The financial news that actually matters
A general consumer finance category covering everyday money decisions, budgeting, saving, debt management, credit behavior, and personal financial improvement strategies.
California’s insurance commissioner is moving to strike marital status from the list of factors insurers can use to set auto insurance prices, a rating practice regulators in the state have permitted for three decades. Commissioner Ricardo Lara proposed the change Sept. 16, arguing it penalizes single, divorced and widowed drivers for a life circumstance that…
The BMW M4 costs more to insure than any other vehicle in Compare.com’s newest ranking of the priciest cars to cover, at $319 a month, or $3,828 a year. The site’s Sept. 24 analysis, built from more than 50 million real insurance quotes gathered across more than 100 partner insurers, put the M4 narrowly ahead…
One hundred ten members of Congress, in a letter led by Rep. James Walkinshaw, Sen. Chris Van Hollen, Rep. Steny Hoyer and Sen. Brian Schatz, are asking congressional leaders to guarantee federal civilian employees a pay raise of at least 3.8% in the fiscal 2027 appropriations bill. The letter, dated Sept. 22, pushes back on…
Electric utilities shut off power to U.S. homes roughly 13.4 million times in 2024, and natural gas utilities disconnected service about 1.7 million times, according to a winter heating outlook the National Energy Assistance Directors Association published Sept. 14. The report ties the disconnections to a heating season in which the average household is projected…
Wells Fargo 401(k) participants who held company stock in the plan’s employee stock ownership fund between September 2016 and December 2022 have until Feb. 9, 2027, to cash checks from an $84 million ERISA settlement, according to the case’s official settlement website. Distributions began going out Aug. 13, 2026, months after a federal judge in…
Peacock is raising the price of its Apple TV bundle plans by $3 a month, with existing subscribers seeing the new rate on their first bill dated October 1 or later, according to Peacock’s own help-center pricing page. The Apple TV + Peacock Premium bundle moves from $14.99 to $17.99 a month, and the Apple…
About 43,674 light-up glasses, crown headbands, sparkle headbands and ties are being recalled because a child can access the button cell batteries that power them, according to a notice the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission published September 24. ABC Trading Inc., of Vernon, California, sold the items for about $1 apiece between September 2016 and…
Walmart’s October sale window opens at midnight Eastern on October 5 and runs seven days through October 11, a full day ahead of Amazon’s Prime Big Deal Days and Target’s Circle Deal Days, which both run October 6 to 7, according to NBC News’s report on Walmart’s announcement and a companion report from Retail Dive….
The University of Maryland Medical System has agreed to mail $2,251,781.52, or about $2.25 million, in restitution to patients who paid outpatient facility fees the hospital system did not adequately disclose, Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown’s Consumer Protection Division announced on September 25. The fees at issue were charged before July 1, 2021, the date…
Rivian has told federal safety regulators it is recalling 98,828 vehicles because a software notification can sit over the backup camera image at the exact moment a driver needs to see behind the vehicle. The recall, filed with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration as campaign 26V597, spans 62,259 R1S SUVs, 34,088 R1T pickups and…