Click-to-Cancel
The US Federal Trade Commission on Wednesday announced a final “click-to-cancel” rule that aims to simplify the process of ending unwanted subscriptions to products and services.
[…]
“Too often, businesses make people jump through endless hoops just to cancel a subscription,” said FTC Chair Lina Khan in a statement. “The FTC’s rule will end these tricks and traps, saving Americans time and money. Nobody should be stuck paying for a service they no longer want.”
FTC (Hacker News):
The final rule will provide a consistent legal framework by prohibiting sellers from:
- misrepresenting any material fact made while marketing goods or services with a negative option feature;
- failing to clearly and conspicuously disclose material terms prior to obtaining a consumer’s billing information in connection with a negative option feature;
- failing to obtain a consumer’s express informed consent to the negative option feature before charging the consumer; and
- failing to provide a simple mechanism to cancel the negative option feature and immediately halt charges.
While it was good that in some cases customers could get easier cancellation by paying for an additional layer such as the App Store, I think it makes sense to just make these bad practices illegal.
Cemented by AOL in its heyday, and perfected by everybody from the Wall Street Journal to your broadband and wireless phone provider, corporate America loves to make it as annoying as possible to simply cancel services, often actively hiding any way to do so.
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Most of the FTC’s new guidelines will go into effect in 180 days, with some in effect within 60 days after publication in the Federal Register. The rulemaking updates started way back in 2019. There’s a fact sheet here that explains the proposal in more detail.
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Trade groups representing everything from media companies and telecoms to car wash operations called the rules “burdensome and unnecessary.” Publishers and Advertisers like the News/Media Alliance also complained about the rules, insisting they would “confuse customers“ (one alliance group member, the WSJ, worked for years to make subscription cancellation as annoying as humanly possible, and didn’t seem too upset about consumer confusion at the time).
Previously:
- U.S. Sues Adobe Over Subscriptions
- Amazon Prime Dark Patterns Lawsuit
- Amazon to Drop Prime Cancellation Dark Patterns in Europe
- Click to Subscribe, Call to Cancel
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This is a great example of what kind of policies we should be seeing. It’s great that specific companies have gotten chased down over this in the past, but a blanket-ban is exactly what we need.
True story: When Apple News+ first debuted, I decided to give it a six month trial and called the Chicago Tribune to cancel my existing sub on the premise that I’d come back if News+ didn’t work out, but that I’d made the decision and wouldn’t be talked out of it.
Indeed, after a few months, probably only two, I bailed on News+. But I didn’t return to the Tribune because even though I expressed up front my intentions and reasons, it still took me carving through 45 minutes of debate with the rep I got, who tried every sales pitch he could (except listening to me) to keep me as a customer. Eventually, having lost patience, I just stopped responding until he gave up and processed the cancelation. He had the gall to ask me to stay on the line for a survey, and I said something unkind and hung up before he could finish the thought.
I honestly would have resubscribed to the Trib after News+ flopped for me, but the thought of ever having to cancel again prevented me from doing so. I’m sure they’ve run the numbers and decided being customer-hostile is a net win for business, but I will never again pay for any publication that employs that sort of practice, so at the very least, my money is off their table directly because of this.
Similar annoyance was New York Times. Not sure if they still do this, but one time I signed up for a one-year promo rate. All through the year, I checked under My Account, and there was a button to Cancel Subscription. I thought, great, they've made it easy now. But since it bills month-to-month, you can’t cancel until the last month. BUT, once you get within 30 days of your impending renewal (at 10x the price), they REMOVE that button, and the process changes to a forced Chat or phone call. Evil, dark pattern.
