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ST. LOUIS NEWS TODAY - Sunday, January 2, 2005
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Americans are More Focused on Shrinking Their Waistlines than Shrinking Their Debt
ST. LOUIS, (PRNewswire) January 2, 2005 - The results of an annual "New Year's Resolution" national survey, conducted by Roper for Bankrate, indicate 36% of Americans polled are focused on weight loss as opposed to 31% who are concerned with eliminating outstanding debt.
This is a significant change from the 2003 poll in which 37% of those polled were more concerned about their debt, while only 29% were concentrating on losing weight. In fact, this is the first time in the three years that Bankrate has conducted the survey that Americans have chosen weight loss over controlling debt as their New Year's Resolution.
The survey reveals that the average amount of debt Americans polled need to pay off is $11,288, which is slightly less than the 2004 survey result of $11,895. Men are more focused on money matters than women, coming in at 34.1% as opposed to 32.5%.
Participants were also asked how much weight they would like to lose in 2005. The average desired weight loss is approximately 23 pounds. Women rank higher in this category with the hope of losing 23.9 pounds. Men want to lose an average of 21.3 pounds.
Bankrate conducts this survey as an ongoing effort to better understand consumer trends, as well as educate and assist consumers in making better personal finance decisions.
"Slamming and Cramming" Top List of Consumer Complaints for Missourians
JEFFERSON CITY, (SLFP.com) January 2, 2005 - For the second year in a row, unauthorized charges to phone bills and switching long-distance providers without the consumer's consent topped the list of consumer complaints in Missouri, according to Attorney General Jay Nixon.
Total, Nixon's office received an estimated 88,000 consumer complaint calls, letters, and e-mails in 2004. Final numbers, including consumer mediation dollars, will be available after the first of the year.
The most frequent complaint coming into Nixon's office involved telephone services, specifically the practices known as "cramming" - adding services to a customer's phone bill without their consent - and "slamming," where long distance service providers are switched without permission. Slamming and cramming complaints accounted for 1,898 of the total as of Dec. 30.
Home repair fraud, with 1,595 complaints, and travel scams, at 1,355, also continued to be major areas of concern for consumers.
"Aggressive enforcement of the No Call law has resulted in a precipitous decline in telemarketing fraud, yet there are still those who will always try to find a way to make a dishonest buck," Nixon says. "Missourians should feel empowered to contact my office any time they feel like someone is trying to pull one of these scams."
Consumers can contact the Consumer Protection Division of the Attorney General's Office through the toll-free hotline at 1-800-392-8222, or they can download a complaint form.
The complete top 10 list of consumer complaints to Nixon's office for 2004 are:
1. Telephone slamming, cramming, billing: 1,898
2. Home repair and remodeling: 1,595
3. Travel scams and time shares: 1,355
4. Unsolicited faxes: 1,148
5. Financing: 1,025
6. Auto repair: 925
7. Credit: 906
8. Auto sales: 889
9. Debt collectors: 636
10. Sweepstakes and lotteries: 592
$8.8 Billion in Online Purchases During the 2004 Holiday Season
ST. LOUIS, (PRNewswire) January 2, 2005 - VeriSign, Inc. has released new e-commerce data showing that the 2004 holiday shopping season (Thanksgiving through Monday, December 27) yielded a total of $8.8 billion in online shopping purchases, a 24 percent increase as compared to the same period last year.
VeriSign also reported that the average price of an online purchase reached a season-high of $178 on Wednesday, December 22, 2004, one of the final shipping days before Christmas. Additionally, the final five shopping days during the week of December 20 accounted for $1.5 billion in online purchases.
"The 2004 online holiday shopping season has proved highly successful, with virtually every indicator showing growth. From spikes in merchant categories to new shopping phenomena like 'Black Monday,' we continue to observe the impact the online marketplace has on traditional shopping-behavior patterns," said Trevor Healy, vice president of payment services, VeriSign. "Through the online data we collected, we have seen clear changes in consumer behavior such as accelerated weekday shopping activity, more confidence in buying digital goods from e-commerce sites, an increase in gift-certificate purchases as well as the direct impact of shipping lead times on sales."
VeriSign's latest statistics are based on the analysis of online sales volume processed through VeriSign Payment Services, which comprises more than 35 percent of all North American e-commerce and represents in excess of 120,000 online retailers.
20 Million Smokers Resolve to Quit in 2005 ... Again
ST. LOUIS, (PRNewswire) January 2, 2005 - Nearly half of America's smoking population -- more than 20 million people -- say they want to quit smoking in 2005 ... again, according to a new survey.
For most smokers, 2005 won't be the first year they've tried to quit. The survey of more than 2,000 Americans found that 82 percent of smokers have tried to quit at least once, and one out of five smokers (20 percent) have tried to quit five or more times.
Smokers rate worries about the psychological and behavioral challenges of quitting as high as the physical challenges, like withdrawal symptoms. Nearly equal numbers of smokers worry about fading willpower (72 percent) and finding themselves around people and in places or situations where they'd be tempted to smoke (71 percent), as about cigarette cravings (75 percent) and irritability (73 percent).
"Individualized support is the key, and a tailored Web-based program offers the best of both worlds; it's customized, like individual or group therapy, but instead of reaching a few people, it can reach millions, like a major public smoking cessation campaign," said Dr. Robin J. Mermelstein, clinical psychologist, smoking cessation researcher and director of the Center for Health Behavior Research at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
For those looking to quit this New Year's, Dr. Mermelstein offers the following tips for getting started:
- Think about the reasons you smoke -- It will give you a clearer path to
quitting. Does smoking relieve stress? Is it a large part of your social
life?
- Get your head in the game -- Dr. Mermelstein recommends that clients get
support products like nicotine replacement therapy and online help
before they quit, so they can read up on materials before they're under
the pressure of quitting. Not only does this help raise consciousness
about the patterns of smoking, it gives them the tools they'll need when
they make the decision to quit for good.
- Check out online support services -- The online Committed Quitters(R)
program provides support and encouragement to help you break your
behavioral and psychological link to cigarettes, and is proven effective
in helping smokers quit.
- Get yourself physically ready -- Start walking, take in more fluids, and
get plenty of rest.
- Put a support system in place -- Fight the urge to keep your plans to
yourself and enlist the help of family and friends. You can also rely on
online support programs like the ones at Committed Quitters, which has
been proven more effective in helping smokers quit.
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