Allison Pohle

speaker

908 appearances 18 recordings 1 series first heard Apr 2021 last heard Dec 2024

Allison Pohle’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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WSJ Your Money Briefing · Junk Fees Are Easier to Spot… But Still Hard to Avoid · 18 Sep 2024 podcast

It could be...

$40 a night, it could be $70 a night.

You might see it at the end of a rental car transaction where there is a service fee added to the bill, but there's no specification about what that service fee is for.

Companies do say that there are benefits given with these fees.

So with a resort fee, for example, a hotel might say this includes access to the pool or the fitness room or a food and beverage credit.

And so we're giving you things along with charging this fee where consumer advocates argue that those things that are given, for example, should be included in the initial price that consumers see.

Since then, there's been a bunch of regulations from various angles.

So, for example, the Transportation Department has taken a look at fees related to airlines.

So they're looking closely at seat assignment fees because families want to be able to sit together without paying a bunch extra for that.

They're also looking to make fee displays more transparent in terms of checked bags or the cost to change or cancel a flight.

So there are federal rules that have been proposed along those lines.

But there are also bills on the state and national level.

In California, for example, two bills went into effect that target mandatory fees.

So these are fees that you have to pay.

They're not optional.

And the California bills are saying that these fees that consumers must pay when they check out have to be disclosed from the time the initial price is advertised.

They are not.

And so the California attorney general put out some guidance that said this isn't meant to affect the price.

It's not meant to make sure prices are higher necessarily or lower necessarily.

It's just meant to

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