Pod Insights The Clark Howard Podcast 04.17.26 Clark Answers His Critics on Clark Stinks / Booking Travel - New Guidance About this episode Friday - Clark Stinks day! Christa shares Clark Stinks posts with Clark. Submit yours at Clark.com/ClarkStinks. Also today - the travel industry’s ongoing reaction to rising fuel costs calls for new guidance for booking travel. Clark reveals why he never starts his search on an airline’s website and how a simple shift in your booking psychology can save you hundreds. Clark Stinks: Segments 1 & 2 New Rules Of Travel: Segment 3 Ask Clark: Segment 4 Mentioned on the show: IRS - 2026 Charitable contributions SIM Card Swapping: The Dangerous Cell Phone Scam Everyone Needs To Know About How Passkeys Work—and How to Use Them Storage Unit Prices Keep Going Up. Is There a Better Way To Store My Possessions? eBay Motors and WeGoLook Partner to Provide Onsite Inspections for Vehicles The Details on Transferring 529 Funds into a Roth IRA The Tax-Saving Charity Funds Wealthy People Are Buzzing About Airfares Skyrocket as Carriers Tackle Rising Fuel Costs Clark Howard’s Secrets to Beating Sky-High Airfares and New Hidden Fees Follow Clark Howard's #1 Rule To Travel Cheap 4 Ways To Fight Sky-High Airfares This Summer Is ID.me Safe? / About ID.me Clark.com resources: Episode transcripts Community. Clark.com / Ask Clark Clark.com daily money newsletter Consumer Action Center Free Helpline: 636-492-5275 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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1:04 Speaker 02 It's my pleasure to welcome you here to the Clark Howard Show. You know, our mission is to serve you with advice and information that empowers you to make better financial decisions in your life. Today is the day that many of you love the most. Clarkies. Clark Stinks Day. Clarkies love the most. Clarkies love the most. Okay. Also, it's Friday and as you know, I love my weekends. So Friday, I'm always kind of amped up. I'm always joyous because the weekend's straight ahead. And I'm joyous about Clark Stinks because I love learning from my mistakes.
1:48 Speaker 02 And also later in this podcast and YouTube show, I'm going to give you some new guidance for booking travel with the conditions of the airline industry going through a huge shift right now as a result of what's happened with the cost of jet fuel. I'm going to tell you how you can protect your wallet. But right now it's time to hear how much I'm stinking it up.
2:13 Speaker 03 I should have never encouraged you to speak.
2:15 Speaker 04 You must think I'm pretty stupid. You should be ashamed of yourself. Well, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe you're right, pal.
2:25 Speaker 05 Oh, the behind the scenes on the Clark Howard Show.
2:28 Speaker 02 How can this actually be Clark Stinks when the YouTube viewers did not get to see you dance?
2:34 Speaker 05 I'm sorry.
2:35 Speaker 02 Every time that song plays, and you know what you want to hear less than see me dance? Hear me sing.
2:42 Speaker 05 Oh, me too.
2:43 Speaker 02 Oh, it's dangerous to hear me sing. I feel so badly anytime I call somebody to wish them happy birthday and I start singing and I'm like, oh, man, I'm hurting their ears.
2:54 Speaker 05 Yeah, that's one gift I wish I had. If I had a singing voice, oh, my gosh, I'd be so grateful.
2:59 Speaker 02 Well, we should talk now about how I'm not gifted.
3:02 Speaker 05 Right. There we go. Here we go. Rolling out with Andrea in Texas, she says, Clark answered a question about charitable giving and again failed to mention the brand new 2026 charitable deduction for non-itemizers. There are some rules that apply, but basically, starting in 2026, non-itemizers can deduct up to $1,000, $2,000 for married couples filing jointly for cash donations to public charities. This above the line deduction introduced by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act allows taxpayers taking the standard deduction to also reduce their taxable income by the amount of their charitable cash contributions. Like Clark, I'm a big fan of charitable giving and I'm looking forward to this extra deduction as part of my giving. And a few people wrote in about that.
3:45 Speaker 02 Yeah, and thank you to you and everyone else who mentioned it because most people do not itemize overwhelmingly. It's a small percent of people that itemize. And so people who don't itemize just basically lost out on charitable deductions. And now it's added in as kind of like a bonus under the revisions to the tax code. So thank you and all the others who mentioned it and brought it forward on the podcast.
4:14 Speaker 05 Jim in California says, you shouldn't recommend using text as two factor authentication. I was a victim of SIM swapping and had multiple incidents because my two FAs were being intercepted. They also had access to my email.
4:28 Speaker 02 So somebody was really determined to get after you and that's why new methods of verification.
4:37 Speaker 02 Like pass keys, which are my favorite, things that involve biometrics especially, are way preferable. And if you notice at more and more financial sites, they're trying to get you to migrate from using texting or a notice to your email as the two factor because of exactly this problem, Jim, that happened to you where your accounts were compromised. And then criminals have what they need to try to steal your money. So when you see the option of using pass keys, which sounds more complicated than it actually is, once you use them, are you using pass keys?
5:20 Speaker 05 I am.
5:21 Speaker 02 Yeah, I use pass keys regularly now. It is a much better layer of security than what we've had in the past. And we're moving towards a day that the whole password thing is going to not be needed at a lot of sites because you'll be using biometrics instead of passwords as well.
5:41 Speaker 05 Tim in Florida says, Clark stinks like the free lobster I won at Clambake and accident- accident-mindedly left in my trunk when I went on vacation for a week in August. That's really bad. That's very stinky. You've mentioned how companies constantly bother their customers with emails and marketing campaigns. But every time I open your newsletter, I am asked to subscribe to the newsletter I just opened. A small pop-up window appears every day. I'm already a subscriber. Leave me alone. I hope you can fix that. And the reason that happens is when people block their cookies. If you have cookies enabled with our site, then we know that you've come from there and are subscribed. So as a, I'm sure, a security precaution, a lot of people do block cookies. And so that automatically happens.
6:26 Speaker 02 So there's no way we can prevent that because?
6:29 Speaker 05 I'm going to double check with our tech team though, and just make sure there's no new solution we can do. And I'm sure somebody will write in and tell me I'm an idiot and there's a really easy way to do that, but I'll find out.
6:38 Speaker 02 Well, then we'll have that on Clark's Stinks.
6:40 Speaker 05 Okay. Mitch in Minnesota says, "On the storage unit issue, you stink so much, there isn't a comparable smell. There is no way I would deal with a terrible company like that making me pay extra or move to a similar unit to train me like a rat. That wouldn't happen. I would rather burn my stuff. I'm always disappointed when you bash bad business practices, but then bow down to them. If people keep allowing this behavior, not only does it continue, but it gets worse. That's why I won't own a newer car, play the credit card game, et cetera. P.S. I still love your show."
7:14 Speaker 02 Okay, just in brief, what this is referring to is I was talking about how the storage unit business is all about luring you in with a cheap price. You move your stuff in, or you rent a truck to move your stuff in. And then, once your stuff's there, that teaser rate they gave you vanishes pretty quickly, and the rate goes up and up and up and up on a regular schedule. And this was in context of talking about how U-Haul is experimenting with having a fixed price. You move in, and you don't have to worry about the price going up in short order.
7:53 Speaker 05 Because it happened to you, and you had to move.
7:56 Speaker 02 Oh, yeah. So I moved. And so what we've got here is somebody saying, "Wait a minute, I was being the lab rat. I was just trying to save money. I was willing to move. I've done it twice."
8:07 Speaker 05 A few people also wrote in and said they were very shocked that you would pay for a storage unit and have one. Why do you have that much stuff? Do you want to address that, or should I move on?
8:17 Speaker 02 Marital harmony.
8:21 Speaker 05 Well, that's a good reason.
8:22 Speaker 02 This has been an ongoing conversation we just actually had a couple nights ago about our storage unit. I hate having a storage unit. You know, it's funny is the same day I saw that, there was an item in, I think it was the Wall Street Journal about how one of their writers had spent $100,000 over the years on storage units and realized that the stuff they were storing was never worth as much as it cost them for the storage unit. What am I supposed to do?
8:56 Speaker 05 No.
8:57 Speaker 02 I do what my wife says.
8:59 Speaker 05 There you go. I think that's smart. Phil in Tennessee says, Clark has a small odor here, but there's a Clark world and then there's the real world. Clark would take that used car you're about to buy to a mechanic for a full inspection before you buy it. In the real world, it takes a week to 10 days to even get into a shop around here because of the shortage of mechanics. Not sure who you're ever buying the car from is going to let you keep that vehicle for that long.
9:23 Speaker 02 Well, you are so right. And the good thing is that something that grew out of a place people used to buy used cars a lot, eBay Motors, although I don't hear about them a lot anymore.
9:35 Speaker 05 That's right. Yep.
9:35 Speaker 02 All these pop-up businesses started around the country where you could hire a vehicle inspector to check and you want to make sure they know what they're doing, obviously. But their business is dealing with the clock, you know, how you're on a short timeline to make sure a vehicle is okay. But Phil brings up another very valid point that we talked about months ago about jobs that auto mechanics are way, the average age of an auto mechanic is way older than the average American. And
10:14 Speaker 02 Automobile companies have a really hard time getting young people to consider becoming auto mechanics and there's an enormous need. If you have a family member who's looking for a career and enjoys that, it would pay well and let me tell you, you're needed.
10:31 Speaker 05 Lynda Virginia wrote in with this one. I know you often recommend good 529 plans. While I don't think that advice or you stinks, I have a warning that I think you should include for listeners. Our son's 25. Since both his dad and I have postgraduate degrees, we thought he would go to college and a 529 was started for him. However, without ever attending college, he now has a very good paying job as an IT administrator.
10:54 Speaker 02 Great.
10:54 Speaker 05 He has no plans to attend school and is the beneficiary of a large 529 plan as it has grown amazingly well over the years. So we thought it'd be great for him to transfer the allowable amount to his Roth IRA. But here's the catch. When he wanted to begin rolling over some of the funds, our accountant said he could not. When he turned 21, we changed the owner of the 529 from his dad to our son and the 529 fund automatically opened a new account so the 15-year window began again and he can't put anything into a Roth for many years. So he can't take advantage of transferring a portion of the 529 to grow tax-free in the Roth. Please warn your listeners about this. We should have left his dad as the owner and our son as the beneficiary.
11:34 Speaker 02 Thank you so much for pointing that out because every time you change designations in a 529, the clock does reset to zero. Now here's the good news. What your son should do is set the investments in the 529 as if he's a young kid who's not going to enter college for another 15 years. And that way, in the age-based portfolio, it will go back to a good mix of investments that are very heavily stock-oriented. The money will continue to grow tax-free over these years, mimicking what you'd be doing in a Roth IRA anyway,
12:16 Speaker 02 and then 15 years on, transfer the money year by year to get it into the Roth IRA tax-free with continued tax-free growth and tax-free spending in retirement.
12:30 Speaker 05 Tony in Nevada, Nevada, says,
12:33 Speaker 02 Nevada, yes.
12:34 Speaker 05 "The stench was as bad as that stinky French cheese, Clark." "A listener inquired recently about the New Orleans game in Paris, flying via Milan. For a deal, the flyer should also check out EasyJet and Ryanair. I saved a lot on that route flying on EasyJet. Don't limit yourself to those expensive code share agreements."
12:52 Speaker 02 Thank you, Tony. And having flown Ryanair many times and not been abused yet, despite of all the stories about Ryanair, yes, Europe has a very vibrant, successful, deep-discount airline industry. And they are huge. I mean, Ryanair is now one of the world's largest airlines. And so, getting to and from Europe on a regular fullfare airline, and then flying within Europe on a deep-discounter, is a great idea to save money. But watch some of the YouTube videos on how you fly on Ryanair or EasyJet to avoid having
13:36 Speaker 02 rip-offs that just tear your wallet apart.
13:40 Speaker 05 Gretchen in Washington says, "I love you, Clark, but please tell your listeners about the downside of donor-advised funds. They do not have to donate to the charity you nominate. They are called donor-advised funds because you can only advise them to which charity to choose. According to the Wall Street Journal, no one has ever won a lawsuit against any funds. They can't, because when you set it up, you give control of the money. This is the price you pay for the tax deduction. Far better to just donate the money directly to your charity of choice. You can then carry over any unused credits for five years and avoid the fee the fund charges, so more of your money goes to the charity of your choice. They have refused to donate to certain charities and instead give your money to charities they approve of."
14:22 Speaker 02 Okay, so donor advised funds are a very, very fast growing part of charitable giving. Charities don't like them because money that would have gone to them sooner sits in the DAF, the donor advised fund for a good period of time. If you do your donor advised fund with one of the big outfits like the, the operations from my three favorite children Vanguard, Fidelity and Schwab, they are not likely to restrict who your donations go to as long as it is and must be a charitable organization.
15:02 Speaker 02 And they, I gave money recently from one of our donor advised funds to a children's hospital and they did not approve it right away. And they put it into suspension and said they were going to research it. So they want to make sure that before they donate, that it is a bona fide charity. Obviously, a nonprofit children's hospital is, but they, they did put that one on hold. As far as DAF's refusing to make donations, it is a very rare occurrence that that happens. And usually it'll be an organization that in some way is looked at as a political nonprofit
15:45 Speaker 02 instead of a charitable nonprofit.
15:48 Speaker 05 And I'm going to end with this one, this gem of a Clark stinks from Suzanne, Wisconsin. It's not a Clark stinks, but he'll probably think I stink with this. Clark's great financial advice helped me retire early from marketing and now I have the best fun job in the world, for fun job in the world, teaching personal finance part time. Instead of desks, I have my students sit around tables. To differentiate the tables, I have named one Bogle, one Buffett, one lunch and one Howard. Maybe next year I can rename the table Clark instead of Howard. Thank you Clark and team for all the rich content.
16:25 Speaker 02 Thank you. I love that you are teaching personal finance. Do we need it so badly? Things are so much more complicated than they used to be. How you make decisions. And a lot of that is for the good. It's more free market than we used to have. But then a lot of other things are gotchas. And people really need to have a base understanding of personal finance to not get burned. You know, a lot of people will say, I wish I'd known this 10 years ago or 20 years ago or whatever. So what you're doing is a wonderful thing and I appreciate it so much. And I'm glad that more and more kids to graduate from high school have to complete personal finance curriculum.
17:10 Speaker 02 And they vary in quality, obviously, but I think it's great that, that we're realizing that we're handicapping people when they come into adulthood and don't understand the basics of money. Well, thank you so much, all of you for your posts on Clark stinks. If you're a first timer watching our YouTube show or listening to our podcast and you're like, wow, this is a weird segment. This is the most important thing I think that we've done for the last 25 years. Is it's a way of opening up the microphone essentially. So that things that I missed, things I got wrong, things that I should have addressed are brought forward.
17:53 Speaker 02 And I'm not always going to agree with every post, but they're so valuable. And I'm grateful to you that you post these. And I appreciate you being part of team Clark, spreading knowledge and useful information to your fellow listener and viewer. Coming up ahead, I got to talk about a freight train coming down the tracks. And it ain't your friend. It's what, another travel analogy.
18:21 Speaker 05 Yeah.
18:22 Speaker 02 It's what the airlines are doing to your wallet right now and how you're going to fight back.
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20:44 Speaker 02 Airfares are going crazy. Airlines are facing unbelievable increased costs. Individual airlines...
20:56 Speaker 02 Facing potentially billions of dollars of additional expense because the cost of jet fuel, airlines canceling flights by the thousands, and the airlines frightened by what's happening to their costs from jet fuel have been doing everything they can to get more money out of your or my wallet. Airfares were already trending higher comparing this year to last year because demand had been really strong. And now I saw that United in a briefing for a financial analyst said that their intention is to raise airfares
21:40 Speaker 02 20% from here, 2-0% to deal with the cost of jet fuel. Now, you and I get a vote here. Airlines may think that they control what we're going to pay, but actually, it is a continuing negotiation between you and me and the big airline, small airline or in-between. So, the airlines are going to do everything they can to get more money out of us. I mean, witness the new baggage fees. The airlines have raised baggage fees to the point that
22:23 Speaker 02 checking one bag one way is more than what I paid for my last suitcase because I paid $39 for a suitcase recently when my suitcase died when I was on a trip and I bought a suitcase at Walmart to get home with for $39. It was on clearance. And to check a bag starts with most airlines now at 45 bucks.
22:47 Speaker 02 And then it goes up from there. So one question I have for you, when fuel goes back down and costs jet fuel, do you think the airlines are going to lower their baggage fees at that time? Oh, man, that was cynical. Anyway, the reason they say they're raising the baggage fees is because the fuel and bags cost money for fuel, but certainly not 45 bucks a bag on a trip. JetBlue is doing something even more diabolical. JetBlue is charging based on dynamic demand for bags, meaning that when travel is peaking, the baggage fee will be higher. When travel is softer, the baggage fee will be lower. Tell me how
23:30 Speaker 02 that could be related to fuel. But anyway, the cost of tickets higher and it's clear, but there's still things you can do. Number one is don't. A number of people will shop around for a trip they were thinking of taking. They'll see what the prices are and they're not going to go. And that's a big power. That's a huge power you and I have that we can choose to be bribed into that seat. What do I mean by that? When the price is where you and I are willing to pay, you buy. Now, big mistake is being hyper loyal to a single
24:09 Speaker 02 airline. I shop around every ticket I buy. I shop one way. I shop round trip. I see what's going to be my best way of getting to and from. And because I shop one way, it's very rare that I go somewhere on the same airline I fly back on. That if there's a much cheaper deal, which sometimes there will be, most times not for buying a round trip from a particular airline versus a one way. I find I save quite a bit by being a free agent every time. So my airfare search never starts in an airline's own site.
24:55 Speaker 02 I love using Google Flights. A lot of people really love Hopper. There may be other tools you like. And so when you know you're taking a trip or you're considering taking a trip and it's to a specific place, maybe in a specific time period. The more you shop different airlines and different days of the week going and returning, the more your price comes down. So that's number one. Number two, a lot of people, travel is very, very discretionary. And if you will follow my forever rule, which is buy the deal and then figure out why you want to go there. There will still be sale fares. There will still be places that bookings are soft
25:37 Speaker 02 or times that bookings are soft or a place that is something that a particular airline is having trouble getting market share to on a route. And they're offering deals there and you grab that deal. So what's called for now is enormous flexibility. And for you to consider the death penalty of a trip, which is, I really wanted to go there, but it's too much. I'm not going. That's the power, the ultimate power you and I have is to say, you want that much? You gotta be kidding. I'm gonna do something else with that vacation.
26:20 Speaker 05 All right.
26:22 Speaker 02 You know, I mean, how much of my travel is like, oh, there's a deal there. I'm going. I mean, that's how I, that's always been my mentality.
26:33 Speaker 05 Yeah. Find the deal and then decide why you want to go there. Right?
26:36 Speaker 02 Couple of times it's not worked. I got somewhere and it's like. Oh, that was not my best idea to go there.
26:45 Speaker 05 Winter and, you know, somewhere super cold or something.
26:48 Speaker 02 Like, think about January during the coldest January ever in Prague in the Czech Republic.
26:55 Speaker 05 Yep, that was a staff trip. You know why I don't remember that? Because I was on maternity leave and didn't go on that trip.
27:00 Speaker 02 Oh.
27:01 Speaker 05 And when I saw, I was so bummed. And then I saw, I mean, I wasn't because I had a baby, but still I saw all the pictures of you all and you couldn't even see your eyes because you were all so bundled up and it was like brutal.
27:11 Speaker 02 I remember walking, for those of you who've been to Prague, I remember walking the old bridge. It was six below zero and the wind was going crazy. And I get across the bridge and I don't even remember what I was going to see across the bridge. And I'm just across the bridge and there's a McDonald's.
27:30 Speaker 05 Oh, wow. An oasis for you. An oasis for you.
27:33 Speaker 02 So I go into the McDonald's and it's silent. People are sitting like at every table. Nobody's eating. They're just hunched over.
27:42 Speaker 05 Just unfurling their hands because they're so cold.
27:44 Speaker 02 Escaping the cold. And, you know, I don't do cold well.
27:49 Speaker 05 No.
27:51 Speaker 02 That was, it was a real deal.
27:53 Speaker 05 Yeah. I mean, what a deal. Hey, all right. I've got some questions for you. This first one has to do with travel. Jeffrey in Alaska says, Clark, I know how much you hate to check bags. Me too. Today I have a lot of stuff. I've relented to self-tagging and bag dragging my stuff to the baggage drop counter. Question is, during my advanced booking, I get questions about how many bags that I'm going to check and whether they're oversized. What advantage does the airline have with this advanced information when otherwise I can check in at the airport last minute, do this nuisance myself? I'm in their loyalty program and I get two free checked bags with no charge anyway. Do I get some pat on the back?
28:36 Speaker 02 Okay. All right. So when you do select upfront, you're going to check bags and you go to the terminal and you pop in your frequent flyer number or your record locator for your trip, it knows already that you're checking two bags and prints out the tags. It speeds things up.
28:58 Speaker 02 When you put it in there, but the big one there is wanting to know if you have something oversized, because with these increases, I forget which airline did, but they went to $250 charge for an oversized bag.
29:09 Speaker 05 Wow.
29:10 Speaker 02 Yeah. That's some serious money.
29:13 Speaker 05 Oh, my gosh.
29:14 Speaker 02 So, the airlines make all kinds of extra bank on the oversized bags. And so, they want to get you voluntarily upfront to cough up all that money for them. And by the way, you get two free checked bags by being, you know, some status with the airline loyalty program. And I've noticed all the lowest tier credit cards with tied in with the airlines that are the $100 a year cards, pretty much universally are one free checked bag. And so, with the new baggage fees, if you take two round trips a year and you like to check bags, or you take people with you, everybody on your reservation gets a free bag.
29:57 Speaker 02 It's worth the $100 fee for the card just to get the free bags.
30:04 Speaker 05 Becky in Ohio says, "We'll be traveling to South Africa in June to take part in a safari for one week. How awesome is that? Should we consider subscribing to a VPN for that time? We have traveled in the US, but it's our first time making such a big trip. We want to make sure we're safe."
30:20 Speaker 02 That was another staff trip.
30:22 Speaker 05 Yes, that was the best trip I've in my, of my life.
30:25 Speaker 02 Going, going to a reserve was, I mean, what a, what an incredible experience that is. So VPN, all right. So first of all, I'm going to tell you why so many people taking an international trip get a VPN, because they're sports nuts and they want to be able to pretend they're in the US to be able to watch sports with digital rights allowed. When you're outside the United States, you usually can't listen to your music, can't listen to, can't watch anything. It's US originating content and your streaming services, you can't watch because of digital rights work. So that's the number one reason I'm aware of. People have a VPN on. On their phones when they travel internationally.
31:10 Speaker 02 But the advantage of a VPN is obviously having a virtual private network is the privacy aspect of the data you have. A VPN is not a failsafe. VPNs vary in quality and cheap guy is going to tell you something. There are a lot of free VPNs out there. I actually believe you pay for one. I pay for one. There's too much funny stuff that goes on with a lot of the free VPNs. But as far as a security precaution, VPN by itself does not make your devices secure. It makes information you're transmitting more private.
31:54 Speaker 02 So a VPN, unless you're interested in US-based content while you're overseas, the reason to have a VPN is the same at home as it is overseas, which is private transmission of information.
32:09 Speaker 05 Randy in Virginia says, with all the walking Clark does, does he have a favorite brand of walking shoe?
32:15 Speaker 02 Should I take my shoe off and show it?
32:16 Speaker 05 Sure.
32:17 Speaker 02 The YouTubers. So I wear the Hoka and I buy these. They're so expensive. Hokas are ridiculously expensive. It's like they think I'm buying the whole factory.
32:30 Speaker 05 I'm shocked at what a, that's like a light gray or white. Like you usually have very bright colors.
32:36 Speaker 02 So let me tell you how I end up with the colors I do. This is an Arahi seven, which is a discontinued shoe.
32:43 Speaker 05 Oh.
32:44 Speaker 02 So what happens is if you buy a discontinued Hoka and you buy the color that nobody wants, which for those of you listening, it's what do you call?
32:54 Speaker 05 It's a light gray. I'd say beige gray. Yeah.
32:57 Speaker 02 I can't, it just looks.
32:58 Speaker 05 But your last ones were like orange, I think.
33:01 Speaker 02 Yeah, well, they were, they were the bargain.
33:03 Speaker 05 Right.
33:03 Speaker 02 So I buy whatever the deal is and I buy the last version always. And I went to a Hoka store where they had a device. This was in London and it told me which Hokas were best for the shape of my feet.
33:22 Speaker 05 Oh.
33:23 Speaker 02 And it was this one and another one called the Bondi or?
33:26 Speaker 05 The Bondi, yeah. Did you actually?
33:28 Speaker 02 I didn't like the Bondi.
33:29 Speaker 05 Did you buy Hokas at that store?
33:31 Speaker 02 No, I did not. Are you kidding?
33:34 Speaker 05 All right, speaking, I knew this was gonna be your answer. So after this, so after you answered Randy's question.
33:41 Speaker 02 What an insult you just threw my way.
33:43 Speaker 05 Steven wrote this one to you. Steven in California. I'm about to buy Hoka shoes online when I saw that I could save money if identify myself as a healthcare provider via verify with ID.me. I happily filled out my information to help this app verify that I'm a nurse. Full name, address, birthday, and social security number? Um, no. I immediately stopped. I did not give out my social security number. Should I? Is verify with ID.me legitimate? Who else will have my social security number if I provide this information? I don't know how much of a discount I would have received since I didn't continue verification. The retail shoe price is $180.
34:21 Speaker 02 Wow.
34:21 Speaker 05 With no tax and shipping.
34:23 Speaker 02 Wow, these were, these were 90, which was killer for me.
34:26 Speaker 05 Wow. I really, really like the shoe and brand, but providing my social might be a deal breaker. Any thoughts? Love you all.
34:33 Speaker 02 Okay.
34:34 Speaker 05 We love you too.
34:35 Speaker 02 So Steven, what happens is ID.me is legit. The feds use it to verify you for a lot of services. Guess what the feds are asking for? Same thing. Your social security number. A lot of employer databases operate off of your social security number. ID.me is, is best anything can be, a very secure site. There's always a risk sharing your social security number. And it's supposed to be for a legitimate business purpose, which this would be considered to be, since it generates a discount for you. But I would tell you that if you want to buy Hoka's, you want to shop around more, you'll probably get more of a
35:20 Speaker 02 discount, looking like last version, like I do of the particular Hoka you're interested in, or picking an ugly color. I've had some that make me look like I'm one big clown car, wearing my shoes. I don't care. I just want to be comfortable. So if you're freaked out about giving your social security number, and that feels unsafe to you, don't give it, but just do a better job shopping around for a better deal on those Hoka's. And I want to thank you so much for joining us on today's podcast YouTube show. Hope you have wonderful plans ahead for the weekend.
36:02 Speaker 02 And if you've been really sedentary lately, well, take a message from Stephen and Randy with the walking questions and get out there and walk some. I walk less than I used to. I was walking nine miles a day. Now I average seven miles a day. And why did I go from nine to seven? Because going nine miles a day, and I was doing some walking and running, I still do that at seven, but mostly walking, is I was starting to have more joint issues from going nine miles a day. And so too much of a good thing became a bad thing for me. So I've stepped back to an average of seven miles a day.
36:46 Speaker 02 And that seems to be working for me. So go do something, enjoy yourself, and be careful with your money and know we serve you all weekend long at Clark.com and Clarkdeals.com to help you stretch every dollar. Everything we do is about your empowerment with knowledge so you can save more, spend less, and avoid getting ripped off.
37:17 Speaker 06 Your sausage McMuffin with egg didn't change. Your receipt did. The sausage McMuffin with egg extra value meal includes a hash brown and a small coffee for just $5, only at McDonald's for a limited time. Pricing participation may vary. Promotion pricing may be lower than meal pricing.
37:32 Speaker 07 When you shop pickup at Kroger, you can expect the savings you love and fresh groceries selected just for you. Our associates are committed to getting every detail right, carefully handpicking your items, checking for quality and freshness, and packing your order with care. Because bringing you fresh, quality groceries is what we do best. And right now, enjoy $20 off your first online order of $75 or more. Restrictions apply. See site for details. Kroger, fresh for everyone.
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