Word: payment
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Already the dioceses are being adversely affected by squeamish insurance companies that expected church liabilities to include only tumbles down rain- soaked steps. Now they are reluctant to extend coverage and even to remit payment for expensive lawsuits. New Mexico's Santa Fe archdiocese has settled 48 cases within the past year against priests who served there. Some insurers, however, are stonewalling over payments. Just before Christmas, Archbishop Michael Sheehan claimed that bankruptcy loomed and asked for added financial assistance from parishioners at all 91 parishes in the archdiocese...
...number of fraudulent electronic filings doubled to 26,000 last year, at a cost to the government of nearly $54 million, as computers spat out refunds before IRS examiners could go over the returns. Such incidents have led critics to warn that the rush to automated payment systems is proceeding too fast even for computer experts. "The demands on software are far outpacing the development of software," says Dain Gary, a manager at the Software Engineering Institute at Carnegie-Mellon University...
Small wonder that the advance toward a cashless society has created a new category of frustrated consumers. Hudson Hendren, an engineer in Herndon, Virginia, was mortified last summer when the phone company shut off his service after failing to receive a payment he had made through the ScanFone system. In New York City, hundreds of subway passengers complained last month that the new electronic fare cards were double-charging them for rides or failing to let them through the automated turnstiles. A spokesman for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority blamed the confusion on riders who had not yet learned...
Above all, high-tech payment systems create new problems of privacy even as they increase convenience and efficiency. Maryland became the first state to provide debit cards for welfare clients last year when it issued its "Independence Card" to 170,000 households that received public aid. The cards enable recipients to shop at supermarkets such as Giant and Safeway as well as at 3,500 other stores around the state; families on welfare can also use the cards to withdraw cash from ATM machines and to pay utility bills and rent for public housing. Among other benefits, these cards have...
...main weapon against cash and checks is plastic -- credit cards, bank debit cards and so-called smart cards. Together they represent 9% of total consumer payment transactions and are expected to reach 15% by 2001. Besides taxicabs and newsstands, credit cards are employed in parking garages and movie theaters and could soon be the way that Americans pay their taxes, if industry lobbyists prevail. But since card issuers charge an average of 16.5% while the irs extracts only 7% for late payments, consumer groups warn that taxpayers should be wary. So far, stiff interest rates have done little to curb...