Twice last week, clerks left
security tags on clothes I bought. I didn't discover them until my son and wife needed to wear their clothes. We had a wedding to attend and didn't even look at the clothes until it was time for them to get dressed. Of course we were out of town. So, of course, we
turned to the Internet to find out how to remove the tags without ruining the clothes.
I don't understand why the tags didn't set off alarms when we walked out with them still attached. The only other time that I remember a clerk leaving a tag on clothing was last Thanksgiving. It may have something to do with overworked clerks.
Government Expense Accounts
My old friend Jeff Baillon at Fox 9 News in Minneapolis reported an interesting story about how some state employees turn in hundreds upon hundreds of dollars in meal expenses without a scrap of documentation. Watch the story here.
City/County Credit Cards
The Washington Post took a look at who is using taxpayer financed credit cards in Prince George's County, Md., and what the officials are buying. I love this quote:
As county executive, [Jack B.] Johnson has sometimes traveled at hefty expense to taxpayers.
In December 2005, he flew business class to Senegal, at a cost of $6,003, for a ribbon-cutting ceremony for homes built by a Prince George's developer.
"I always fly business class or first class," Johnson said. "I think the people of Prince George's County expect me to. I don't think they expect me to be riding in a seat with four across and I'm in the middle."
Clubs Scan Licenses
I do not know if this is happening elsewhere, but The Star-Ledger in Newark, N.J., says nightclubs are scanning driver's licenses before allowing people to enter. The patrons are told the scan is to check birth dates, but the clubs use the data for marketing. The paper tells of it happening at KatManDu, a popular Trenton, N.J., nightclub:
They swipe everyone's driver's license through a small, yellow electronic box that reads a bar code and instantly displays the customer's age.
Club managers love the gadget, and it's rapidly becoming standard issue at the bigger clubs in Manhattan, New Jersey and elsewhere.
But the box does more than just check birth dates. It also retains the customer's name, address, license number -- even height, weight and eye color. All that information then can easily be downloaded into a computer system.
Most patrons have no idea their information is being electronically stored -- nor are they asked if they mind.
"Why do they need it?" asked Tara Fort, a 22-year-old customer from Hamilton Township, who became agitated when told the scanning device was storing personal information.
"They probably want to send you a bunch of crap you don't want. ... At least tell me you're taking my information."
While federal law prohibits sharing or selling data from driver's licenses, there is nothing on the books in New Jersey preventing bars from collecting and storing it. A handful of states -- including New Hampshire, Texas and Nebraska -- have outlawed the practice, but a spokesman for the New Jersey Attorney General's Office said the issue has never come up.
Joseph Surdo, a manager at KatManDu, said his club has built a database of more than 15,000 names in a year, but he stressed the information is used only for in-house promotional purposes.
"I don't sell the list," said Surdo, the club's director of marketing and entertainment, adding that only two other employees had access to the information.
Such assurances don't mollify some privacy advocates, who see the potential for identify theft or the illicit sales of such lists.
"If the information is gathered, someone somewhere will use it for reasons it wasn't intended," said Melissa Ngo, staff counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a nonprofit group in Washington, D.C. "This is about taking your information without your consent. It can be misused and abused."
That is exactly why New Hampshire passed a law preventing the scanning of driver's licenses, Rep. Neal Kurk said.
"That bill was part of a decade-long effort to ensure the driver's licenses are used only for the purpose for which they were intended, which is to operate a motor vehicle," said Kurk, a Republican and 20-year member of the state's House of Representatives. "Privacy is very fragile and very easily lost."
The paper followed up with the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission's reaction two days later.
Green Cemeteries
A terrific reporter, Vince Patton at KGW-TV in Portland, Ore., sent me a story on cemeteries going "green." Vince covers the environment beat. Green burials include coffins like the "Ecopod," which is made from recycled paper and leaves.
I gave some background on green burials in July.
Infomercial Complaints
This might be a nice holiday-season idea.
Here is a Web site that claims to post complaints about infomercials. There is no way to verify the complaints since they are all anonymous, but it might give you ideas on how to test some of these products you see advertised on TV. I am struck by how uncommonly well-written so many of these complaints seem to be. I do wish there was a place where the advertisers themselves could respond to these complaints rather than just getting sniped by nameless complainants.
When people get ripped off, where should they complain? The Better Business Bureau? The attorney general?
Here is an infomercial-monitoring site that includes stronger documentation. This site only monitors health-related infomercials. Many of the same complaints show up on this one, too. This site includes links to several Food and Drug Administration actions on companies.
We are always looking for your great ideas. Send Al a few sentences and hot links.
Editor's Note: Al's Morning Meeting is a compendium of ideas, edited story excerpts and other materials from a variety of Web sites, as well as original concepts and analysis. When the information comes directly from another source, it will be attributed and a link will be provided whenever possible. The column is fact-checked, but depends upon the accuracy and integrity of the original sources cited. Errors and inaccuracies found will be corrected.
It does not seem to me that using a drill...
