Archer Works

Archive for the ‘Hoaxes / Scams / Urban Legends’ Category

This is a review of AutoPartsWarehouse.com – This review is based on my personal experience with Auto Parts Warehouse nothing more and nothing less.

I own a 2006 Ford Focus and my alternator went bad. I took my car into the shop and it turns out, like other repairs, that my Focus has some of the highest cost parts that I have ever had to pay on a vehicle I own. The alternator held true to this statement as the alternator was going to cost me $350 installed. I was in shock when I heard the replacement cost and tried to buy the part myself and have my local mechanic fix it as he reccomended that I do this becuase his cost for the alternator was around $250+. The lowest price that I could find was just under $200 at the Auto Parts Warehouse (refereed to as APW going forward).

I was eager to get my car out of the shop so I did my best shopping around online but didn’t check reviews on the website (which I would normally do). Before I purchased the part from APW I got a hold of their online customer support via online chat (I was at work) and gave them my vehicle VIN# and they told me the part I needed. I ordered it and was happy for the most part. I was happy with the price but not with the shipping as I knew it was going to take 4-5 days as it shipped from CA and I live in NJ. So I waited patiently (car was up on a lift at the shop) and 7 days later I had the part in my hand. Again the shipping took longer then I was told but frankly after 1 week I didn’t care, I wanted my car FIXED!

I took the part to the shop before work, went to work and waited on a phone call to tell me the repair was done. I recieved a call and I was told that not only was my car still down but they had shipped me the wrong part – I was upset to say the least. After work I went to the shop and they showed me the part I had ordered and the alternator I was replacing and they infact weren’t the same part. Red faced I went straight home and called up APW.

I spoke to a sales person who took my information again and this guy said “That isn’t the right part what you need is part number xxxxx”. I was sitting at my computer and pulled up the part number he told me was correct and he gave me a part number to a starter. Still on the phone I was like I didn’t ask you for a starter I asked for an alternator **side note. at this time I should have told APW to forget it and give me a refund because they were clueless… Like a dummy I said I need an alternator not a starter and they gave me a different part number.

SO now I said, look you’ve shipped me the wrong part, we’ve confirmed that, I want to trade this part sitting next to me for the replacement and they stated that they couldn’t do that. I would need to RMA my old alternator and wait for them to approve it, ship me the packing slip (free shipping back) and then wait another week for them to ship me the correct part. Needless to say I couldn’t wait 2 weeks for them to make this right so I ordered the “correct” alternator for another $200 with express shipping (3 day) and had them start the RMA process.

At this time I had over $400 wrapped up in alternators and no workng part in my hand. So I waited and 3 days later I called up APW and asked where the hell my part was and what the status of the RMA was and they said it is being shipped tomorrow and the RMA was in process.

WTF!!! Almost 2 weeks into this deal, my car still on a lift at the shop and no parts in sight I demanded a refund on the 2nd part and told them not to ship it. I got a straight attitude back from APW and they refused this. I demanded a refund right now or I would take this to my bank for a charge back. After this they said “You can’t do that” and when I asked to talk the the supervisor they hung up on me. I WAS PISSED!!!!!!

5 minutes later I called my bank (USAA) and told them the deal, they apologized for my situation (which they had nothing to do with) and they put in a claim to master card for my second part charge back and gave me the money back in my account same day – USAA rocks!!

The next day I got the RMA via email and sent it in which was refunded about a week later. By this time (3 weeks after my car broke down) I had to purchase an alternator at a local store (autozone for $300) and had the car fixed.

At this point I had a repaired Focus and never recieved the 2nd part from APW, but the charge back from USAA made it right. In the weeks following I would get the story that APW said they shipped the 2nd part but I never recieved it and they were saying UPS screwed up – THEY WERE WRONG.

If I can press anything on to you, it is NOT to EVER deal with APW – EVER! I understand that if they ship you the right part in a timely mannor you may disagree with me, but wait until they screw up and you could end up just like me.

Well over a month later AWP said they shipped the 2nd part, UPS denied that claim, Master Card went in my favor for the refund and I will never, ever go back to APW for ANYTHING – EVER!

Steer clear – go somewhere else!

*Update – I’ve ordered a part for my ford focus from AutoAnything.com and received excellent service and will use them again – a review will be done shortly on their service.

I received the following email recently about snopes, but before I paste the email I personally look to snopes for these chain letters, political emails, virus emails and/or any scare tactic type of email that you see floating around the web – which by the most part get sent to me by friends and family who consistently lean one way or another either politically or find it amusing to send out the email that will make them richer when they forward an email to 10 people etc…

Here is the email as I received it and I will conclude with my opinion of this whole thing:

For the past few years www.snopes.com has positioned itself, or others have labeled it as the ‘tell-all, final word’ on any comment, claim and e-mail.But for several years people tried to find out who exactly was behind snopes.com. Only recently did Wikipedia get to the bottom of it — kinda makes you wonder what they were hiding. Well, finally we know. It is run by a husband and wife team — that’s right, no big office of investigator sand researchers, no team of lawyers.

It’s just a mom-and-pop operation that began as a hobby. David and Barbara Mikkelson in the San Fernando Valley of California started the website about 13 years ago — and they have no formal background or experience in investigative research. After a few years it gained popularity believing it to be unbiased and neutral, but over the past couple of years people started asking questions who was behind it and did they have a selfish motivation? The reason for the questions — or skepticisms — is a result of snopes.com claiming to have the bottom line facts to certain questions or issues, when in fact, they have been proven wrong. Also, there were criticisms the Mikkelsons were not really investigating and getting to the ‘true’ bottom of various issues.

When I saw that Snopes had falsely claimed that Obama’s Birth Certificate had been properly validated, I realized something was wrong with either their research and/or their credibility. It seems something is seriously wrong with both. Then a few months ago, when my State Farm agent Bud Gregg in Mandeville hoisted a political sign referencing Barack Obama and made a big splash across the internet, supposedly the Mikkelson’s claim to have researched this issue before posting their findings on snopes.com. In their statement they claimed the corporate office of State Farm pressured Gregg into taking down the sign, when in fact nothing of the sort ever took place.

I personally contacted David Mikkelson (and he replied back to me) thinking he would want to get to the bottom of this, and I gave him Bud Gregg’s contact phone numbers. Bud was going to give him phone numbers to the big exec’s at State Farm in Illinois who would have been willing to speak with him about it. He never called Bud. In fact, I learned from Bud Gregg no one from snopes.com ever contacted anyone with State Farm. Yet snopes.com issued a statement as the ‘final factual word’ on the issue as if they did all their homework and got to the bottom of things. Not!

Then it has been learned the Mikkelson’s are very Democrat and extremely liberal. As we all now know from this presidential election, liberals have a purpose agenda to discredit anything that appears to be  onservative. There has been much criticism lately over the internet with people pointing out the Mikkelson’s liberalism revealing itself in their website findings. Gee, what a shock! They were also big supporters of both Clintons and used Snopes to “debunk” any criticism of the Clintons without checking the validity of the item.

So, I say this now to everyone who goes to snopes.com to get what they think to be the bottom line facts: Proceed with caution. Take what it says at face value and nothing more, and understand their liberal agenda. Use it only to lead you to their references where you can link to and read the sources for yourself. Plus, you can always google a subject and do the research yourself. It now seems apparent that’s all the Mikkelson’s do. After all, I can personally vouch from my own experience for their ‘not’ fully looking into things.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snopes.com

Looking at this email at first glance it is a hit on snopes being a valid source for information, run by a mom and pop and used only to spread it’s liberal word to the rest of the world… I wouldn’t disagree with this 100% so lets really break this down – snopes style ;o)

 ”For the past few years www.snopes.com has positioned itself, or others have labeled it as the ‘tell-all, final word’ on any comment, claim and e-mail. But for several years people tried to find out who exactly was behind snopes.com. Only recently did Wikipedia get to the bottom of it — kinda makes you wonder what they were hiding. Well, finally we know. It is run by a husband and wife team — that’s right, no big office of investigator sand researchers, no team of lawyers:

If you visit the FAQ page of Snopes you will find that it actually states:

Q: How do I know the information you’ve presented is accurate?

A: We don’t expect anyone to accept us as the ultimate authority on any topic. Unlike the plethora of anonymous individuals who create and send the unsigned, unsourced e-mail messages that are forwarded all over the Internet, we show our work. The research materials we’ve used in the preparation of any particular page are listed in the bibliography displayed at the bottom of that page so that readers who wish to verify the validity of our information may check those sources for themselves.

So we know from their own FAQ section that they are showing sources to their claims and you can see this in most if not all of their posts if you want to do your own research on the facts they present.

Next the first paragraph says that Wiki finally got to the bottom of this. If you know anything about Wiki.org this is a silly statement – why? Wiki.org is in-fact a community website, meaning that you, me or anyone else and their mom can register with Wiki and write/add/delete any part of their website. SOOO what that means if you are knocking on snopes becuase it is run by two people, then don’t say that Wiki is any better because the fact the matter is Wiki is written by anyone and everyone. Please understand that Wiki has people who moderate, validate and try to ensure that what has been posted is well referenced and if it isn’t then they make a change on the website – again you can do this too.

Finally on the first paragraph it says Wiki uncovered that this is run by two people – if you care to look at the FAQ page of snopes they make this same statement and don’t hide it – so did Wiki uncover anything or just post the facts already stated on the snopes website. http://www.snopes.com/info/faq.asp

 It’s just a mom-and-pop operation that began as a hobby. David and Barbara Mikkelson in the San Fernando Valley of California started the website about 13 years ago — and they have no formal background or experience in investigative research. After a few years it gained popularity believing it to be unbiased and neutral, but over the past couple of years people started asking questions who was behind it and did they have a selfish motivation? The reason for the questions — or skepticisms — is a result of snopes.com claiming to have the bottom line facts to certain questions or issues, when in fact, they have been proven wrong. Also, there were criticisms the Mikkelsons were not really investigating and getting to the ‘true’ bottom of various issues.

This 2nd paragraph is also much of the same – you can find this out on the snopes FAQ page so I don’t need to say anything on that. What is key here is they are trying to dis-prove snopes as valid when again they do post their references to what they are proving or disproving on their website – could the snopes posts be  wrong? Absolutely, but again the Internet has so much information and if you want to research something your going to get a TON of information and picking through it to find the truth is very tuff – why? Because everyone has an opinion or a direction they lean and the media is no different. This fact alone is why emails get forwarded without research and why wiki and snopes are popular becuase for the most part some sort references are given which is where they pull their facts from to draw a conclusion.

 When I saw that Snopes had falsely claimed that Obama’s Birth Certificate had been properly validated, I realized something was wrong with either their research and/or their credibility. It seems something is seriously wrong with both. Then a few months ago, when my State Farm agent Bud Gregg in Mandeville hoisted a political sign referencing Barack Obama and made a big splash across the internet, supposedly the Mikkelson’s claim to have researched this issue before posting their findings on snopes.com. In their statement they claimed the corporate office of State Farm pressured Gregg into taking down the sign, when in fact nothing of the sort ever took place.

The 3rd paragraph is getting more specific becuase it references “When I saw that…” okay who is the “I” in this statement, this email neither contained any source information of who wrote it (most emails like this do not) and probably never will… so if I’m lead to belive that the “I” was the person who sent me this email then I’m hitting delete becuase I know the kind of emails that they send and don’t believe that they did some great undercover research to find out all the facts – but I (Jason Archer, the owner of this blog) will move on.

As for the rest of this paragraph I’ll point you to snopes and why they said the birth certificate was valid… again look at the sources – http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/birthcertificate.asp  and http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/citizen.asp

If you find their results as false then that is your choice – but to me this is something that clues me in that this email is being sent out by those that are against Obama and want to think that he has made it past all checks and balances that the US has and somehow became president on false documents and rights. If this is the case then I can think of no one else better to run a country if he is infact this slick and powerful he could have taken over China using the same techniques and they could be invading the US right now and literally running over each and every defense we have with just pure numbers using table spoons as their only weapon… come on people!

I personally contacted David Mikkelson (and he replied back to me) thinking he would want to get to the bottom of this, and I gave him Bud Gregg’s contact phone numbers. Bud was going to give him phone numbers to the big exec’s at State Farm in Illinois who would have been willing to speak with him about it. He never called Bud. In fact, I learned from Bud Gregg no one from snopes.com ever contacted anyone with State Farm. Yet snopes.com issued a statement as the ‘final factual word’ on the issue as if they did all their homework and got to the bottom of things. Not!

The 4th paragraph is much of the same becuase we still don’t know who “I” is but we have some names and a quick check of Bud Gregg on snopes leads us to the following link – http://www.snopes.com/photos/politics/chicken.asp and on it’s page it does agree that they never contacted Bud to get the “Truth” so what it’s saying is that Bud Gregg knows the real truth and we know this because he puts statements above his state farm sign saying things like “A Taxpayer voting for Barack Obama is like a chicken voting for Colonel Sanders” – to me this sounds like a very level headed, fact based individual who is NOT putting his personal opinions into his statements (what is it this email says at the end of this paragraph)… Not!

Now trying to research Mr. Gregg; if you google it you will find this email and his sign but what I found most interesting was searching for him on the state-farm website I couldn’t find him… http://online2.statefarm.com/b2c/sf/AgentLocator – maybe he isn’t in Texas anymore or maybe he is so damn good he isn’t on the agent locator because he was fired?? Haha either way I don’t care but I can’t find info on statefarms website which leads me to draw a self-serving conclusion that even if David Mikkelson did contact State Farm they likely wouldn’t support his claim to fame or he would be still working for them… or maybe he got hired by Geico – I dunno… moving on.

Then it has been learned the Mikkelson’s are very Democrat and extremely liberal. As we all now know from this presidential election, liberals have a purpose agenda to discredit anything that appears to be  conservative. There has been much criticism lately over the internet with people pointing out the Mikkelson’s liberalism revealing itself in their website findings. Gee, what a shock! They were also big supporters of both Clintons and used Snopes to “debunk” any criticism of the Clintons without checking the validity of the item.

The 5th paragraph points to the Mikkelson’s personal agenda to take over the world with Snopes. Yet again it references  that all the Clinton posts on snopes show no references to validate the claims – I don’t have the time or inclination to pull all of these up but with a simple search on snopes you can find this out for yourself.

 So, I say this now to everyone who goes to www.snopes.com to get what they think to be the bottom line facts: Proceed with caution. Take what it says at face value and nothing more, and understand their liberal agenda. Use it only to lead you to their references where you can link to and read the sources for yourself. Plus, you can always google a subject and do the research yourself. It now seems apparent that’s all the Mikkelson’s do. After all, I can personally vouch from my own experience for their ‘not’ fully looking into things.

The 6th paragraph is probably the only thing closes to good advice this whole email has – but falls short in of itself.  First it shows that the person who wrote this – the mysterious “I” – has always been the type to take everything on the Internet as face value, up until now where they realize that they should “proceed with caution” and now recommend that others do the same. Well how about that”I” – you can teach old dogs new tricks. Additionally “I” recommends that you search for facts yourself – NOW STOP THAT… what kind of an idea is that? If you were to do that I wouldn’t get half the crap I receive via email because people would fact check themselves? WOW glad “I” FINALLY figured this one out.

The paragraph concludes with the famous “I” having personally found Snopes doesn’t look into things fully… if you define fully as knowing all the facts before you open your mouth, send out an email or blog about something then even I wouldn’t have this blog posts because knowing all the facts is IMPOSSIBLE.

To conclude on this whole LONG post. I read this email and conclude the same thing I conclude every time I see things like this. First – do your research, yourself. Don’t depend on Snoopes, Wiki, My blog, your BFF’s email or anyone else as the only truth. Draw your own conclusion but don’t do what you despise and send it out as the FULL truth  to all of your friends or you might as well say an incantation before hitting send and add “Send this to 10 of your friends and you will get a phone call from your dead cousin telling you the meaning of life and where to find the lost city of Atlantis”.

Hope you enjoyed because if you didn’t and you read this entire thing those are 15 minutes of your life you will never get back.

Jason

I had a clickbank subscription that I didn’t realize I set-up… after two months I got fed up with paying it but couldn’t figure out how to cancel, finally I found out how – and it is EASY!!

Once you get an email that you have been charged for a subscription payment for a clickbank subscription, simply forward the email to-

… Post moved to “http://howtocanx.com/how-to-cancel/clickbank-subscriptions/” see details there.

In the past I have written about EBay scams and have saved hundreds of people a ton of money on how to identify potential scams. The general rule of thumb here is to watch out for what I call “Red Flags” that have in the past caught even the best scam artists.

Here is a brief overview of those “Red Flags” that should throw up a STOP sign or at-least APPROACH WITH CAUTION for you:

If the person states that they are in Africa or on another continent – Don’t take this wrong but many times when dealing with someone on a large transaction the inability to meet face to face or have a third party that can represent both parties where the laws are the same is often necessary and critical to you not being scammed.

If the end result is stating that after you have sent in your money then you will get what it is you are buying, renting ect. This is often the case when we buy online but hopefully you are buying from a knownl location that you can meet with or follow the same laws that you do.

A transaction that requires you to send money via wire transfer aka western union. Western Union states that you should only send money to people that you know – family etc or those that can personally trust.

Email clues:

- If the person is using a free account with the name of joe-bob@email.com but during your communications you find that the name they use is Jimmy Carter. This just doesn’t makes much sense as most people don’t set up accounts like this because an email is an identifiable item and most people realize this.

- If the person is stating that they represent a company but they use a free Email account – this is NOT the standard.

- Many spelling, grammatical errors in the e-mails – sounds like someone who is really trying to communicate with you but just cannot. Don’t get me wrong I have friends who are terrible when it comes to Emails but if I didn’t know them I obviously wouldn’t do business with them without a face to face either.

Website clues:

- After learning the website of their business, do a search via Google. Try and locate their business website. If your having trouble ask them what their business website is and if it is a large company you should be able to find a phone number and give them a call – see if that person works there.

- If they state they work for a company but they don’t have a web presence at all. This is especially true for medium to large sized companies however in todays’ environment even the smallest of businesses have a web presence – shoot even 16 year olds have myspace pages.

Although their are many other “Red Flags” out there the biggest one is

IF IT SOUNDS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE – IT PROBABLY IS!

This is the basic ground work and as I find some real world examples I will do my best to post them in this Category.

If this helped you feel free to comment and add your two cents or other RED FLAGS that you know of!

Jason