DEAR READERS: The letter about department stores closing customers' charge accounts for inactivity hit a nerve. Here are just a few of the many reader responses:
Erin and Rebecca said, "If you keep your balance at zero, the store is not collecting interest or finance charges."
Betty wrote: "The company is making a power play. Managing the bottom line is important for business, but this threatening letter is a low-level business practice."
Bobbye said: "I had the same experience, but mine wasn't by a letter. I found out my account was closed when I was making a purchase. Talk about embarrassing!"
Readers, thank you for the feedback. Unless you get some benefit from a store card, you really don't need one. All major stores take national credit cards. Why get aggravated when you don't need to?
DEAR HELOISE: I keep a long-handled ice scraper in my car in the summer to prop up the sunshade over the passenger side of the windshield.
-- Charmaine M.,
Roswell, N.M.
DEAR READER: Charmaine, you just taught me something. I hate that floppy sun shade.
DEAR HELOISE: Here are some of my favorite makeup hints I've learned over the years:
• I blot my face with a tissue between moisturizer, primer, foundation and powder. It absorbs extra product, so there's a less cakey appearance.
• Warming a hard eyeliner pencil between my fingers softens it so there are fewer harsh lines.
• When I'm done, I take a step back and look in the mirror to get the whole "picture," and many times see that my eye shadow or blush may be a little too much.
-- Antoinette B. in California
DEAR HELOISE: When I find a product I really like, I use it for a few years, and then it's discontinued on every store shelf in town! I go online, only to find that I have to sign up and build a file with my email address so they can fill up my email with offers and sales on almost a daily basis.
It's either live with it, or do without a product you really like. Argh!
-- Darlynn in Salem, Ore.
DEAR READERS: Open a "dummy" email account that you use only for internet sites such as you described. The unwanted email goes there.
Send a money- or time-saving hint to Heloise, P.O. Box 795000, San Antonio, Texas 78279-5000; fax to (210) 435-6473; or email
Heloise@Heloise.com
Style on 08/22/2017