'A blog in support of stupid people's rights (probably the most important...)' blog

callum9999

JimmyTheWig wrote: »

I believe, Martin, that it's selfishness.

RyanAir, for example, can afford to offer flights for £1 because they know that most people who are drawn in by this offer will pay many times this in charges. Some of those able to avoid the extra charges are glad that others pay the charges because this is the very reason they can get their £1 flights.
Likewise, credit card companies only offer 0% deals to make money out of people. Those of us who are able to benefit from this are offset by others who cannot.

If everyone was savvy, the currently savvy would lose their edge. I would be happy for this to happen in the name of the greater good. But others wouldn't.

It's not selfishness. It's not as if I've found a secret loophole that let me get a pre-paid mastercard and I have magical bags that let me take everything I need as hand luggage.

I get those cheap deals through research. Those getting "drawn in" and paying extra have only themselves to blame. I am not benefiting from the stupidity of others, I am benefiting from the laziness of others. HUGE difference, and they have only themselves to blame. (On the whole - of course some people are too stupid to book a flight but they are an extreme minority).

callum9999

aliasojo wrote: »

My adult son has learning difficulties. His Father took him away for a few days and whilst Dad was in a queue to pay for things at a station kiosk, son was approached by someone who got him to sign up for an MBNA credit card.

He was told to 'just sign here, get the card and stick it in a drawer and don't use it if you don't want to'.

Son is as gullible as they come and his difficulties are obvious as soon as he opens his mouth so the chap knew fine what kind of person he was touting this card to. Son had no understanding of any of this but the chap told him to sign, so he signed.

An account was opened and a card was issued. Needless to say I complained to MBNA but it's shocking how easily this happened.

Many people with learning disabilities will have support so will hopefully be 'minded' so they don't fall foul to 'opting out', but there are also many who will be affected by it.

Yes, I do think too many people simply dont take enough care (and I dont feel much sympathy for that group tbh) but there are sections of society who do find things difficult and I think that should be acknowledged.

I'd like to believe that an ethical approach is always taken when selling to us, but the reality is, it's not. For that reason, I think Martin has a point with his comments.

Btw Martin, I'm not usually the type to get too hung up on the terminology of things but I question the wisdom of using the term 'stupid' in your article. And yes, I did note the inverted commas. :undecided

Of course, no-one in their right mind would blame your son in these circumstances. However, the vast majority do so through laziness - not because they have learning difficulties or because they are "stupid". I admit, I generally won't read T&Cs, but that is a risk I am taking based on my knowledge of the product - which so far hasn't caused a single issue. If I didn't understand the product I would read the T&Cs.

tagq2

callum9999 wrote: »

I am not benefiting from the stupidity of others, I am benefiting from the laziness of others.

One of the indicators of intelligence is the speed with which someone can process information. So what requires a little bit of effort for one person to take in requires a lot of effort for another, and still this latter may misunderstand something or forget a detail. The sort of optimisation activity you perform routinely might others take more time to complete than they have available.

The brightest person I knew while growing up spent most of his life reading leisure magazines, listening to music and sleeping. He really didn't have to work hard to do what most people found relatively challenging.

Effort is certainly a factor but the major factor in differing performance is ability. The standard metrics of intelligence do not change significantly with hard work. And there's no "clever" or "stupid" dichotomy - while there are some lines which you can cross to be considered disabled, each person is just a point on various spectra. Life's just not that fair.

Mobeer

Just with the travel insurance thing, if I don't take out the insurance and subsequently needed it (having obtained no alternative), then I would be stupid. Someone who did not need travel insurance (as already covered) would be as equally stupid as me.

What I think Martin overlooks is that the best deals to be found absolutely rely on a mix of naivety and laziness being common. Ryanair is only cheap to fly on because of the people who pay card fees, bag charges and then buy food on board. The AA would never offer such good introductory deals if everyone shopped around every year. We need naive lazy people to make our lives better!

callum9999

tagq2 wrote: »

One of the indicators of intelligence is the speed with which someone can process information. So what requires a little bit of effort for one person to take in requires a lot of effort for another, and still this latter may misunderstand something or forget a detail. The sort of optimisation activity you perform routinely might others take more time to complete than they have available.

The brightest person I knew while growing up spent most of his life reading leisure magazines, listening to music and sleeping. He really didn't have to work hard to do what most people found relatively challenging.

Effort is certainly a factor but the major factor in differing performance is ability. The standard metrics of intelligence do not change significantly with hard work. And there's no "clever" or "stupid" dichotomy - while there are some lines which you can cross to be considered disabled, each person is just a point on various spectra. Life's just not that fair.

I do agree with your point, but when we are talking about something like credit card and baggage fees, there are very few people who are "programmed" in such a way to make looking into those so much effort its unfeasible for them to do so.

Yes, I guess it's still easier for some people to motivate themselves to do so, but it's a sufficiently simple task that I don't think you can blame genetics etc. as putting people off from doing it! In the majority of cases it is just laziness.

SnowMan

Just want to say what a great blog.

The un-thought through

‘if people are stupid enough to (insert issue) it’s their own fault’

arguments that appear on the forums all too often, really wind me up. I wonder how many people arguing that have really thought about which categories of people they are calling 'stupid'.


A further unintended consequence of that sort of viewpoint widely held is to hinder true competition in the various marketplaces in the UK (be it the savings market, the utilities market or other markets).

Effectively arguing that ‘if people are stupid enough to (insert issue) it’s their own fault’ just states that large chunks of the population deserve to be conned and leads to competition between companies on who is the best at deceiving the most people. That is not real competition.

Surely competition should be about which company is operating most efficiently and so able to offer an identical product at the cheapest price. That is why there has to be strong regulation to stop companies creating overcomplicated products and employing deliberately misleading marketing. It's not just about protecting vulnerable people (although that is of course really important). Once you have that regulation you are actually allowing allow companies to openly and fairly compete on price.

Allowing companies to try and decive consumers, requiring consumers to spend time spotting and avoid the deceptions is absolutely ludricous.

For simplicity of argument let's say that everyone in the world works 40 hours per week. Every company then finds efficiencies in their operations to enable them to produce the same things at the same cost but with people all working only 38 hours per week. That means 2 hours of extra leisure time for people to do the things they really enjoy doing. However if you then allow companies to overcomplicate and con consumers, and to avoid the cons people have to spend 2 hours per week; bang goes that extra leisure time. That is absoutely absurd.

So I like the suggestion in the blog that the test should be 'So, if I were to try and draw the line I’d perhaps say we must stop activities that entrap people into getting things they don’t want or aren’t aware of, by deliberate manipulation or confusion.'

wozearly

dtsazza wrote: »

And anyway, celebrities are very rarely famous for their acumen in choosing a cereal/bank/car/etc. Why would someone think "he's good at acting, so I bet he is better at choosing a breakfast cereal for my life, than I am"? It boggles the mind...

What's interesting is that if everybody realised that it was OK/sensible/socially acceptable to refuse T&Cs that you didn't understand, the problem would disappear very quickly. Companies wouldn't be able to release products with confusing T&Cs, else they'd lose market share to other companies that were more up-front.

But for some reason people let companies "get away" with complex terms and conditions by not exercising their right to choose, to the point where it's now commonplace - and judging by the blog post, even those who really don't understand are being swept along with it.

Using a celebrity endorser is primarily to associate the company's brand with the celebrity's personal brand - so a fragrance brand normally wants someone considered attractive and distinctive, and a financial brand will often want someone seen as an expert and trustworthy.

It a bit like putting "As seen on TV!" on the box. Why would someone looking at it care that its been advertised on TV? Because we've learned to recognise that television is the arena of big, usually fairly trustworthy brands (because its expensive). So having a product on TV gives it prestigious associations.

Someone coming at it from a rational angle like you can almost certainly see through this. But what about people who don't think about it so rationally? Does that lack of expertise mean they're should end up being considered fair game for confusion marketing and mis-selling?

Its occasions like this where I really feel for Martin's position. I studied marketing, I work in marketing, and though on a personal level I try to stick on the side of the angels, there are a lot of subtle techniques in marketing and sales that do make a proven difference to how likely someone is to make a purchase.

If we were all rational creatures, this would make no difference. But because it does, it soon becomes blindingly obvious that there's a lot of money to be had in taking advantage of human nature...and whilst companies buy into this knowledge, consumers aren't generally coached in how to see through it.


As for ridiculous T&Cs, I freely admit that I put up with them from the likes of Apple, Adobe (and others) and don't read them. At all. They're lengthy documents written from a legal perspective and not easy to read and understand. There is never a summary of key points or changes to the previous EULA - the document is to protect the company, not inform the consumer.

However, past experience tells me that they are rarely (if ever) are detrimental to my experience as a consumer. And I trust the likes of Apple and Adobe not to do daft things. I probably shouldn't, and on a rational level I'm aware that this is not necessarily a very good approach, but even if I was to find a T or C that I object to, I can't opt-out from it without not using the product.

In principle I could then look into various competitor products, comb through their T&Cs in the hope that they don't have the same problem (or a different one), and investigate whether the user experience, cost and other factors are also equal. Then finally make a rational judgement about which to install, or what the loss would be to me if I choose to install none of them.

By this point, I'd have spent a fair chunk of time on it, probably for little to no personal gain. So I don't - I go straight to the "Accept" button, carry on, and don't think about it. Unless and until I get burned at some future point, where my immediate reaction is going to be to get angry at the company for abusing the trust I placed in them based on past experience.

Knowing that "they're right and I'm wrong" will not, at this point, make me feel any better. :cool:

Dave_C_2

I read with interest the self-righteous comments along the lines of "I'm clever and I benefit from people less clever than me, it doesn't matter about everyone else".

Isn't this going against the whole idea of a civilised society. The comments should be "I'm clever and I will help people less clever than me and the whole of society will benefit"

Let's not forget why consumer protection laws have been enacted.

Dave

michaels

Martin

MSE carries referral links - there is an explination and an option to use a non-referral link however if someone chooses to use one of your links rather than topcashback or quidco then you allow this. How is this any different from these other 'sharp practices' you criticise. You are benefitting from people's ignorance/laziness unwillingness to seek out the best deal.

Where will you draw the line - if someone wants to buy an iphone on payg should the sales person do a full investigation of their usage and suggest that they can get a better deal on contract with a different company? The difference may be hundreds of pounds.

I guess my question is who is this person who decides whether I should be allowed to enter in to a transaction I wish to? It sort of smacks of totalitarianism.

metalgal

its not always "stupid" people who get stung. the problem is that companies everyday think of new ways to get more money out of you, be these added fees or charges or dodgy T&Cs, a bit of internet research can help but until people realise they are getting shafted in the interim hundreds are getting shafted, its bloody difficult to keep track of all the ways people can get money out of you. plus we all have weak moments and desperate situations, if you need money quickly and don't have spare cash (some self righteous people on the boards don't understand that there are people without thousands in the bank nor are in a position to start to get thousands in the bank) then you are more likely to get involved in something dodgy, i myself fully admit i got stung by a loan broker after a county court summons came through my door. the worst thing is that these scams/rip offs are aimed at the people who have little money, if you aren't in the luxury of having spare income as a buffer for your bills then you are the one getting hit by bank charges and trapped in the never ending cycle. if you don't have much money then you're quite likely to have a poor credit rating and have to resort to payday loans and believe the brokers who say they can get you a loan. a rich person would not be grearly affected by a few bank charges but they will never be hit by them, however those that will be hit by bank charges are in a position that the loss of that money has a devastating effect on their finances and will get trapped in the cycle of charges that is very difficult to get out of.