In New York: Miss Lonelyhearts Many Times Over

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Dear Action Line:

One night while I was watching the Late Show—I always watch the Late Show while I'm doing my ironing, ever since I started getting these terrible shooting back pains if I ironed during As the World Turns, just like the pains my older sister used to get before they operated on her varicose veins—anyway, this guy comes on during the Late Show and he's demonstrating the Miracle Vegetronic. You know, the one that slices, dices, cubes, chops, grates, shoestrings and shaves a tomato so thin you can read a newspaper through it? Well, I sent in my $10.27 plus postage and handling to Fly-by-Day Enterprises, P.O. Box 18,274, Ocean View, Kans., and it's been seven years now and I haven't heard. Can you help me?

Mrs. J.A., Nader Heights

Dear Mrs. J.A.:

You are in luck. Action Line has just returned from the first national Action Line Conference, sponsored by the Corning Glass Works in Corning, N.Y., a graceful old mill town tucked, as one company official puts it, "in the valley of sand and imagination." Action Line met more than 100 fellow problem-solving columnists—who are also known as Mr. Fix-It, Mr. Action, Call for Action, Action for You, Help Desk, Hotline, Tell It to George and other reassuring names—as well as assorted government and industry consumer-movement watchers.

In Corning, Action Line learned that since the first such column appeared in the Houston Chronicle in 1961, the idea has spread to some 400 papers, from the New York Daily News (circ. 2 million, the nation's largest) to the mighty Logansport (Ind.) Pharos-Tribune (circ. 16,502).

And not a moment too soon. As life and fine print grow more complicated, all those champions of the downtrodden, avengers of the defrauded and writers of wrongs find themselves very much in demand. Last year Action Line columns answered more than 2 million complaints. Action Lines unmask unscrupulous repairpersons, humble haughty bureaucrats, chasten heartless computers, stay the hands of overeager credit companies, track lost merchandise to the ends of the zip-coded universe and locate spare parts for Polish-built refrigerators. They are the new Miss Lonelyhearts, multiplied many times over. As White House Consumer Adviser Esther Peterson told them, "You are a growth industry. I salute you for raising the awareness of the public."

Action Lines in attendance also raised their own awareness. They learned that mail-order merchandise is the most common target for complaints (followed by automobiles, home repairs, government agencies, utility companies, landlords and retail stores). The columnists were only dimly aware of the magnitude of the mailorder problem until their get-together. Then passing mention of the phrase "five towels for a dollar" sent a tidal wave of groans across the hall.

The consumer helpers were also only dimly aware of each other until the conference. "These people are so damn excited to see each other that they stay up most of the night talking," reported a bleary-eyed Ken Rashid, an official of the federal Consumer Products Safety Commission. In the bars, halls and hospitality suites of the Corning Hilton, Action Lines told each other their troubles. Not their troubles, mind you, but other people's.