But now and then, counter-evidence appears. The latest can be found at McDonald's, where in-store advertisements for the McRib sandwich herald the product with these words: "It's real pork!"
Now, as regulars know, this runs directly against the Haggler's plea, described in this space in August 2010, to cease boasting about the realness of a food product that consumers should assume is real, without the boast. No more claims that something is made of "real fruit" or "real ice cream," for instance.
So the Haggler called the public relations office at McDonald's and asked: Did the company skip that column? And why, oh why, is McDonald's bragging that a product called McRib is made of pork? Does the company worry that customers will otherwise figure it's made of chicken, or a meatlike gelatin, or maybe some sort of lab-tested synthetic?
"This year we wanted to emphasize the real quality pork that goes into the McRib," wrote Ofelia Casillas of the company's media relations department, "along with the other ingredients that make the sandwich special."
Hmm. But McDonald's isn't stressing the quality of the pork, the Haggler wrote back. It's stressing the porkiness of the pork. How come? Isn't the porkiness pretty much implied?
This e-mail did not elicit a response.
O.K., letter time. The details here are a bit complicated, but the principle at stake, we shall see, is simple.
Q. In spring 2011, I bought my dream car: a lightly used Mercedes-Benz E350 wagon from Silver Star Motors in Long Island City, Queens. I set up electronic funds transfer to Mercedes-Benz Financial Services to cover the loan payments.
But in late December 2012, something weird started to happen. I got a check for the precise amount of my monthly loan payment from M.B.F.S. This month, another check. Then I looked at the M.B.F.S. account, and it indicated that the loan had been paid in full in late October — the checks that I had received were reversals of my automatic payments.
What was happening? A rep at M.B.F.S. told me that my insurance company had called to declare my car a total loss because of damage from Hurricane Sandy. Two problems: The insurance company that called is not my insurance company. And my car didn't even get wet during the hurricane. I called M.B.F.S. to clear up the matter.
Five days later, I heard from a rep at a collections agency who told me that some payments were past due — one of them 63 days past due. The rep wanted payment right then, along with late fees. On top of that, M.B.F.S. had charged late fees and extra interest because, in the company's mind, I hadn't paid my account.
How, you may wonder, could M.B.F.S. return checks I'd sent and claim that my payments were overdue? How did M.B.F.S. allow the wrong insurer to declare my car a hurricane casualty? Why did M.B.F.S. not contact me to confirm that this was true?
These are excellent questions, but I have been unable to get even mediocre answers. I have, however, convinced both the collections agency and M.B.F.S. that my car is fine and all of the financial penalties have been dropped. My payments have resumed. But my excellent credit rating, which I have carefully tended for many years, may be dinged as a result of the supposedly late payments. That is what the rep from the collections agency told me, at any rate.
Here is the galling part: M.B.F.S. seems to believe that the work of ensuring that my score is unscathed is my problem. I've been instructed to write a letter to the company's credit dispute department, explaining all. Then the department will decide how to proceed, and in what time frame.
That is infuriating. This little mess was made by M.B.F.S. I think the company ought to clean it up. Do you agree? ROSLYN HOOLEY
Ridgefield, Conn.
A. The Haggler agrees. And it turns out that the executives at M.B.F.S. agree, too. When the Haggler forwarded the above e-mail to the company, which is based in Farmington Hills, Mich., it caused a bit of a stir. Janet Marzett, a vice president, called to explain that Ms. Hooley's car was erroneously tossed into the totaled-by-Sandy column, either because an insurer provided incorrect digits, or an employee at M.B.F.S. key-punched a wrong number.
"We have had to process about 2,500 claims as a result of Sandy," Ms. Marzett explained. Somehow, Ms. Hooley's car became one of them.
Mistakes happen, and this one was cleared up without too much trouble. The real heartburn started when that M.B.F.S. rep claimed that keeping Ms. Hooley's credit score pristine was her problem. That, says Ms. Marzett, was a terribly wrong message.
"I listened to that phone call," she said. "It's absolutely unacceptable for us to even allude to the notion that the customer needs to do anything if we make a mistake. I can't excuse it and I'm not going to defend it. And I can tell you that we dealt with that phone representative immediately."
The Haggler imagines a stern lecture in a tiny room, suffused with new-car smell and lined with auburn brown leather with white stitching.
A rep from M.B.F.S. also got in touch with Ms. Hooley, calling to offer apologies and to make clear that she need do nothing to ensure the robustness of her credit score. The company, the rep explained, would handle that.
E-mail: haggler@nytimes.com. Keep it brief and family-friendly, include your hometown and go easy on the caps-lock key. Letters may be edited for clarity and length.
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