How to Complain for Fun and Profit
Writing to a company's CEO can help you get the compensation you deserve.
March 4, 2009— -- Kelly Dean makes money dressing up as LuLu the Clown, entertaining kids with balloon animals and magic tricks at parties in New York City.
Because scheduling those parties is complicated, she wanted a BlackBerry PDA to keep her business organized. So she went to a T-Mobile store, where a clerk talked her out of a BlackBerry.
Tune in March 13 for a special hour with John Stossel: "Bailouts, Big Spending and Bull."
"The lady kind of convinced me to get this T-Mobile Dash. She spoke very highly of it, said it was a really good phone, that it's got all the things that I want, which it did. But it also doesn't work," Dean told ABC News.
Among the problems: The phone doesn't ring; it only vibrates when a call comes in, which caused Dean to lose jobs. And even more annoying, the alarm won't shut up.
"The alarm would go off at all hours of the night, wake me up at 6 o'clock in the morning, 6:02, 6:07, like every two minutes throughout the entire day," Dean said. "The only way to make the phone stop was to turn it off, which is ridiculous, because I need my phone."
Eventually the store gave her a replacement Dash, but it had the same problem.
"Four days after I got it, the alarm started going off again," she said.
When you think you've been ripped off, what do you do? Scream? Call and complain? Or just take it? Maybe there's a better idea.
Bruce Silverman, author of "How to Complain for Fun and Profit," suggests writing a letter to the boss of the company.
"Most companies actually want to do the right thing. Most companies care about consumers. That's how they stay in business," Silverman said.
He says when he complains, he nearly always succeeds. He sends complaint letters to the CEO. ABC News correspondent John Stossel asked Silverman if the CEOs really read the letters.
"I don't actually believe that the CEO of a big company usually reads the letter. But I think their assistants will. And assistants in big companies like that have immense power. They can pick up the phone and call somebody and say 'take care of this,'" Silverman said.
To test Silverman's claim, "20/20" posted notices on various Web sites, looking for unhappy consumers who wanted to go on television.
