Live data from Hacker News

California law requires businesses to let you cancel your subscription online

niemanlab.org

341–350 of 554 posts

Re: California law requires businesses to let you cancel your subscription online

#341

Thank god for that. I made the mistake of joining a Goodlife gym in Canada many moons ago... The place was disgusting. Always crowded. Mould growing in the bathrooms. Stunk very badly, etc... So I stopped going regularly... and one day I was in the area I decided to stop in and cancel my membership. "Oh sorry, you'll need to make an appointment with management in order to cancel." "OK, is a manager in right now?" "Ye…

The abuse of politeness appears to be the cornerstone of our society.

My name is MEGACORP. I am a member of the polite society that contains us both. A polite person follows the rules with a smile. The rules say that I get to eat you.

Re: California law requires businesses to let you cancel your subscription online

#342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a poor analogy, because the service of car parking is already available to everyone. A better analogy might be sidewalk ramps, which probably get used ten times more often for prams (strollers) than for wheelchairs. If they were absent or faulty, complaints by owners of prams can help grease the wheels of local government.

Sure, the service of cancellation is already available to everyone too. I also don't see how a sidewalk ramp is a better analogy since it's pretty obvious when someone needs to use it at the same time so that you can know you're not getting in their way. Over here you have no idea.

Car parks are a scarce resource. If I use a car space, I am monopolising the resource for the duration.

Sidewalk ramps are not a scarce resource; my use of them doesn't in any way detract from their use by a disabled person. Any visible use of them ultimately benefits everyone.

Online cancellation (compared to telephone cancellation) is like the latter, not the former.

Re: California law requires businesses to let you cancel your subscription online

#343

Wow, just the right article at the right time: today after seeing SiriusXM charges of ~ $20 monthly for subscription, to my huge surprise, I searched for online cancellation, only to find none exists. I called them to cancel and indeed ended up not canceling, rather getting a promo deal. I really love SiriusXM while driving, but that lack of online cancellation completely annoyed me.

[deleted]

Re: California law requires businesses to let you cancel your subscription online

#344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's probably disputable as in violation of their merchant agreement, but yeah most people will just suffer under the consequences instead of pushing back.

“However that doesn’t stop them from trying to collect payment directly from consumers. A review of some merchant agreements found online were silent on the issue of whether they can subsequently try to collect from consumers. And when we asked the major card companies whether their merchant agreements restrict this practice, only American Express responded, saying in an email that, “American Express has an establish…

Interesting. I guess it doesn't violate the merchant agreement...

...which makes sense in that a valid debt can't be invalidated by a chargeback. But it doesn't turn an invalid debt into a valid one either.

And if you have a contract that you cancel in accordance with the contract (e.g. making the required request to the required phone number then limiting your call to a reasonable duration after doing so), charging back charges for periods after your payment obligation ends shouldn't give them a valid basis to send you to collections, contract or no contract.

They would be unable to prove a valid debt in that case, so a dispute with the debt collector and/or credit bureaus would get it off your credit.

Re: California law requires businesses to let you cancel your subscription online

#345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously. And if that doesn't work, try "I hate you"

My dad used to use "I'm unemployed and have no money" on telemarketers, with some success. Though nowadays, in the era of pervasive financing and Wall Street investors that care more about revenue than cash flow, I wonder if that would even work. Maybe "I'm being investigated by the Feds and all of my financial relationships are considered suspect, and so would prefer to have as few of them as possible"?

> My dad used to use "I'm unemployed and have no money" on telemarketers, with some success.

I've tried telling the truth, I've tried assertively stating I'm not interested, I've tried so many things...

...at this point, when I pick up a call, I wait for the other side to introduce themselves, and if they call with an unsolicited offer, I just hang up without saying anything. Am I a bad person?

Re: California law requires businesses to let you cancel your subscription online

#346

Thank god for that. I made the mistake of joining a Goodlife gym in Canada many moons ago... The place was disgusting. Always crowded. Mould growing in the bathrooms. Stunk very badly, etc... So I stopped going regularly... and one day I was in the area I decided to stop in and cancel my membership. "Oh sorry, you'll need to make an appointment with management in order to cancel." "OK, is a manager in right now?" "Ye…

> When my turn came... I just said "I'm moving to england and I don't know a single person here who might want to absorb my contract".

I actually came here to say the same thing. I realized “I’m moving” was the best way to get results in these situations when I was actually moving out of the country for a bit. It’s like a magical incantation that immediately gets them to stop trying to upsell or retain you, no questions asked.

Re: California law requires businesses to let you cancel your subscription online

#348

Thank god for that. I made the mistake of joining a Goodlife gym in Canada many moons ago... The place was disgusting. Always crowded. Mould growing in the bathrooms. Stunk very badly, etc... So I stopped going regularly... and one day I was in the area I decided to stop in and cancel my membership. "Oh sorry, you'll need to make an appointment with management in order to cancel." "OK, is a manager in right now?" "Ye…

The best thing to do is issue a chargeback. You tell the credit card company that you 1) tried to cancel, and they wouldn't do it; and 2) you did not get any service from them since you tried to cancel.

They have to pay you back AND THEY GET CHARGED an additional $20-$30 that your credit card company takes from them as punishment.

Please don't abuse chargebacks unless the merchant deserves it, though.

Re: California law requires businesses to let you cancel your subscription online

#349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, the service of cancellation is already available to everyone too. I also don't see how a sidewalk ramp is a better analogy since it's pretty obvious when someone needs to use it at the same time so that you can know you're not getting in their way. Over here you have no idea.

Car parks are a scarce resource. If I use a car space, I am monopolising the resource for the duration. Sidewalk ramps are not a scarce resource; my use of them doesn't in any way detract from their use by a disabled person. Any visible use of them ultimately benefits everyone. Online cancellation (compared to telephone cancellation) is like the latter, not the former.

> Sidewalk ramps are not a scarce resource; my use of them doesn't in any way detract from their use by a disabled person. Any visible use of them ultimately benefits everyone.

> Online cancellation (compared to telephone cancellation) is like the latter, not the former.

Wait, what? No, it's like the former. How do you know these agents handling your cancellation weren't assigned to handle similar cancellations from other deaf customers? How do you know the representatives don't have to go through extra procedures (such as documenting and obtaining authorizations for the non-standard cancellation, or bothering more reps to figure out whom to forward the inquiry to) that wouldn't take them far more time than it would take the phone agent? Meaning you could well be taking up a resource that was reserved for disabled folks, slowing down the responses for them in the process. Heck, even if the amount of time spent isn't any more than for a phone call, it's likely to be a separate set of agents handling these special requests than taking calls, meaning you'll still be slowing down this service for those who actually cannot use the phone.

What I find baffling is that neither you nor anybody else is making the most compelling counterargument I can see here, which is that cancellations aren't time-sensitive, so a slower reply would be unlikely to do anyone much harm as a result of slow service. Meaning it's one way you could argue disabled people are not suffering any tangible harm from slow replies. But to argue that it doesn't even affect the service provided to them in the first place is bizarre, especially if you think about what would happen if tomorrow everybody decided to follow this advice and do the same thing.

Re: California law requires businesses to let you cancel your subscription online

#350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple iTunes based subscriptions also have a very easy way to unsubscribe, probably to the chagrin to companies which use them.

I wouldn't call "having to open a separate, unrelated app, visiting its homepage, entering your Account area, finding the Subscriptions list" easy. Easy would be: - Open app with subscription - Go to settings - Find subscriptions

It’s far easier than having to call anyone
Post reply on HN