8 Stupid Business Tricks

We all like stupid pet tricks and stupid human tricks videos on You Tube. But wait. There's more. Now we have stupid business tricks to entertain you.

1. Charging people to pay their bills when they do it using a "customer service representative” like AT&T. I mean, after all, why would we want you to pay your bill any way you want to using any means possible?

2. Having one dedicated service center for a city of 3 Million and charging everyone else and voiding the warrantee if they go to someone other than that one person. But, of course, we in healthcare are all over that one.

3. Creating so many fare structures, like Frontier Airlines, that you get so confused when you show up at the ticket counter 5 minutes before departure and either pay an extra $60 to see you bag at your destination or just leave it behind. Did I mention they changed the size of the carry on baggage box?

4. Taking a nice cozy bank with convenient parking, scrape it for the land value, build a 10 story office complex with not enough parking, except for the construction guys who built it.

5. And then, of course, the tried and true bait and switch. You can buy a pair of glasses and get an eye exam and get lenses for only $69. Of course, you will look like some geek from a Charles Dickens novel, but things are going retro, aren't they?

6. How about the "it's our policy" ploy. Go to a 24-hour fitness center and ask the person behind the desk what it costs to join. You have to sign in as a guest first. It's policy. Even if you don't want a tour. It's policy. But just tell me what it costs. Nope. It's policy.

7. The Best Buy Phone Hell Screw You Shuffle. You want to buy a converter so you call the number for Best Buy Mobile from their website. You are put in phone tree hell and after 5 or 6 levels, someone, miraculously answers the phone, and yes, what you want is available. You go to the Best Buy Mobile store and are told, no, sorry, that the converter is only available at the OTHER Best Buy Store 7 miles away. Any moron knows that if you push #2 during the 4th phone tree menu you are transferred to another store. Gotcha.

8. Building more hospitals, when the future of medicine will be that anyone going to a hospital will be an admission of a failure of the system that is increasingly being decentralized, based on prevention and early detection, data driven, patient and home based and digitally delivered.

Be sure to stay tuned for the video of your hospital CEO who is being paid millions, turning the shovel on the new wing. It almost rivals that German Shepard singing along with Billy Joel. But wait. There is more. If you look now we'll give you two videos for the price of one.