Chicago: More Bars in More Places

That SUCKS, that's the companies getting free money, I agree with Nick!! Totally shitty and unscrupulous, if you ask me.

Yeah, I don't know how illegal it is, but I told my mom never to buy another gift card for people from there.

When I get together and play with some of my drummer friends, I feel like Gene Krupa to their Buddy Rich. :(

I feel like I heard something in the news about gift certificates that took deductions from the money & how it was illegal. I'll have to ask my in-house lawyer-to-be.

I think its about as illegal as those minimum debit/credit card charges at stores, i.e. technically illegal but good luck telling a store owner that.

Hmm. Well, all I know is that a friend of mine was able to redeem gift certificates from Sak's that were like THIRTY YEARS OLD -- his mother found them in a closet from corporate days gone by, and the store honored EVERY DOLLAR of them. That's classy.

Hahah altho they were maybe lucky b/c $50 thirty years ago would have gone a lot further!

I remember something about diminishing balances on gift cards....I don't know if it is still legal, but it was at some point. The businesses' justification was that it costs them money to maintain the account and if you're not using the money within a reasonable period of time (1 year or whatever) then they need to start charging.

The thing is, that argument is total bullshit.

Dear everyone,

Advise me on something. I have a file with the extension .docx

It was created on Word a few years ago and it will not open.

That's total bullshit if for no other reason than the fact that THEY'RE HOLDING AND EARNING INTEREST ON SOMEONE ELSE'S MONEY ALREADY. If there were legitimate business costs associated with those handful of bytes of computer memory that it takes up, they could damn well be covered by the few cents of interest that $40 is going to earn over a year, in their hands.

Dear Jesse,

Google is a good place to start with unknown file extensions.

For example, Google told me that .docx is a XML-related file format.

http://filext.com/file-extension/DOCX

I think that means it's been converted from another version of Word?

xpost

Gift certificates from C@tch Thirty5 have an expiration date. Gift cards don't, but I don't know if they charge fees after a period.

I am not about to argue to hard for the business, but it sort of makes sense that eventually you have to account for the money, and there comes a time when it is reasonable to say that if you haven't used it yet, you probably never will.

plus, it's just bad customer service.

Dear Dan

I find Google impersonal and prefer the warmth of your assistance.

Jesse: http://www.download.com/Docx-Converter/3000-12565_4-10668996.html
?

Are you using Office '07?

Thanks guys! If this works I'm a shoe-in for partner!!!

jordan-- no. 2003.

I downloaded AbiWord the other day to help me convert some really old WordPerfect files into Word. It seems to support a lot of extensions.

Oh wait. Actually I am using '03, but the documents were created on '07.

Jesse: http://www.download.com/Docx-Converter/3000-12565_4-10668996.html
?
^^ this is a bum download. I will try John's.

Thanks.

I thought you said "a few years ago"? You're not going to be able to open it ever if you're using 2k3 and it was made in 2k7.

grep %Creator jessesfile.docx

I think part of the problem was that many companies weren't keeping track of their gift cards very well. Let's say you "sold" $7000 worth of gift cards in 2006. If you aren't keeping track of what percentage of those gift cards have been redeemed for product, then you don't know how much you owe the consumers at any given point. The business also has no idea how many of those outstanding gift cards will EVER be used.

Actually I am using '03, but the documents were created on '07.

Ah, that's what I thought (I only saw the "x" extensions after upgrading to '07).

Jesse, that download.com link works for me.

xpost, he should be able to use one of those converters to convert it to plain text or html.

In other words, it complicates accounting. I think it makes sense for gift cards to expire as long as that date is clearly printed on the card. I generally assume a 1-year expiration date unless stated otherwise.

All good points, Sarah. And in fact if I have like $.87 left on a gift card, I'm not nec going to run out and find another item just to deprive Macy's of my eighty-seven cents, or whatever! But that's okay, that's my choice as a customer. I especially think the timed deductions are just crappy, crappy, crappy.

Haha--HE will do nothing of the sort. *I* do all conversions around here apparently.

That link downloaded but then said that it can't run on Windows. Who knows. I'm trying Abiword.

http://www.cashdash.net/programs/cash-dash/gift-certificates.aspx

http://illinoislegalaid.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=home.dsp_content&contentID=3336

(i think it differs from state to state on gift cards, i know there was a big lawsuit in NY state about them, that seems weird about the itunes thing, though.)

grep %Creator jessesfile.docx

-- dan m, Wednesday, October 3, 2007 12:02 PM (11 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

^^ what does that mean?

http://www.download.com/3120-20_4-0.html?tg=dl-20&qt=docx&tag=srch

You guys can add "troubador" to your lists of words by which I would someday like people to use to refer to me.

That was a poorly constructed sentence. Basically I would like to be called a "troubador" someday.

I might have to switch my style up a little first.

how about "bard"

When would be a good day for a Halloween party for you nice people? Who would prefer the 27th, who would prefer the 28th, and who doesn't want any part of this pagan holiday?

quote from a coworker at lunch today when we were talking about the current housing market:
"Well, let's face it, a million dollars is basically nothing. You can't buy anything for a million dollars any more."

sarah, that reminds me, i haven't told you that i'd like to hit your co-workers in the face with a pipe wrench in a while.

bard = gay

http://www.ffcompendium.com/jobimages/11-bard-c.jpg

I don't care what day we do a Halloween party as long as no one expects me to put very much effort into my costume. I don't like costumes.

ha ha, Kevin.
Also, later during the same conversation, they were putting the housing market into different buying brackets, and the bottom number they through out for the po' folks was $500,000.

threw

Courtney is to host. Hallowwen party at Courtney's everybody!

Word 07 sucks, simply have him save in Word 2003 format and all will be ok.
That is the best solution.

Nick, I will call you a "tunesmith."

grep %Creator jessesfile.docx

-- dan m, Wednesday, October 3, 2007 12:02 PM (11 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

^^ what does that mean?

It means I was grepping for the creator of your file.

Nick, I will call you a "tunesmith."

-- jaymc, Wednesday, October 3, 2007 6:06 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Link

ok go for it