Consumer Protection


Coughing up $4 fees for ATM transactions. Iron-clad cell phone contracts you can’t get out of with a crowbar. Paying big bucks for insurance you don’t need on a rental car or forking over $20 a day for supposedly “free” wireless internet. Every day we use banks, cell phones, and credit cards. Every day we book hotels and airline tickets.

And every day we get ripped off. How?

Here are just a few examples of how big business can get you:

  • You didn’t fill up the rental car with gas? Gotcha! Gas costs $7 a gallon here.
  • Your bank balance fell to $999.99 for one day? Gotcha! That’ll be $12.
  • You miss one payment on that 18-month same-as-cash loan? Gotcha! That’ll be $512 extra.
  • You’re one day late on that electric bill? Gotcha! All your credit cards now have a 29.99% interest rate.

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In Gotcha Capitalism, MSNBC.com’s “Red Tape Chronicles” columnist Bob Sullivan exposes the ways we’re all cheated by big business, and teaches us how to get our money back–proven strategies that can help you save more than $1,000 a year.

Listen to Interview on NPR’s Fresh Air with Terry Gross

Debt Management

Learn more about managing your credit and finances

More people are beginning to take control of their finances and reducing their debt. The place to start for most is to improve their financial literacy, search for more information and understand how the credit system is designed to enslave them with perpetual debt they can never repay.