Russell Simmons debit cards fall flat

Russell Simmons' post Def Jam career has seen him running a debit card service for people who can't access ordinary banks, Rushcard. The cards already have a faint whiff of exploitation about them - Time in 2013 pointed out that the fees piled up really quickly for users - and now the cards have locked themselves up. Users have found themselves unable to access any of the cash locked into the card for over a week.

Yes, that's right. The sort of people whose hand-to-mouth existence means they can't open everyday bank accounts have been unable to access their money for eight days.

They're blaming a problem with an upgrade to a computer system, which everyone believes because there's no way that they'd have been able to roll that back, right?

Russell Simmons, to be fair, hasn't vanished. But he's... well, he's not exactly helping, either:

Praying for this who have been and those who still are affected by the tech change at Rushcard

— Russell Simmons (@UncleRUSH) October 17, 2015

Oh yes. Praying. Nothing says "the company is just experiencing a mild technical problem" like the figurehead having to call in favours from God.

The company has promised a fee holiday until the end of February, although that will only become useful if people are able to access their funds before then.

Elton dumped and fuming

Hell hath no fury like a fabulous celebrity scorned. Elton John was supposed to go on a dinner date with a banker, Spencer Lodge.

Not in a skulky, behind David Furnish's back sort of date. This was one that Lodge had bought in one of Elton's charity auctions.

But it turns out you can't trust Lodge. Imagine that - a banker who doesn't stick to his word. The money never turned up, and now Elton is pursuing legal action:

[A] source close to Sir Elton said: ‘Both David and Elton, and everyone involved with the EJAF are really angry about this.

‘Elton is not personally hounding the man and demanding the cash, but he is fully supportive of the legal proceedings to benefit the charity,’ the Daily Mirror reported.

I love the reassurance that Elton isn't personally turning up at Lodge's house, yelling through the letterbox.

[Thanks to Michael M]