Like everyone else, I've made my share of financial mistakes, small and big. You sold a house at the bottom of the real estate market. I bought gym equipment that I didn't use. And I spent a lot on lottery tickets.
But nothing frustrates me quite like the $300 I recently lost because I didn't notice the asterisk.
It's all about the bank promotion I signed up for which had different requirements, including a minimum balance. I thought I'd followed everything to the letter, only to discover that by overlooking that asterisk — and the subtleties that the asterisk was leading me to — I'd misunderstood the terms.
Maybe what frustrated me was that even though I could blame myself, I somehow felt like I wasn't entirely at fault. Couldn't the bank just drop the fine print (and the asterisk) and spell out the terms of the promotion in nice big letters?
This was not the first time I had been punished for not paying attention to fine details. That happened not long ago with the credit card offer – and once again, the relevant terms were lost in the land of small type. And I'm sure there are countless other examples from the past because, really, who reads this stuff?
Apparently, almost no one. A 2020 Deloitte survey found that 80% of consumers do not take the terms and conditions in some documents seriously – meaning they “always”, “almost always” or “sometimes” accept them without reading them.
And there have been some funny experiments to prove just how casual – or ignorant – consumers can be when it comes to the finer points.
““In modern times, we have the attention span of cockroaches. The probability of reading 10 pages [of fine print] Little to nothing.“
My favorite example: Purple, a WiFi provider, put a joke clause in its terms and conditions stating that users of its service agree to commit to 1,000 hours of community service. These services include: cleaning toilets and picking up pieces of gum.
Apparently 22,000 people unwittingly accepted the deal in exchange for internet access. Purple didn't oblige them, since the goal was to enhance consumer awareness of how companies hurt you and show how Purple was aiming to avoid that.
Gavin Weldon, Purple's chief executive, told me he sympathizes with those who skip lengthy contractual documents because he considers himself among the legally perplexed.
“In modern times, we get the attention of cockroaches,” he said. “Probability of reading 10 pages [of fine print] Little to nothing.
The consequence of not reading these things can be costly, as my $300 example attests. But I'm hardly alone.
On social media, you'll find no shortage of people complaining about being tripped up by minutiae. One option from a Reddit thread, with a four-letter word in the post's title, presents case after case, relating to everything from product warranties to employment situations. In fact, there are nearly 7,000 responses to the topic.
The subtle concerns extend all the way to Donald Trump's latest entrepreneurial venture — namely, his new line of sneakers, which range in price from $199 to $399. Questions have been raised about when the shoes might show up at anyone's door, since the fine print on the sneaker's website says expected shipping dates are between June and August 2024. But until then there's this caveat: “Shipping and delivery dates are estimates.” . Only and cannot be guaranteed. We are not responsible for any delays in shipments.”
On social media platform
A Trump spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
That doesn't mean companies are necessarily at fault for putting all of these things in the lowercase, at least according to some legal experts. In a litigious society, businesses inevitably need to cover their bases, and this often translates into long legal documents presented in 8-point (or less) font.
The goal is not necessarily to mislead consumers, said Nicholas Creel, an assistant professor of business law at George College and State University. But he acknowledged that accurate disclosures have “the potential to do this easily.”
To be clear, if a line is crossed — that is, if the fine print turns out to be a good deception — consumers may have some legal protections and a way to fight back.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, an independent federal agency, notes that abusive behavior by companies is covered by the Consumer Financial Protection Act. Such conduct is defined, in part, as anything that “interferes with a consumer's ability to understand a term or condition of a consumer financial product or service,” according to the CFPB.
There are remedies that go beyond following the legal path. Consumers can always file a complaint with the Better Business Bureau, for example.
However, perhaps the best defense is a good offense. Specifically, should we actually be trying to read all that fine print?
““It's important as a consumer to read the fine print, especially when it means getting the money you're entitled to.”“
Here I got different responses. You should wear those reading glasses, says Erica Kohlberg, an attorney and personal finance expert who has made a career out of explaining what's hidden in all those terms and conditions.
“It's important as a consumer to read the fine print, especially when it means getting the money you're entitled to,” she told me.
But others, especially the lawyers I spoke with, pointed out a stark reality: We are bombarded with so many minute disclosures these days that we spend hours every month, even every week, going through them all. In the end, for what? You have to weigh the value of your time against the value of what you might gain (or lose) financially.
Another option: You can hire an attorney to do all the reading for you. This may not make sense when it comes to, say, signing up for a $40 a month gym membership, knowing that a lawyer's hourly rate can run into the hundreds of dollars. But when it comes to larger purchases, like a car or a house of course, that's another matter.
“It's about a cost-benefit analysis,” said Justin Lehto, a lawyer and businessman.
I'm pretty sure it wouldn't have helped that I brought most of the fine print documents I ignored — or, let's be honest, ignored — to a lawyer. Case in point: I probably ended up paying out more than the $300 I lost on that bank bonus issue.
But I would still argue that companies, even if they stay within the letter of the law, can do better with their disclosures. In many cases, it seems fairly obvious which key terms and conditions will be most important to consumers, so why can't companies make them clear enough?
Either that or they should at least equip everyone with a magnifying glass.
