Credit Debt Banking News | CDBN

This is a guest post by Steve Hanov, who blogs about programming and startups.

For a micro-ISV, selling to big businesses can be more lucrative than selling to consumers. Instead of making a few dollars per sale and hoping for thousands of sales, you sell to only a few customers, and charge much higher rates. But the rates are high for a reason. It takes more time and money to sell to businesses, especially the big ones.

Legal Issues

Consumers rarely read software license agreements. Most corporate customers don’t read them either, but some have legal departments that must approve any agreement that the company makes, no ..read more

You probably think of “tech support” as the bottom of the food chain. “Shit flows downhill” and all that. After all:

Tech support deals with insane customers. Tech support answers the phone; a job even salesmen don’t want. Tech support keeps angry customers at bay while having no power to effect change.

Yep, that sounds lowly. Dismal too — how would you like to deal with an irate voice screaming at you when you know how to fix the problem but lack the authority to do it? This is a masochistic job for a poor slob with no other job prospects, right?

If this is your attitude, your conception ..read more

Racking up consumer debt is not difficult to do, especially during tough economic times. You may have racked up debt without even noticing. A few charges here and there and bam! You’re hit with high interest rates that make it practically impossible to make a dent in that debt. Before you know it, you run late on a few credit car or installment loan payments and the negative marks start to accumulate on your credit report.

You may have special circumstances that forced you into debt – illness, divorce, the unexpected death of a loved one, or even unexpected home or vehicle repair expenses. The problem is that while credit card debt is piled up, interest only grows and grows. If you pay only the minimum ..read more

If you want to catch my speech this Wednesday, it will be webcast live. You can register and follow this link. There’s no charge for the service.

Bell continues to frustrate, annoy and enrage its customers. I found out when I did my latest Star column on Bell Blues and got a very enthusiastic response.

I wondered if there was a chance that complaints were levelling off. No way. Only one reader tried to defend Ma Bell, while many others gleefully diagnosed its faults.

See comments below and at Bell Blues, where number 600 is in sight. Investors may wonder, as Bylo does in his comment posted today, how much better this company could perform if it could sharpen up its laggard approach to service.