only decide, was it ethical business or was it a fraud.

This is a big lesson for all of us

I have noted in on more than one occassion, but i always have problems with best buy rebates. they should sort out their rebates department.