Markups, Podcasts, And Frustrations

I talked to a reader yesterday who is in the process of buying a motorhome and needed some advice. When he got the contract from the dealer to sign they had added on two different fees, one for $79.95 for a “starter/fill up” kit and a second charge for $399.95 for “pre-delivery service.” He wanted to know if I thought these were legitimate charges or just the dealer padding the bill.

I told him that I would walk away from the deal if they didn’t take those unanticipated fees off. I teach a seminar at RV rallies called Be A Smart RV Shopper in which I address all these little scams that RV and car dealers use to stick it to the customer. I don’t know what a starter/fill up is, but if they’re not going to fill it with fuel, they can forget it. As for the pre-delivery service, I would tell the dealer that no other business charges me an extra fee on top of the purchase price to get a product ready to deliver to the customer.

Another one they like to throw in there is the “Dealer Document Fee” which is basically paying them to do the paperwork. If I go to WalMart and buy something they don’t charge me to give me a receipt. Chris Yust, my insurance agent, doesn’t charge me for filling out my application and processing my policy application. So why should I pay a dealer extra for doing his job? These are all RV dealer scams, and you don’t have to pay them no matter how much they whine and snivel and tell you that you do. Thank them for their time and tell them you’ll make your purchase elsewhere and see how long they stick to their guns.

Hey, Miss Terry is famous! Well she’s always been famous. Now she’s just more famous. Yesterday Kathy Huggins featured Terry in the new Living The RV Dream podcast, talking about her interest in the fiber arts, like spinning and weaving, and how she blends her hobbies with the fulltime RV lifestyle. Check it out, the podcasts are free and Kathy and her hubby John share a lot of great information in them.

To the genuine glee of my buddy Greg White, who is gloating and saying “I told you so!” right now, I’ve decided I hate my iMac. While it is great for putting the paper together, for everyday use it sucks.

I paid huge dollars to switch to Macs from Windows based computers for both my wife and I and the damn thing has had problems from the onset. I even paid for the extended warranties on both iMacs. My DVD/CD drive died soon after I bought them and I took it back and they installed a new one. Before long that one failed. It has failed once more and the store in Orlando, Florida says it needs to go back to the store where we bought it in Indiana for replacement, since they were the one to do the previous repairs.

Now I keep getting a message that plugins are blocked and a lot of images won’t open. I get a message that I need to update software, but when I try to do that, it asks for my Administrator password and when I put it in I get a message saying that it is invalid. I have changed the password half a dozen times, received confirmation that the new password is valid, and when I try again I get the same password error. Apple Support said to put in my original installation DVD and reset if from there. Except of course, that the DVD drive doesn’t work! When we get to Arizona in a couple of weeks I’ll see if an Apple store there can do anything for me. At this point, I’m not exactly a fan of Apple’s customer service.

Thought for The Day – If olive oil is made from olives, what’s baby oil made from?

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