Nice. I canceled a service recently and I had to "continue to cancel" and click on other such "confirmations" such that I think I proceeded through 7-8 pages before my subscription was actually canceled. Truly manipulative and obtuse. That was Spotify btw. I should have recorded the process, as it was nearly comedic (if it weren't so hostile).
Amazon is the worst in this regard.
FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
81–90 of 793 posts
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#82Earlier quoted context omitted.
NYTimes already allows cancelling online for most subscriptions, so I imagine this won't be a big issue for them.
That depends on what state you're in right? (i.e. California customers can cancel online, but Wisconsin ones need to talk to an agent)
I'm in Texas and was able to cancel online. It was slightly frictional. I had first paused my subscription. Apparently you can't cancel if your subscription is paused, so I had to reinstate the sub to cancel.
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#83> will require sellers to make it as easy for consumers to cancel their enrollment as it was to sign up. I am very curious what exactly this means? Is it the number of pages or forms you had to fill out? People you had to talk too? So if for my internet I had to have someone come out to install it before service would start could they argue that they require someone to physically come out to turn off service? Or a ca…
They didn't require someone to come out to get you signed up for service.
Litigation could resolve malicious attempts to "complicate" signups for the purposes of complicating cancellation.
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
Posted elsewhere in this thread but here is the reasoning why from Melissa Holyoak, who voted no. This rule goes further than just the cancellation mentioned in this article and there are some legitimate concerns with that. It is unclear but I think Melissa Holyoak would have voted yes if it was just the cancellation rule. https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/holyoak-dissent...
[flagged]
Automatic renewal is convenient and appreciated when you like the service.
It's a dark-pattern underhanded dirty trick when you don't.
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#85[deleted]
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sure, that is how it was designed. The reason it doesn't work that way anymore is because of a continuous parade of states violating Americans' rights, each one so egregious that people said "yeah, it was designed the way macinjosh describes, but boy it turns out a lot of these state 'cultures' or 'identities' are producing despicable outcomes for our fellow Americans, and we should step up to prevent those abuses."
"I know better than the people that voted for their own state government so I am going to force my will upon them." Mindsets like this are actually why democracies fail.
What?
In that case, why have a state government? Why not have everything determined county-by-county?
In fact, why have it be county rule? Why not just neighborhood by neighborhood?
You place the locus of control according to the problems you need to solve. Neighborhoods combine to cities combine to counties combine to states combine to countries in order to be competitive and thrive against the broader environment. Yes, it does typically entail a loss of autonomy, but the benefit is that your little independent enclave doesn't get taken over by the next-strongest neighbor.
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
NYTimes already allows cancelling online for most subscriptions, so I imagine this won't be a big issue for them.
That depends on what state you're in right? (i.e. California customers can cancel online, but Wisconsin ones need to talk to an agent)
IIRC they implemented online cancellation everywhere a while back.
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#88> will require sellers to make it as easy for consumers to cancel their enrollment as it was to sign up. I am very curious what exactly this means? Is it the number of pages or forms you had to fill out? People you had to talk too? So if for my internet I had to have someone come out to install it before service would start could they argue that they require someone to physically come out to turn off service? Or a ca…
[deleted]
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#89Earlier quoted context omitted.
"I know better than the people that voted for their own state government so I am going to force my will upon them." Mindsets like this are actually why democracies fail.
What? In that case, why have a state government? Why not have everything determined county-by-county? In fact, why have it be county rule? Why not just neighborhood by neighborhood? You place the locus of control according to the problems you need to solve. Neighborhoods combine to cities combine to counties combine to states combine to countries in order to be competitive and thrive against the broader environment.…
Why vote at all? You don't care about the consent of the governed, we should just make you chairman of the federal government and have your enlightened rule bring us to a new era of prosperity!
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
[flagged]
> this is the actual faithful steelman argument for the people who vote against this. My argument is different. There should not be any regulation except where existentially necessary (e.g. you need government to manage an army, because otherwise someone else will conquer the country, this sort of thing). Sure, most rules sound good in isolation. But in aggregate you end up with huge administration and 50% marginal t…
> Not able to cancel a subscription easily after you willingly enter into a relationship with some business is too tiny an issue to merit expanding the government monster.
So in your world, I have to protect my credit card details from all evil people in the world forever (and also somehow prevent them from acquiring companies that I've previously given my details to), because it's okay for a company to keep charging my credit card forever, even if I don't want or use the service.
This is pretty much an argument for legalizing theft.