Netflix stops charging customers who never watch • Hacker News Board

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#421

Post by koheripbal » Sat, May 23, 2020, 4:15 PM UTC

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.

It's easy to be noble when you're making more profit than God.

The real test is how they behave when competition heats up.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#422

Post by jaybeeayyy » Sat, May 23, 2020, 4:19 PM UTC

danlugo92 wrote: post #345

lucasverra wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yeah, when i saw that i got so mad that I created a virtual credit card, changed the billing method, and then deleted the card. You can not imagine the big smile on my face when i received the email "we cannot charge you".... Reaaaaaally big smile on my face

How can i create such a virtual card?

Some credit card companies have card generators (Capital one has Eno, Amex has one I believe, Citi calls it Virtual Card Generator etc) but you can also use privacy.com, revolut and I think there's an app called token or something?

I think I pay for everything online with my privacy cards now. It's just easier to keep track of stuff when you get alerts after a company charges a closed card, or tries to charge you more than your card limit that you set up.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#423

Post by gizmo » Sat, May 23, 2020, 4:20 PM UTC

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.

Email them and say you want to cancel and state that you're deaf so you can't do it over the phone. They have to oblige because of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#424

Post by war1025 » Sat, May 23, 2020, 4:27 PM UTC

perl4ever wrote: post #408

war1025 wrote: post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do people really have the same credit card number for that long? I feel like every year I end up with a new card for one reason or another and suddenly I have to track down all the places that can no longer process my payments. I learned that you can request a replacement card with the same number, which I was initially very excited about. But when you get the new card it has a different expiration date, so it still…

In my (recent) experience, periodic charges are automatically applied to a new card, even if it has a new number. For your convenience, if you forgot to update your payment info...

Well I guess maybe I don't need to worry about it as much then. You'd think companies would do a better job informing people of that.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#425

Post by drdec » Sat, May 23, 2020, 4:43 PM UTC

ryandrake wrote: post #325

tialaramex wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you've got here is an is/ought distinction. You're telling me how you think the universe ought to be but my advice was about how the universe is .

I suppose what OP is saying is, if an innovative company figured out how to do those things, obviously using the technology/universe we already have, then they'd have him as a customer and/or investor. They'd have me too. These are all great consumer-focused features that would be game-changers for a credit card company. It's simply utterly bananas that all it takes is for someone to get a few numbers from me, and th…

Isn't this what Venmo and Zelle are doing (sorry US perspective here)? The trick is to get companies to accept payments via those methods where the customer has control over the recurring payment.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#426

Post by antoinec » Sat, May 23, 2020, 4:49 PM UTC

kchr wrote: post #406

bcrosby95 wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My wife has an old gym membership for 24 hour fitness. She pays $120/year. Never uses it. Figures it's good "whoops, you're homeless" insurance - it's a place you can get dressed and take a shower.

Wow, that's one use of the gym card I never considered. Genious.

Not sure where it was, but I remember reading about someone saying, from experience, that when you are about to become homeless, signing up for a yearly gym membership is one of the best things to do (for this specific reason!).

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#427

Post by orhmeh09 » Sat, May 23, 2020, 5:08 PM UTC

perl4ever wrote: post #412

seesaw wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I only use virtual cards for online payments. I use Citi and they have an option to generate a card with specific amount and expiry.

Last I checked, Citi's virtual card feature inexplicably requires Flash. I was like "I thought that was dead?"

This was true for Bank of America, too, at least in December 2018.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#428

Post by baby » Sat, May 23, 2020, 5:12 PM UTC

bcrosby95 wrote: post #366

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…

My wife has an old gym membership for 24 hour fitness. She pays $120/year. Never uses it. Figures it's good "whoops, you're homeless" insurance - it's a place you can get dressed and take a shower.

I personally stopped paying my previous gym membership because I was not going anymore, fuck year membership.

They emailed me a few times telling me I had to continue paying until the end of the membership, then called for a few months (never picked up), and now it's all gone.

Maybe my credit suffered, I have no idea, but I couldn't care less. I do not want to be a slave to this "credit score".

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#429

Post by _jal » Sat, May 23, 2020, 5:16 PM UTC

distances wrote: post #330

Kye wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are people out there who make enough money that they don't bother with an item-by-item check of each charge. I can't blame them. Being that careful is a huge cognitive load that scales with the number of charges even if it comes back to bite them when times aren't so good.

Now that I think of it, in the US people probably pay everything with a credit card? That would definitely be a longer list of expenses to check. In Europe the default is to use debit for physical card transactions, and credit much more rarely mostly for subscriptions and online purchases.

Debit cards are pretty popular in the US. Cash is used more than in Europe, partly because about 20% of the country doesn't have a bank account, partly because a significant number of who do still prefer using cash.

Personally, I use cash for day-to-day transactions, credit if I want the third-party record or it is a larger transaction. I never use debit because the protections are stacked against the user, and CC cash back schemes refund a portion of the credit card cartel tax. So not using it except at the bank ATM means I don't have to worry about the number being abused, unless my bank's ATMs are compromised.

Re: Netflix stops charging customers who never watch

#430

Post by 0ld » Sat, May 23, 2020, 5:17 PM UTC

Kye wrote: post #304

distances wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does this even happen? I'm just curious here. Don't you check your bills? I find it hard to imagine I would miss a recurring payment on my credit card receipt.

There are people out there who make enough money that they don't bother with an item-by-item check of each charge. I can't blame them. Being that careful is a huge cognitive load that scales with the number of charges even if it comes back to bite them when times aren't so good.

my current bank app (in europe) just sends me a push message on any transactions made in my name. and the previous bank had a sms service for the same

not much cognitive load or anything (i disabled sound for these and just check em once a day) and very hard to miss any transactions you didn’t really authorize