Road Runner Sports: really shady or just a coincidence and mildly shady? (Read 1353 times)

Yup...I don't trust banks.  I am starting to think that those folks who stuffed their mattresses with their cash during the Great Depression were onto something...  Banks seem to want us to believe that it's a privilege when they let us have OUR money.

Not saying I trust credit card companies either, but that's another story.

If a vendor is shady or just sloppy, and their data is leaked/stolen, I'd prefer that it be my CC# vs. my debit card #.

 

In terms of data security and the risk of having your card number stolen and used for fraudulent charges, there is basically no difference between using your debit card at physical point of sale or online.  If you fear using your debit card online then you should just not have a debit card at all.

The problem I've had twice is vendors using my debit card and mistakenly running the charge many times.  Once it was a local produce co-op to whom I was making a payment through their website.  They made a mistake that resulted in charges repeating many, many times  -- it resulted in me paying them something like $1500.  It was all cleared up fairly quickly, but since the problem happened on Saturday, it wasn't cleared up until Monday.  Meanwhile, our account was down all that money.  In my poorer days, that could have been devastating.  As it was, we could transfer money to be sure that automatic charges cleared while we cleaned up the mess.  

The other time was Boston Marathon registration -- I ran into the problem that many did in registering for 2011, where I would get most of the way through the transaction and it would hang.  What I didn't realize until I read it somewhere here is that each time it went through, a hold was placed on my debit card. (I think I had 17 holds in all).    Again, I called the bank and they fixed it right away, but without RA, I'd not have noticed it for a bit.  Probably not until something bounced, since I'm not as vigilant as Mike.  

Neither was fraud and both were easy to fix.  I've since used only my credit card for on-line payments nonetheless.  Not because I'm afraid of fraud, but for fear of errors.  The consequences of overcharging my credit card by thousands are a lot less serious than the consequences of pulling thousands out of my bank account.  

...

And hey, speaking of shady behavior...Does anybody else hate Active.com with a passion? Every time I register for a race I have to be careful not to buy a membership or some bit of garbage they're hawking. I have no idea how those jokers turned into THE place for race registrations. 

A more reasonable question would be: does anyone NOT hate active.com with a passion?

Sheer size and social marketing clout, I think. 

 

While I love RunningAhead and am glad that I ended up here, Active's purchase of Coolrunning, and then deploying ActiveSara and Co. to tell us how great active was after ruining everything made me less than happy. I plan to never register for a race through Active.

This is a great place, no doubt about it. I came over from MapMyRun, and I only regret not doing it sooner.

Not to get too far off on a tangent, but you should get acquainted with a credit union. We switched to one last year, and I'm absolutely floored at the service they provide -- and with NO maintenance fees, "service" charges, or other crap. Getting ready to refi my car loan there, too.

DH still has a CU account from the CU that was connected with his previous employer.  He really likes it.  We've been talking for a long time about ditching our regular bank accounts...I really wish we had done it on Bank Transfer Day.

I recently found RunningWarehouse.com.  In general, I think their prices are lower than RRS's, and their free shipping is UPS 2nd Day, not Fedex Ground (4-5 days).  I only order from RRS now when they run a special that I can't come close to on RW.

Not like I feel the need to stick up for RRS, but ... (a) they'll price-match on shoes; (b) they're the only place I know that'll let you run in the shoes for up to 60 days and still return them with no hassle (I've returned shoes to them twice); and (c) at least for me, they've actually compared my order against past purchases and asked me when I was ordering neutral shoes after a history of mostly motion-control and a couple stability models.  I liked that they were trying to make sure I wasn't accidentally screwing up my order.

I don't use them for everything, but they're a solid bet when I'm trying a new-to-me shoe.

(Need I say: I have no financial interest in RRS.)