Today I learned about the Gulf Rupee

Today I learned that the Gulf Rupee, which was issued by the Government of India and the Reserve Bank of India, was the official currency between 1959 and 1966 of the areas that today form the countries of Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, and the United Arab Emirates. It was initially pegged at par with the Indian rupee. A Wikipedia page on this is here. The Reference site for Islamic Bank Notes writes about it here.

Walmart Discontinues Savings Catcher

Starting today, 14 May 2019, Walmart has discontinued its price-matching program named Savings Catcher. The price-matching program, that automatically refunds customers any price difference between Walmart and its competitors, is popular among its shoppers. In its email to customers, Walmart has said that it is ending the program because it already offers the lowest prices in most cases.

The text of the email read like this:

Dear Customer,

Here at Walmart, we’ve always been committed to providing you with low prices every day, so you and your family can save money and live better. Savings Catcher, which compares nationally advertised prices through submitted receipts, was designed to catch occasions when a competitor’s price on a particular item was found to be lower than what you paid for it at Walmart.

What we’ve learned through Savings Catcher is that our efforts to lower prices upfront on thousands of items across our stores is working. Walmart’s prices win most often when you submit your receipts, which tells us that the program’s intent has been met.

That’s why we have decided to discontinue the Savings Catcher receipt submission, effective May 14, 2019. After May 14, you will no longer be able to submit your Walmart Pay eReceipts to Savings Catcher. But don’t worry, the money you have on your Savings Catcher eGift Card will remain yours to spend until you’re ready to use it.

We want to thank you for your loyalty and your participation in the program. We’ll continue to work hard to offer you features and services that deliver on our promise to save you time and money—whether you’re shopping in our stores or online at Walmart.com.

Questions? Learn more about this change here.

Sincerely,

Your Walmart Savings Catcher Team

The price matching program was convenient and appealing to many shoppers at Walmart. The refund was in the form of money reloaded onto an eGift Card on the Walmart mobile app which could be spent either at Walmart or Sam's Club. When a price match is done, an email is received stating the same. Here is a part of an email which was received on August 10, 2018.

Since the announcement of the discontinuation of the program, there is general outage in social media from Walmart's customers.

A user on Twitter wrote:

Walmart PLEASE reconsider your decision to do away with Savings Catcher. Your reasons do not seem to be legit. This helped me so much. I got cash back most of the time and am very disappointed with you. #SavingsCatcher

— Kimberly Guajardo (@kimbow72) March 21, 2019

Earlier, on October 29, 2018, Walmart had made a change in its terms of using Savings Catcher such that the price-matching program would be applicable only if customers paid using Walmart Pay in their mobile app. Paper receipts scanned using the app would no longer be considered under the program. Payment using the Walmart Pay mobile app is done by scanning a QR code at the register which generates an eReceipt. The eReceipt can be directly submitted to participate in Savings Catcher right from the app.

A WRAL story on this news is here.

A Business Insider article is here.

1TB microSD cards showcased at Mobile World Congress

Micron and Western Digital’s SanDisk brand both showcased their UHS-I microSDXC products at the Mobile World Congress which is being held in Barcelona, Spain.

Whereas Western Digital's 1TB SanDisk Extreme® UHS-I microSDXC™ card can reach a read speed of 160 MB/s [source], Micron Technology's Micron c200 1TB microSDXC UHS-I card can reach a read speed of 100MB/s [source].

The Verge has lots of details here.

Google Maps will now display speed limits for its Android and iOS apps

The new feature, spotted by Android Police (via Mashable), displays the posted speed limit on roads in the corner of the app, and also introduces an icon to denote the location of speed cameras.

https://www.theverge.com/2019/1/19/18189559/google-maps-speed-limits-android-and-ios-apps

American Express Confirm Card Search in Google vs Bing

In this post I will describe how you need to tread cautiously while activating a new American Express credit card based on my experience.

So, you have received a brand new American Express (Amex) credit card and you are excited to confirm it on their website and start swiping.

You know that you have to confirm the receipt of the card on their website before using it - as that's what the mailer says as it tell you to visit "americanexpress.com/confirmcard". So you fire up your browser, but you are feeling lazy today, so instead of typing that URL on your browser's address bar you just search for "american express confirm card" on your default search engine. This post compares between the results that you get in Bing and Google as of October 16, 2018.

Bing

The screenshot below is what was seen on Bing. Have a look at it then you can read on.

"American Express Confirm Card" on Bing

So, the first result on the first page is a phishing scam. If you are careful enough to identify that this resulting page is not what an American Express web page should look like, you could be giving out you personal (financial) details to a scammer.

Phishing Website

The rest of the Bing results on the first page on seems fine with some pointers to the original Amex website or some other blogs.

Google

The search on Google does not point to the actual "Confirm Card" web page, but most results are from the original Amex website.

"American Express Confirm Card" on Google

Please leave comments below. If there is anything specific that you want me to check out and write on, do leave me a note.

Google+ shutting down for consumers

Siting several privacy issues with the Google+ APIs, a blog post by Google announced the shutting down of Google+ for consumers in the coming 10 months.

Music I'm listening to in 2018

Here is a quick log of the music albums that I have been listening to this year.

1. Sankalan (Bengali Tagore Songs) / Supratik Das
2. Best of Debabrata Biswas (Songs of Rabindranath Tagore) / Debabrata Biswas
1. Catalog Number: IP 5006 Hindustan Record
3. Ami Je Jalsaghare / Manna Dey
1. Catalog Number: CDF 142032 Saregama
4. Aguner Parashmoni Choao Prane / Hemanta Mukherjee
5. Sonu Ke Titu Ki Sweety / Various Artists
1. Catalog Number: SFCD 1-2503 T-Series
6. Bandho Bhangar Chhanda: Rhythmic Songs of Tagore / Kamalini Mukherji
1. Catalog Number: CDNF 143443 Saregama
7. Call of the Valley / Pt. Shiv Kumar Sharma, Pt. Brij Bhushan Kabra and Pt. Hariprasad Chaurasia
1. Catalog Number: CDNF 150008 Saregama
8. Atom Heart Mother / Pink Floyd
1. Catalog Number: PFR5 Pink Floyd Records
9. Bangerz / Miley Cyrus
1. Catalog Number: 88883-74526-2 RCA
10. Awaaz / Jagjit Singh
11. Sarbonaash / Shilajit
12. Bandook / Nikhil Kamath
1. 1643 Worldwide Records
2. I like the song Mirgtrishna Marusthal which is sung by Jagjit Singh
13. Pink Friday / Nicki Minaj
1. 276 476-9 Young Money Entertainment
14. John Denver's Greatest Hits / John Denver
1. 82876 69376 2 RCA
15. Invasion of Privacy / Cardi B
1. Atlantic
16. Born This Way / Lady Gaga
1. B0015602-72 Streamline Records
17. Songs Of Experience / U2
1. Island Records
18. Melody Road / Neil Diamond
1. B002184202 Capitol Records
19. Erik Satie: Piano Music / Roland Pöntinen
1. BIS
20. Cha / Chandrabindoo
21. Emotions / Mariah Carey
1. Legacy Recordings
22. The Pinkprint / Nicki Minaj
1. B0022251-02 Cash Money Records
23. Best Of Dark Horse 1976-1989 / George Harrison
1. Dark Horse Records
24. The Wall / Pink Floyd
1. Columbia Records
25. Out of Time / R.E.M.
1. Warner Bros. Records
26. Who Made Who / AC/DC
1. Atlantic Records