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Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

bbc.com

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Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#381

Post by teekert »

mywacaday wrote: post #168
sytelus wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm getting charged by rhapsody.com every quarter for no apparent reason. I used their service like may be 8 years ago. They have a phone number in their merchant line which is invalid. When I filed request to void the charge to American Express, initially they declined! Then I filed appeal with angry comments and they finally voided it. It took over two months for the process. I just saw new Rhapsody charge again. T…

Companies that make it difficult to unsubscribe should be penalised, I live in Europe and got the New York Times on a 12 month trial for €4 a month. Trial just ended and it's now €8 a month, only way to cance is to ring them, have tried once so far and was on hold for 20 mins before I hung up. There should be a law that if you can sign up online you can cancel online.

Yeah, Adobe did this to me, then I reminded them that they broke Dutch law by increasing my contract term by 1 year after a year (this can only be done automatically for a month), after talking to bosses of bosses of bosses they finally ended my subscription.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#382

Post by JMTQp8lwXL »

fedups wrote: post #336
cdolan wrote: post #285

For those in the chat who react by saying “this should be law!” Laws have unintended consequences. Also I subscribe to a number of services I barely ever use, generally because I got in with an account very early on, and the price I’m paying is usually 1/5 or less of the current retail price. I do not want companies to proactively cancel my service. “Thats Absurd!” You may say... well for about 10 years I kept my ori…

Planet money had a story where a similar superficially good idea ended up with Etrade selling a man's Amazon stock and deactivating his account after he didn't log in for a certain period of time. He was able to reclaim about $8000 for stock that would be worth ~$100k today. https://www.npr.org/transcripts/799345159

This is mildly infuriating because the whole point of long term investing is to buy a stock, and well, do nothing -- besides hold it for decades. The stock should continue being held whether a user logs in or not.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#383

Post by spurdoman77 »

sytelus wrote: post #143
goodside wrote: post #55

Years ago, I heard of a dating site doing the opposite of this. They normally sent periodic digests and newsletters to their users to try to increase engagement, but if a user went a certain number of months without logging into their account, but still allowed monthly fees to be charged, they were labeled as a “sleeping giant” in the database. Once in this state, they would not be contacted by the site for any reaso…

I'm getting charged by rhapsody.com every quarter for no apparent reason. I used their service like may be 8 years ago. They have a phone number in their merchant line which is invalid. When I filed request to void the charge to American Express, initially they declined! Then I filed appeal with angry comments and they finally voided it. It took over two months for the process. I just saw new Rhapsody charge again. T…

Report your old card stolen, and renew the card. Also makes sense to use virtual cards for future purchases.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#384

Post by virgilp »

heavenlyblue wrote: post #351
virgilp wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you not call the bank to block the card on account of fraud and get a new one? The subsequent payments would surely be declined...

In the UK, last time I did this my bank themselves have shared the updated details with which they could charge me again.

Ugh, that sucks. I've changed banks for less.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#385

Post by svara »

They know how to treat their customers. Meanwhile, cancelling a Wall Street Journal subscription online is simply impossible, they have you call their hotline. Unless you're in California, in which case you can cancel online. It's ridiculous and frankly should be illegal.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#386

Post by ricotico060 »

svara wrote: post #385

They know how to treat their customers. Meanwhile, cancelling a Wall Street Journal subscription online is simply impossible, they have you call their hotline. Unless you're in California, in which case you can cancel online. It's ridiculous and frankly should be illegal.

Couldn’t agree more, tried to cancel my membership a week ago and just didn’t because the process was so long

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#387

Post by _squared_ »

dylan62 wrote: post #177

Netflix impressed me recently with how easy they made it for me to cancel my subscription. It means I will have no hesitation to re-subscribe in future, should I feel the urge. I just wonder how long it will last. It sometimes feels like all the big successful consumer companies become accountancy-driven scumbags sooner or later. Fingers crossed Netflix can buck the trend and stay a nice company to deal with.

Netflix joined the Motion Picture Association not so long ago. I'd recon they are well into the transition from startup mentality to dominant bureaucracy-driven business mentality.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#388

Post by tracer4201 »

mywacaday wrote: post #168
sytelus wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm getting charged by rhapsody.com every quarter for no apparent reason. I used their service like may be 8 years ago. They have a phone number in their merchant line which is invalid. When I filed request to void the charge to American Express, initially they declined! Then I filed appeal with angry comments and they finally voided it. It took over two months for the process. I just saw new Rhapsody charge again. T…

Companies that make it difficult to unsubscribe should be penalised, I live in Europe and got the New York Times on a 12 month trial for €4 a month. Trial just ended and it's now €8 a month, only way to cance is to ring them, have tried once so far and was on hold for 20 mins before I hung up. There should be a law that if you can sign up online you can cancel online.

California has such a law, and at least on one website I changed my address from WA to California do it would show me the option to cancel directly on the website.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#389

Post by tlrobinson »

goodside wrote: post #55

Years ago, I heard of a dating site doing the opposite of this. They normally sent periodic digests and newsletters to their users to try to increase engagement, but if a user went a certain number of months without logging into their account, but still allowed monthly fees to be charged, they were labeled as a “sleeping giant” in the database. Once in this state, they would not be contacted by the site for any reaso…

This is also the reason I almost never sign up for yearly plans. I'm much more likely to unsubscribe from something I don't use if I see the credit card charge monthly.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#390

Post by steelframe »

spurdoman77 wrote: post #383
sytelus wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm getting charged by rhapsody.com every quarter for no apparent reason. I used their service like may be 8 years ago. They have a phone number in their merchant line which is invalid. When I filed request to void the charge to American Express, initially they declined! Then I filed appeal with angry comments and they finally voided it. It took over two months for the process. I just saw new Rhapsody charge again. T…

Report your old card stolen, and renew the card. Also makes sense to use virtual cards for future purchases.

> Report your old card stolen, and renew the card.

As someone who shops online at a much wider diversity of vendors than amazon.com, My card actually gets compromised about once a year and needs its number changed. I don't mind the hassle because it forces me to update the payment method for my recurring charges. On more than one occasion when I re-evaluated whether I really still needed some random subscription, I decided that it wasn't worth it any more to me.

On that note, I'm amazed how many accounts with outstanding balances have been next to impossible to close out by simply sending a physical check to an address. On the phone, they insist, "If you'll just give us your new credit card number, we'll get this all taken care of now." I respond, "I'm not giving you my credit card number because I don't trust that you'll actually stop charging me. I'm happy to send you a check in the mail to pay off my balance." Then it's often, "Uhhhhh, I don't know how to do that. My computer program requires that I enter your credit card number in this field to process. Please just give me your credit card number and stop making my life so difficult."

By the time everything is said and done (and escalated), they always end up finding a way to accept a check in the mail.

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