Remember Wells Fargo’s uh-oh moment? Think Wells Fargo employees opening millions of fraudulent accounts and issuing credit cards without customer consent. Well, turns out these credit cards started adding up fees and those noncomplying customers started noticing. So on Thursday Wells Fargo received $185 million in fines and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau slapped an additional $100 million penalty. Around 5,300 employees were involved in the scandal, claiming they felt “extreme pressure to open as many accounts as possible,” because the compensation policies rewarded them for opening new accounts.
“It is way out of character for one of the cleanest banks around,” said Mike Mayo, a banking analyst at CLSA. “It’s a head-scratcher why so many employees felt comfortable crossing the line.” Is it really though? Wonder what’s really happening behind scenes. (Source: NY Times)
Who Runs the World?! Girls!
Melinda Gates (the notorious Bill Gates’ wife) is trying to find a way to increase female reps in the STEM fields. She’s building her own personal team dedicated to this project to find out what’s causing this gender gap. She believes a lot of it has to do with the “education pipeline,” which pushes girls out of the STEM programs. Supposedly, once the gaming industry took on a boys only club, girls starting dropping out of computer science like flies. Gates also points out the issue of “corporate blind spots” and uses Apple as an example – such as leaving out a menstruation feature in their health-tracking app. Other topics include parental leave policies, adequate female role models and pitfalls with AI. As our team is mostly female, we’re giving a “you go girl” shoutout to Melissa. (Source: The Verge)
What Do You Do When You Just Really Need to Blow Off Some Steam…
Well apparently the French way is to go into an Apple store and start smashing electronics with a steel ball. Think we’re kidding? Watch the video here of a French customer doing exactly that. The man shouts, “Apple is a company that ‘violated’ European consumers’ rights. They refused to reimburse me, I told them: ‘Give me my money back’. They said no. So you know what’s happening? This is happening!” Then he proceeds to wreck another iPhone. Eventually a security guard escorts him out as he gets arrested by police. The damage is around thousands of euros. C’est la vie. (Source: Mashable)
