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In practice this never happens. I wouldn’t worry about this unless it has happened to you at least once.

by matte_black 8y ago

Silhouette 8y ago
In practice this never happens. Why do you think that?
- matte_black 8y ago
  Because I’ve done it a few times and nothing happened.
  - Silhouette 8y ago
    Then perhaps you've just been lucky. Sometimes merchants might decide it's not worth the trouble to go after you for a small amount, for example. For comparison, I work on a service that uses recurring billing, and we have wording in our legal terms specifically so we can go after you for things like the cost of recovery as well if you abuse us like this. Our lawyer didn't include those words just for fun.
    - matte_black 8y ago
      How many users do you go after per month?
      - Silhouette 8y ago
        Not very many. We don't use dark patterns and make it easy for people who want to cancel a subscription, so it's not a problem we have for the most part. But on the relatively rare occasions that someone has been abusive -- the kind of person who repeatedly tries to sign up under different aliases and get a bit more for free in violation of terms, for example -- we can and sometimes do take action, and we have never lost. It's a little disturbing that so many people's reaction here is apparently a form of wilful ignorance. You can downvote or make comments about how this has never happened to you or talk to your attorney or whatever if that makes you feel good, but your opinion does not change the legal situation: cancelling a payment method is not generally equivalent to cancelling a legally binding contract, and the advice to rely on doing so could lead to people being the wrong side of a real legal action, paying recovery costs that far exceed the original size of the debt, damaging their credit, etc.
    - toufiqbarhamov 8y ago
      Abuse? I record all calls I make to customer service entities, with the opening, “Hi, I’m recording this call.” So yeah, in the four or five times I’ve had to do this, no one was dumb enough to take me to court, and if they did they’d lose. I make sure that I don’t use a service without paying for it, I make it clear what’s going happen and tell them to stop the service and that I’m going to stop payment. If they can’t manage that, by all means, talk to my attorney.
      - kstrauser 8y ago
        When the phone tree says “this call may be recorded”, thank them for granting you permission.
        matte_black 8y ago
        If you don’t consent to being recorded, they are required to serve you in an unrecorded line. And if they cannot, then you have been denied service. And if you’re denied service, you cannot cancel. So run the chargeback.
        ox_cable 8y ago
        Um, no. That's not accurate at all. Maybe it's different outside the US, but many states are "single-party consent" states, meaning you don't need permission to record them and vice-versa. The biggest reason that many companies disclose the fact that they're recording the call is that you might be calling from a location that requires consent from all parties; they want to cover their butts.
        matte_black 8y ago
        I was mostly referring to here in California, but it would also apply to: Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Washington.
      - Silhouette 8y ago
  - briandear 8y ago
    I run a small SaaS and people sign up, forget they signed up and then dispute the charge. I have always won those disputes. A failure to cancel isn’t the same thing as you were charged inaccurately. How am I supposed to know you intend to cancel without you actually cancelling? Should I just lock people out of their accounts each month until they proactively renew? Subscription pricing is just that: subscription pricing. If you want to buy a single newspaper, you pay a higher price than if you are a subscriber? You get a cheaper price because you are subscribing. So how do I know you actually “cancelled” if you didn’t? Am I obligated to provide you service and then you decide after the fact that you don’t want to pay? Newspapers don’t refund your past subscriptions just because you claim you didn’t read the paper. That’s not my problem. A subscription is a contract, an agreement, a deal. When you sign up for something, you are agreeing to the terms. If you don’t like them, don’t sign up. But disputing a valid payment is nothing more than theft. Forgetting you signed up isn’t an excuse. Of course it’s a different story if you did cancel and they keep billing — that is absolutely wrong. But just because you forgot isn’t a valid excuse. How are we (the service provider) supposed to know if you forgot? We are still providing you the service — whether you use it or not isn’t our concern just as newspapers aren’t obligated to ensure that you actually read the paper every day. Auto-renewing free trials however, that is a bit deceptive, so I agree with Mastercard’s approach.
    - staticassertion 8y ago
      > But disputing a valid payment is nothing more than theft. I'm always happy to steal from companies that turn my free trials into subscriptions. I'd steal more if I could. You're coming at this as if the service provider is innocent, and merely providing a service. But we're talking explicitly about companies that give you free trials with the "asterisk, ps, you will pay real money in for this every month on this".
      - jasonkester 8y ago
        asterix As in you were skimming through the signup and didn't notice the part where you typed in your credit card details and clicked the subscribe button? That seems unlikely. If you don't want to buy something, the best policy is not to buy it. Then you won't have bought it by accident and have to get your bank involved to unbuy it.
graton 8y ago
It happened to me with 1and1.com. They renewed my domain name (for one I didn't care about) and my card had already expired. So instead of not renewing the domain, they renewed it and then billed me and sent it to collections. It hit my credit report but I mailed the collections agency a dispute asking them to prove it was a legitimate debt and they ended up dropping it. I don't do any business with 1and1.com anymore. This was back in 2012.
- SmellyGeekBoy 8y ago
  Wow, now there's a blast from the past. I've had nothing but bad experience with 1and1, as a result I also no longer do business with them anymore.

In practice this never happens. I wouldn’t worry about this unless it has happened to you at least once.

Silhouette 8y ago

In practice this never happens. Why do you think that?

matte_black 8y ago
Because I’ve done it a few times and nothing happened.
- Silhouette 8y ago
  Then perhaps you've just been lucky. Sometimes merchants might decide it's not worth the trouble to go after you for a small amount, for example. For comparison, I work on a service that uses recurring billing, and we have wording in our legal terms specifically so we can go after you for things like the cost of recovery as well if you abuse us like this. Our lawyer didn't include those words just for fun.
  - matte_black 8y ago
    How many users do you go after per month?
    - Silhouette 8y ago
      Not very many. We don't use dark patterns and make it easy for people who want to cancel a subscription, so it's not a problem we have for the most part. But on the relatively rare occasions that someone has been abusive -- the kind of person who repeatedly tries to sign up under different aliases and get a bit more for free in violation of terms, for example -- we can and sometimes do take action, and we have never lost. It's a little disturbing that so many people's reaction here is apparently a form of wilful ignorance. You can downvote or make comments about how this has never happened to you or talk to your attorney or whatever if that makes you feel good, but your opinion does not change the legal situation: cancelling a payment method is not generally equivalent to cancelling a legally binding contract, and the advice to rely on doing so could lead to people being the wrong side of a real legal action, paying recovery costs that far exceed the original size of the debt, damaging their credit, etc.
  - toufiqbarhamov 8y ago
    Abuse? I record all calls I make to customer service entities, with the opening, “Hi, I’m recording this call.” So yeah, in the four or five times I’ve had to do this, no one was dumb enough to take me to court, and if they did they’d lose. I make sure that I don’t use a service without paying for it, I make it clear what’s going happen and tell them to stop the service and that I’m going to stop payment. If they can’t manage that, by all means, talk to my attorney.
    - kstrauser 8y ago
      When the phone tree says “this call may be recorded”, thank them for granting you permission.
      - matte_black 8y ago
        If you don’t consent to being recorded, they are required to serve you in an unrecorded line. And if they cannot, then you have been denied service. And if you’re denied service, you cannot cancel. So run the chargeback.
        ox_cable 8y ago
        Um, no. That's not accurate at all. Maybe it's different outside the US, but many states are "single-party consent" states, meaning you don't need permission to record them and vice-versa. The biggest reason that many companies disclose the fact that they're recording the call is that you might be calling from a location that requires consent from all parties; they want to cover their butts.
        matte_black 8y ago
        I was mostly referring to here in California, but it would also apply to: Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Washington.
    - Silhouette 8y ago
- briandear 8y ago
  I run a small SaaS and people sign up, forget they signed up and then dispute the charge. I have always won those disputes. A failure to cancel isn’t the same thing as you were charged inaccurately. How am I supposed to know you intend to cancel without you actually cancelling? Should I just lock people out of their accounts each month until they proactively renew? Subscription pricing is just that: subscription pricing. If you want to buy a single newspaper, you pay a higher price than if you are a subscriber? You get a cheaper price because you are subscribing. So how do I know you actually “cancelled” if you didn’t? Am I obligated to provide you service and then you decide after the fact that you don’t want to pay? Newspapers don’t refund your past subscriptions just because you claim you didn’t read the paper. That’s not my problem. A subscription is a contract, an agreement, a deal. When you sign up for something, you are agreeing to the terms. If you don’t like them, don’t sign up. But disputing a valid payment is nothing more than theft. Forgetting you signed up isn’t an excuse. Of course it’s a different story if you did cancel and they keep billing — that is absolutely wrong. But just because you forgot isn’t a valid excuse. How are we (the service provider) supposed to know if you forgot? We are still providing you the service — whether you use it or not isn’t our concern just as newspapers aren’t obligated to ensure that you actually read the paper every day. Auto-renewing free trials however, that is a bit deceptive, so I agree with Mastercard’s approach.
  - staticassertion 8y ago
    > But disputing a valid payment is nothing more than theft. I'm always happy to steal from companies that turn my free trials into subscriptions. I'd steal more if I could. You're coming at this as if the service provider is innocent, and merely providing a service. But we're talking explicitly about companies that give you free trials with the "asterisk, ps, you will pay real money in for this every month on this".
    - jasonkester 8y ago
      asterix As in you were skimming through the signup and didn't notice the part where you typed in your credit card details and clicked the subscribe button? That seems unlikely. If you don't want to buy something, the best policy is not to buy it. Then you won't have bought it by accident and have to get your bank involved to unbuy it.

graton 8y ago

It happened to me with 1and1.com. They renewed my domain name (for one I didn't care about) and my card had already expired. So instead of not renewing the domain, they renewed it and then billed me and sent it to collections. It hit my credit report but I mailed the collections agency a dispute asking them to prove it was a legitimate debt and they ended up dropping it. I don't do any business with 1and1.com anymore. This was back in 2012.

SmellyGeekBoy 8y ago
Wow, now there's a blast from the past. I've had nothing but bad experience with 1and1, as a result I also no longer do business with them anymore.