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A few weeks ago, Clark told you about some trouble he had with Orbitz during a recent trip to visit his affiliates at WDBO in Orlando. After he went on the air with the story, he realized that he hit a nerve with people who have had trouble booking travel online. The Orbitz customer no service experience prompted Team Clark to take a look at Travelocity and Expedia. Clark's producer Kim had to contact Expedia 8 times to get a response. Travelocity answered promptly, but here's the sad truth about Orbitz, Expedia and Travelocity: None of them have real travel agents answering the phones. They outsource customer no service across the globe to people who may have never left the borders of their own country. Why would you pay these companies a service fee to book with them when you can't get an experienced travel agent to help you?

Clark and Christa were recently in Milwaukee visiting affiliates at WTMJ. Clark was reading the Financial Times of London and there was an insert about Mauritius. That's where Clark's initial call to Orbitz was bounced. During the call, he spoke to a lovely woman with an intriguing accent who wasn't really able to help resolve his issue. That's symbolic of the problem with customer service at these online travel sites. Know that if you do book with these big outfits, they all deliver major customer no service. After all, there aren't any actual employees or actual travel agents available to help you!

Were you frightened by your local newscast last month trumpeting warnings about trace amounts of pharmaceuticals in your drinking water? Clark believes these reports had more to do with sweeps week in the TV world than with an actual threat. Either way, the bottled water industry must have loved the news; they just got to sit back and pick up market share. But one recent study found that 40% of bottled water is just repackaged tap water. Plus, tap water is constantly tested to ensure safety. There is no equivalent for bottled water. Clark is more worried about al-Qaeda than killer tap water.

As a 17-year veteran of TV reporting, the penny-pinching guru knows that February, May and November are the months when ad rates are set based on how that month's news stories pop. So be careful with your TV during those 3 months. The news teams are trying to excite you, titillate you and make you fearful -- anything to raise ratings and drive up ad rates. Take it all with a grain of salt and wash it down with a glass of tap water. Think about it: How many people do you know who have suffered harm from tap water?

RIP-OFF ALERT: Clark is steaming because the IRS has spent $40 million to mail out propaganda to the American people about the economic stimulus payments (aka "the rebates"). But who among us didn't know about the rebates? What's the point in spending an extra $40 million on top of the $150 billion the government had to borrow to fund the rebates in the first place? This is yet another indication that the Politician Protection Act of 2008 (Clark's name for the stimulus package) is malarkey. The politicians want you to take the money; blow it to artificially prop up the economy; and then vote them back into office. But here's a better idea: Take it and pay down your debt. That's how you can make a real lasting impact on your financial house. The government is mortgaging your future, and you have to counteract that.

RIP-OFF ALERT: Have you been enticed on the Internet with offers of free iPods, free computers, free flat-screen TVs and free vacations? If so, don't click through on those pop-ups or banner ads! Online marketer ValueClick has been fined $3 million for ripping people off with these kinds of false Internet come-ons. If you did click through on such ads, you'd have to navigate through multiple screens of sales pitches and surveys. Some people fell for the promise of free goodies and purchased what was being sold -- all in the hopes that it might improve their chances of getting that free iPod or free vacation.

Clark's producer Kim admits to having clicked through on these kinds of ads when she was enticed by an offer of an advance DVD copy of the third season of ABC's Lost. She clicked through multiple screens for about 15 minutes and eventually just closed out of her browser in frustration. Pop-up blockers have really helped to minimize the intrusion of these kinds of ads. But there are still embedded banner ads that tout this kind of stuff. Just before Christmas, the very popular Nintendo Wii seemed to be the product of choice for the scammers to promise you. Just know this: When somebody touts something for free, it's probably anything but that.