Business Blog

November 11th is Veterans Day, a time to honor the nation’s former military personnel. Every year more than 180,000 servicemembers leave the military to join the ranks of the nation’s 18 million veterans. When the troops transition back to civilian life, launching their next career — whether that means starting their own business or finding a job — is one of the first tasks at hand.

The FTC just sent almost $60 million in checks and PayPal payments to eligible drivers who had their tips illegally taken by Amazon. Our advice to Amazon Flex drivers: Watch your mailbox for a check. Our advice to companies that hire gig workers: Watch what you say to workers and customers – and live up to your claims.

Money-making claims have been around for as long as there’s been money. They show up in promotions for gig work, multilevel marketing, “be your own boss” seminars, and work-from-home offers. But when tried-and-true tactics turn into tried-and untrue, the FTC has a long history of challenging deceptive claims related to money-making opportunities. Those misrepresentations are the subject of the FTC’s latest use of its penalty offense authority.

The FTC has been warning consumers for years about impersonation scams – calls that falsely claim to come from the IRS, the Social Security Administration, or other offices or businesses. The messages try to coerce people into making immediate payments or turning over sensitive personal information.

When the financial future of millions of Americans is at stake, it’s important for the FTC to use every tool at its disposal to protect consumers from deceptive and unfair conduct. The FTC just announced the revitalized use of an existing method to hold companies accountable by imposing financial penalties for illegal acts.

According to the CDC, more than 34 million Americans have diabetes. To put a human face on that public health statistic, 1 in 10 people at your company, friends in your neighborhood, and members of your extended family struggle with a disease that could threaten their lives. The uninsured, those with high-deductible health plans, and lower-income consumers face another challenge that makes managing diabetes even more difficult: the high cost of insulin.

If your company is facing the fall-out from Hurricane Ida, flooding in Tennessee, western wildfires, or any other natural disaster, your employees are looking for help in the recovery process – and you’re looking to make a safe return to business. But as flood waters recede, dangerous predators can spring to the surface: scammers targeting people and small businesses trying to get back on their feet. Here are ways to avoid common post-disaster scams.

Have you or one of your employees received an alarming text message about unemployment insurance benefits from what seems to be your state workforce agency? You’re not alone. Identity thieves are targeting millions of people nationwide with scam phishing texts aimed at stealing personal information, unemployment benefits, or both.

No one can top Waylon Jennings’ invitation to Luckenbach, Texas, where people can get “Back to the Basics of Love.” But we can offer the next best thing for business executives, advertising professionals, and attorneys: a virtual invitation to Dallas, Texas, on June 24, 2021, to get back to the basics of law.