Bank of America’s (BAC) new policy — which takes effect in mid-June for new customers and early August for existing customers — comes amid intense public scrutiny of financial institutions’ overdraft fees. In 2009, banks earned about $38.5 billion from overdraft and insufficient-funds fees, estimates Moebs Services, an economic research firm.

Congress is weighing legislation to crack down on these fees. And the Federal Reserve has issued a rule that requires financial institutions to get consumers’ consent before charging them to pay certain debit card and ATM overdrafts.

BofA’s new policy goes beyond what’s required by the Fed rule, which takes effect July 1. BofA isn’t the first to deny debit card overdrafts —Citigroup doesn’t let customers overdraw at the point of sale or at the ATM — but it’s the largest to do so.

“What our customers told us is that, if I don’t have the money, I don’t want to overdraft” with debit cards, says Susan Faulkner, head of BofA’s deposits and card products business. Also, “We don’t think our customers would come in and opt in” to debit card overdrafts and their fees.

BofA customers can still sign up for a formal program to cover debit card overdrafts. The bank already caps overdraft fees at four a day and no longer charges a fee if an account is overdrawn by less than $10 a day. BofA is the largest U.S. issuer of debit cards, with about 15% of all cards in the country, says the Center for Responsible Lending. In 2008, the latest data available, consumers used BofA debit cards for $220.3 billion in purchases, the center estimates, using data from Nilson Report, a payments newsletter.

Because of BofA’s size, its new policy could be a “game changer,” says Martin Eakes, CEO of the Center for Responsible Lending. “My hope is that this will provide the tipping point where the rest of America’s financial institutions will voluntarily do away with hidden overdraft fees.”

Other banks may follow BofA’s lead in refusing debit card overdrafts if they believe most customers won’t opt into the service and its fees, says Ellen Seidman, a former director of the Office of Thrift Supervision now at public policy group New America Foundation.

But as banks change their overdraft policies, they’ll have to find income from other kinds of fees, says Bob Meara, a senior analyst at Celent, a research firm: “It would be self-evident that banks will need to recoup at least a portion of this (overdraft fee) revenue.”

A 56-year-old woman was pulling out of a driveway when her 2005 Prius “shot” across the road, Harrison, N.Y., police said. The driver, who was not immediately named, suffered minor injuries, but the impact sent “some pretty big boulders” fairly far, said Anthony Marraccini, acting police chief.

That Prius is among the 2004-2009 models recalled by Toyota for floor mats that could jam the gas pedal, but Marraccini said the floor mat has been pretty much ruled out since it was tied to the seat base with plastic ties. Police have taken the car for further analysis.

The new Prius incident came as Toyota (TM) and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration rushed investigators to San Diego to analyze the 2008 Toyota Prius involved in a runaway incident.

James Sikes, 61, dialed 911 Monday evening to report his Prius was accelerating out of his control.

“I pushed the gas pedal to pass a car. … It jumped, and it just stuck there” hitting speeds up to 94 mph, Sikes said. A California Highway Patrol officer responded, pulled alongside and told Spikes by loudspeaker to stand on the brakes and also apply the parking brake. Sikes was able to slow the car while the cruiser drove in front, and eventually he could shut it off.

The incident was just a few miles from where the crash of a runaway Lexus last August killed a CHP officer and his wife, daughter and brother-in-law. That crash, attributed to the floor mat jamming the gas pedal, spurred Toyota to recall 5.3 million vehicles — including Sikes’ Prius.

Sikes said he took his Prius to his dealer and was told it wasn’t on the list. Toyota said in a statement that dealers do not yet have repair parts for the Prius and that it has told owners to remove the driver’s floor mat until repairs are made. Sikes still had that mat in his vehicle. Toyota has said repairing all the recalled vehicles could take several months.

Separately on Tuesday, Toyota’s national dealer council accused General Motors of using its federal loans to offer “predatory” incentives. Shortly after Toyota’s recalls last month, GM launched offers for Toyota owners who buy its vehicles, now including 0% financing and up to $1,000 cash back.

“It is outrageous that GM is using our taxpayer dollars against us,” said council head Paul Atkinson.

“We understand why Toyota dealers would be frustrated, but they know better,” said GM spokesman Kerry Christopher. “Incentives have always been a part of the auto business.”

SOURCE: http://www.usatoday.com/money/autos/2010-03-10-toyota10_ST_N.htm

AirTran sparked the sale this week, with US Airways, United, Delta and American among the airlines following close behind, says Tom Parsons, founder of Bestfares.com who tracks ticket prices and scouted the bargains.

But travelers will have to act fast. Tickets have to be purchased by midnight Thursday for travel through Nov. 16. There are blackout dates around Memorial Day and other holidays. And travelers may have to do some digging to find the lowest fares, particularly in July, or when flying cross-country, Parsons says.

“If you’re flying coast to coast, you’re still going to have to look hard,” he says. “The inventory may be restricted in the summer, so you may have a little bit tougher time. The airlines are not going to give away every single seat at a cheap price. But this is the first big summer sale we’ve had, so there should still be plenty of room.”

Travelers might need to make a connection or travel to a smaller, alternative airport to get the lowest fares. For instance, a round-trip ticket on Delta from Orlando to Chicago Midway in May, with a stopover in Atlanta, was priced at $158, minus fees and taxes, as of Tuesday afternoon.

But there were also some non-stop bargains. A round trip in July from Dallas to New York City on American had a base fare of $174, Parsons says.

Though the sale fares require a 10-day advance purchase, the large travel window is unusual, Parsons says. Coupled with deals that can cut a normally $400 coast-to-coast ticket price in half, he says, they’re worth the search.

“We haven’t had a 200-day sale in a long, long time,” he says, noting that the deals allow travel every day except Fridays and Sundays. “It’s Christmas in March as far as I’m concerned. And you’d better take the gift while you can.”

AirTran says it’s not unusual for it to offer sale fares that can be used over a broad time period.

“We’re trying to really entice people to book travel,” spokesman Christopher White says. “We cast the net pretty wide.”

And as the struggling airline industry competes for every last passenger, he says that he’s not surprised that other carriers quickly followed suit. “The unofficial motto is: Match (the fare) or die.”

SOURCE: http://www.usatoday.com/travel/flights/2010-03-10-airfares10_ST_N.htm

Toyota said on Tuesday it would fix all Tundra pickups sold in the United States for the 2000 to 2003 model years to address a risk that part of the truck’s frame could corrode, causing spare tires or even the gas tank to drop to the road.

In November, Toyota Motor Corp recalled 110,000 Tundras sold in 20 cold-weather states, saying exposure to heavy road salt could cause the corrosion. Toyota spokesman Brian Lyons was unable to say how many additional vehicles would be involved.

Toyota told its U.S. dealers in a notice on Tuesday that it would expand the recall to Tundras sold in all 50 U.S. states. Reuters reviewed a copy of the notice, which Lyons confirmed had been sent to the company’s U.S. dealers.

Toyota said the rear cross-member of the frame of the Tundra could corrode in some cases, and that could cause loss of rear brake circuits, making it harder for drivers to stop.

In “the worst case,” the fuel tank may drop to the ground and could be separated from the vehicle, potentially causing a crash or fire, the company said in its notice to dealers.

This repair campaign adds to several safety problems with which Toyota, the world’s largest automaker, is grappling.

Toyota has recalled more than 8 million vehicles worldwide for mechanical problems with its accelerator assembly that can cause sticking and for the risk that floor mats could trap an accelerator.

In February, Toyota recalled nearly 500,000 hybrids, including its top-selling Prius, because of braking problems.

The Tundra, which Toyota redesigned in 2007, represents the Japanese automaker’s attempt to crack a market for full-size work trucks that has been dominated by Ford Motor Co, General Motors Co and Chrysler.

SOURCE: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35787181/ns/business-autos/

A California Highway Patrol officer helped slow a runaway Toyota Prius from 94 mph to a safe stop on Monday after the car’s accelerator became stuck on a San Diego County freeway, the CHP said.

Prius driver James Sikes said that the incident Monday occurred just two weeks after he had taken the vehicle in to an El Cajon dealership for repairs after receiving a recall notice, but he was turned away.

“I gave them my recall notice and they handed it back and said I’m not on the recall list,” Sikes said.

In a statement, Toyota said it has dispatched a field technical specialist to San Diego to investigate the incident.

Toyota has recalled some 8.5 million vehicles worldwide — more than 6 million in the United States — since last fall because of acceleration problems in multiple models and braking issues in the Prius.

On Monday, Sikes called 911 about 1:30 p.m. after accelerating to pass another vehicle on Interstate 8 near La Posta and finding that he could not control his car, the CHP said.

“I pushed the gas pedal to pass a car and it did something kind of funny … it jumped and it just stuck there,” the 61-year-old driver said at a news conference.

“As it was going, I was trying the brakes … it wasn’t stopping, it wasn’t doing anything and it just kept speeding up,” Sikes said, adding he could smell the brakes burning he was pressing the pedal so hard.

A patrol car pulled alongside the Prius and officers told Sikes over a loudspeaker to push the brake pedal to the floor and apply the emergency brake.

“They also got it going on a steep upgrade,” said Officer Jesse Udovich. “Between those three things, they got it to slow down.”

After the car decelerated to about 50 mph, Sikes turned off the engine and coasted to a halt.

The officer then maneuvered his car in front of the Prius as a precautionary block, Udovich said.

Toyota owners have complained of their vehicles speeding out of control despite efforts to slow down, sometimes resulting in deadly crashes. The government has received complaints of 34 deaths linked to sudden acceleration of Toyota vehicles since 2000.

One of the crashes claimed the life of a CHP officer in August.

Off-duty CHP Officer Mark Saylor was killed along with his wife, her brother and the couple’s daughter after their Lexus’ accelerator got stuck in La Mesa.

The Toyota-manufactured loaner vehicle slammed into a sport utility vehicle at about 100 mph, careened off the freeway, hit an embankment, overturned and burst into flames.

SOURCE: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Prius-with-stuck-accelerator-apf-86524522.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=4&asset=&ccode=

Legislation extending unemployment insurance for the long-term jobless faces a key test vote in the Senate, its momentum helped by about 60 popular tax breaks for individuals and businesses that expired at the end of last year.

The measure also prevents doctors from absorbing a crippling cut in Medicare payments, extends health insurance subsidies for the unemployed and gives cash-starved states help with Medicaid, the federal-state program providing health care to the poor and disabled.

The unemployment insurance alone — to provide weekly unemployment checks averaging above $300 to people whose core 26-week benefit package has run out — will cost $66 billion through December. In some states people are eligible to receive benefits for up to 99 weeks.

The bill, and the test vote Tuesday, demonstrate the difficulty Democrats face as they focus on jobs. It doesn’t include new ideas for boosting jobs, but instead reprises elements of last year’s $862 billion economic stimulus bill, which is earning mixed reviews from voters. Simply extending those provisions has produced a far more expensive measure than a separate so-called jobs bill that Democrats hope to soon send to President Barack Obama. That measure would boost highway spending and give tax breaks to companies that hire the unemployed and could clear the Senate for Obama’s desk this week.

At a gross cost of about $148 billion, Tuesday’s measure illustrates the extraordinary cost of the unemployment safety net as the economy inches out of the recession. Democrats say the unemployment benefits inject demand into the economy and say renewing the tax cuts helps preserve existing jobs.

The measure closes $29 billion of tax loopholes to help defray its cost, including one enjoyed by paper companies that get a credit from burning “black liquor,” a pulp-making byproduct, as if it were an alternative fuel.

All told, the measure would add $107 billion to the deficit over the coming decade. Democrats have labeled most of the bill an emergency measure, exempting it from stricter budget rules enacted just last month.

Democrats need to muster at least one Republican vote Tuesday to reach the 60-vote threshold needed to limit debate and guarantee an up-or-down vote. But Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, provided crucial help last week to keep the measure out of another procedural tangle, and Democrats sound confident they will prevail.

The bill includes about 60 popular tax breaks for individuals and businesses that expired at the end of 2009. The bill would extend the tax breaks through 2010, at a cost of about $26 billion.

Congress routinely extends the tax breaks each year with large bipartisan majorities. Businesses and tax planners would prefer a more permanent solution, but lawmakers can’t agree on how to pay for a longer extension.

The tax breaks include a property tax deduction for people who don’t itemize, lucrative credits that help businesses finance research and development and a sales tax deduction that mainly helps people in the nine states without income taxes: Alaska, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Texas, Tennessee, Washington and Wyoming.

There is a deduction for college tuition for couples making less than $160,000 a year, and one for teachers who use their own money to buy school supplies. There is a tax credit for community development agencies that invest in low-income neighborhoods, as well as a tax break for restaurant owners and retailers who remodel their stores.

The expiration of one tax break, a $1 per gallon credit for the production of biodiesel, has already caused “a pretty substantial blow to the industry,” said Michael Frohlich, a spokesman for the National Biodiesel Board. The credit would cost $1 billion to extend for the rest of the year.

SOURCE: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Senate-to-take-up-apf-2067961579.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=2&asset=&ccode=

Starting Wednesday, the giant retailer will allow customers to take advantage of special mobile-coupon offers on their handsets.

The coupon is redeemed when the bar code on the phone is scanned at checkout. Offers are good only once and expire on the dates listed. “We believe it’s a competitive advantage for us,” says Target.com President Steve Eastman.

Target (TGT) says it will be the first major nationwide retailer to exploit the bar-code technology in all its stores. It almost certainly won’t be the last.

For example, J.C. Penney is testing similar scanner-based technology at 16 point-of-sale registers in Houston. But at the rest of its stores, checkout clerks still must manually enter alphanumeric codes tied to discount coupons, rather than using scanners.

Scanning bar codes makes the process faster and easier, says Dan Kihanya, vice president of consumer marketing at Cellfire, the mobile-coupon company working with J.C. Penney on its Houston tests. “Any time you have data entry, you have to worry about errors.”

Mobile coupons, while not new, are still in their relative infancy. “It’s an area ripe for growth,” says ABI Research analyst Neil Strother. Not everyone clips coupons, virtually or otherwise. But most people crave a bargain when the economy is tough. And coupon technology works with more and more cellphones.

U.K.-based Juniper Research recently forecast that more than 1-in-10 mobile subscribers in developed regions around the world will use mobile coupons by 2014, generating nearly $6 billion in redemption value.

Kihanya of Cellfire says mobile coupons are redeemed at a 5% to 20% rate, compared with about 1% for print coupons. Cellfire does much of its business with grocery chains, such as Kroger and Safeway.

Shoppers interested in Target’s program must “opt in” by registering at the company’s online or mobile websites, or by texting the word “COUPONS” to 827438. Opting in addresses privacy concerns, Target says. Once registered, shoppers receive a text message on their phones with a link to a mobile Web page with various offers, which can all be accessed through a single bar code. Target says the program works with any phone that has a browser and data plan.

New coupons will be issued on a monthly basis as older ones expire, although the number and frequency may evolve as the program expands. The coupons cannot be used on Target.com.

Currently, coupons are not tailored to the interests of specific customers, although it is something Target is considering. “If privacy becomes an issue, we’ll make an adjustment,” Eastman says.

SOURCE: http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/retail/2010-03-09-targetcoupons09_ST_N.htm

Stay tuned for more fee disputes threatening local television stations on cable TV lineups.

Broadcasters hurt by declining ad revenue are demanding more fees from cable and other subscription TV providers to carry the stations. The providers are resisting, and in the latest tussle, Cablevision Systems Corp. dropped the ABC station in New York in the hours leading to Sunday’s Oscars telecast.

More such blackouts loom as several networks and various providers across the country have contracts set to expire this year, including one covering major ABC stations in Time Warner Cable Inc. markets. All signs point to down-to-the-wire talks that could leave viewers scrambling for other ways to watch their favorite shows and major sporting events.

“There’s a lot of money at stake,” said Robin Flynn, an analyst at SNL Kagan. “There are a lot more fights coming up.”

Such disputes used to be limited to cable channels such as CNN and ESPN, as they have long been paid per-subscriber fees by the providers. But in recent years, stations that are broadcast for free over the air have demanded such fees from cable TV and other providers as well.

That began first in smaller markets, with affiliates that are not owned by the networks but carry their programming. Now, the networks are demanding such fees for the stations they do own, especially in the larger markets such as New York and Los Angeles.

More than 3 million Cablevision customers in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut lost New York’s ABC station on the day of the Academy Awards, one of the year’s most-watched programs. It wasn’t restored until the two sides reached a tentative deal. Viewers missed the first 15 minutes of the awards show.

The major broadcast networks, such as CBS, ABC, NBC and Fox, used to give cable TV and other operators those rights in exchange for getting some of the providers’ slots for commercials, which broadcasters resell to advertisers. Sometimes, the providers agreed to carry new cable channels owned by the network’s parent, such as ABC owner Walt Disney Co., in lieu of a cash payment.

The providers prefer such in-kind payments because they want to conserve the cash to invest in cable lines, trucks and set-top boxes.

But the TV networks, looking for new income as advertising revenue weakens, are increasingly saying they should be paid cash for their programs. Although the 1992 federal cable law made it possible for broadcasters to demand fees, the networks didn’t start doing so for their stations until recently. It started with CBS Corp. in 2006.

CBS CEO Leslie Moonves told analysts last month that such fees were growing and provided “substantial secondary revenue stream.”

Flynn expects fees for network-owned TV stations and affiliates combined to reach more than $1 billion this year. That’s up from more than $750 million last year and $500 million in 2008.

While these fees went up by about 50 percent last year, cable fee increases aren’t growing even close to the same pace. Last year, cable fee hikes ranged from 5 percent to 7 percent, Flynn said.

Even so, viewers might find themselves with smaller lineups. To pay for higher fees for local channels, a cable provider might have to drop several cable channels it now pays for to keep the overall fees in check. Viewers might not need multiple Disney-owned cable channels but they would complain if the cable provider drops the Disney-owned ABC station.

But if more cable channels get dropped, subscribers would have a greater incentive to cancel their cable service entirely and rely on antenna and online alternatives.

TV wins in a matchup between TV stations and operators, Moody’s analyst Russell Solomon said in a research note.

Broadcast networks “have some of the most popular programming content that the cable and other pay-TV companies need to keep subscribers and stay competitive,” he said.

Broadcasters contend that they are entitled to fees for their over-the-air networks because subscription TV operators charge customers for TV packages that include the local stations. They point out that their shows attract a lot more viewers than cable channels and as such they should be compensated appropriately.

But cable executives said they’re already compensating broadcasters indirectly as part of broader deals for the cable channels that their parent companies own, and the cable providers said higher program fees would lead to higher cable bills.

“Just like people pay more for gas when the price of a barrel of oil rises, the price we charge is directly affected by what we pay for programming,” said Maureen Huff, a Time Warner Cable spokeswoman. “The only way to solve the problem is to let the networks know that viewers are not going to take it anymore.”

The cable TV operators are ready to get tough — even if their viewers have to temporarily miss their favorite shows.

SOURCE: http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Stay-tuned-More-fee-disputes-apf-1270265502.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=5&asset=&ccode=

But motorists may not see prices go much higher — or even stay that high throughout the entire summer — given the weak economy and the ability of refiners to kick up production, analysts add.

“Three dollars a gallon is probably a pretty rich price for the U.S. in 2010,” says Tom Kloza, analyst for the Oil Price Information Service.

The national average for a gallon of regular gasoline rose 0.6 cents Monday to $2.75 a gallon, up 81 cents from a year ago, says auto club AAA, Wright Express and the Oil Price Information Service.

Kloza expects $3-a-gallon gas in parts of the country within the next month. The Energy Information Administration, the forecasting arm of the Department of Energy, also predicts that pump prices may exceed $3 a gallon at times during the spring and summer.

Several factors may keep prices from rising much higher, including:

•Unemployment. The nation’s unemployment rate stood at 9.7% in February.

“People just aren’t driving to work like they were,” says Jim Ritterbusch, president of oil trading adviser firm Ritterbusch and Associates.

The number of vehicle miles traveled in the U.S. last year was about flat with 2008 but down 3% from the peak year of 2007, data from the Federal Highway Administration say.

Ritterbusch doesn’t expect much increased demand for gasoline until the unemployment rate falls below 8.7%. In the meantime, he expects gasoline to peak at $3 a gallon to $3.25 a gallon between now and the Fourth of July.

Then, he says, he expects weak demand to drive prices lower for the rest of the summer.

•Refining capacity. U.S. refineries are running about 14 million barrels a day of crude oil but have the capacity to run nearly 17.7 million a day.

The prospect of higher prices could encourage more production, which Kloza says could lead to greater supply and keep a lid on higher prices at the pump.

Other analysts see more pain at the pump. Over the last four years, gas prices have averaged a 35-cents-a-gallon increase between March 1 and mid-May, says Peter Beutel of energy research firm Cameron Hanover.

If that’s the case this year, some regions of the U.S. will see gas at $3.25 a gallon or more, Beutel says. That’s enough to cause trouble for an economy struggling for traction.

In parts of California, the average price of a gallon of regular gas is already over $3, the Energy Information Administration said on Monday.

“It does have a chance to nip part of the bud of any incipient recovery,” Beutel says.

A big wildcard in summer gas prices is the role investors will have on oil prices, Beutel says.

Prices are up about 15% in the past month on hopes of an economic recovery and the flow of money into oil. Investors, such as pension funds, are increasingly buying oil as an asset, Beutel says.

At times, he says, that’s driven up oil prices beyond what supply and demand would dictate.

SOURCE: http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/energy/2010-03-08-gasoline-prices_N.htm

Fares for sale Monday on remaining seats for Tuesday, Wednesday

JetBlue is holding a one-day sale offering $10 fares between New York’s JFK airport and the carrier’s first 10 destinations in celebration of its 10th year of operation.

JetBlue is offering the discount fares Monday on all remaining seats for travel Tuesday and Wednesday. Cities included in the promotion are Fort Lauderdale, Fla.; Buffalo, N.Y.; Tampa, Fla.; Orlando, Fla.; Rochester, N.Y.; Oakland, Calif.; Burlington, Vt.; West Palm Beach, Fla.; Salt Lake City; and Fort Myers, Fla.

JetBlue, which took its first flight on Feb. 11, 2000, now serves 60 cities with 600 daily flights.

Travel must be booked online at www.jetblue.com by 11:59 p.m. CST on Monday.