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US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

arstechnica.com

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Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#411

Post by antonvs »

pinkmuffinere wrote: post #407
marricks wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a pro business anti consumer supreme court which knows it’d be dangerous to appear that way. Government and court will hamstring their ability to help consumers. My favorite comment on HN was some law student saying his prof said “Scalia is the most complicated supreme court member whose views are always unpredictable” and the commenter said “he’s just a corporate hack who always votes for corporations and backs…

> they rightly commented that if this was allowed to stand, the FTC and every government agency would just always estimate low in these cases. I think you missed this — it isn’t some arbitrary reason to rule in an anti-consumer way. There is good reason to do so. Imo we should keep our checks and balances strong, and this is one small action that does that.

> Imo we should keep our checks and balances strong

I think the tense of this sentence is not quite right. Something more like "Make checks and balances strong again" would work.

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#412

Post by Glyptodon »

ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #346

From the article >"While we certainly do not endorse the use of unfair and deceptive practices in negative option marketing, the procedural deficiencies of the Commission's rulemaking process are fatal here," As with a lot of judge rulings, and what they're always supposed to do, they ruled on what the actual law is and not just on what sounds good. >The FTC is required to conduct a preliminary regulatory analysis wh…

$100 million or more rule seems silly when that's the cost of ~10 stoplights and there are like 33 million businesses in the US.

But it also seems ridiculous to skip since four people doing nothing but having a discussion about a new rule for 30 minutes across a good portion of those businesses is easily $100mil w/o them even having to lift a pinky besides.

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#413

Post by Glyptodon »

rtkwe wrote: post #342
caesil wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you actually bother to click through and read the article, you'd find the court expressed sympathies with the intent of the rule, but the FTC "is required to conduct a preliminary regulatory analysis when a rule has an estimated annual economic effect of $100 million or more", and they did not do that. The blame here belongs to the FTC for its rushed and sloppy process that put the rule on shaky ground legally.

Depends on how accurate you think the >$100 million estimated impact from the lower court is. When the FTC did the analysis they came up with a lower impact so they didn't have to do it. I'd be more willing to believe they got it right than a single judge did.

The main reason I think the court got it right is that with ~33 million businesses in the US you could argue that sending every business an email would cost them >$100 mil in just labor cost if they forward it a few times and several employees spend a reasonable amount of time reading it.

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#414

Post by TheCoelacanth »

hiAndrewQuinn wrote: post #359
GolfPopper wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's described here is really just legalized thievery with extra steps. "We make it difficult to stop paying us" versus "we charge extra for the privilege of not making it difficult to stop paying us" is just fraud versus extortion. That one or both may be technically legal is no excuse.

It's not legalized thievery to make it nonfree to exit a contract you voluntarily signed up for in the first place. That's ridiculous and hyperbolic. People do it all the time, at all levels of scale and severity. You might as well take issue with the US government not having a "click to cancel" option on NATO or something.

If it was an actual contract that you signed, then I might agree, but this is just clicking a button on a website. That type of "contract" should be sharply limited in what terms it can include.

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#415

Post by bluGill »

standardUser wrote: post #366
bluGill wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is false. The conservatives have made it clear that they support the rule, but it needs to be done right. The real question is why are liberals willing to ignore the law?

> The real question is why are liberals willing to ignore the law? I hope you don't get accidentally deported to a foreign prison by those lofty conservatives who are SO concerned with following the letter of the law. But yeah, when a far right court digs up a technicality that just happens to serve the corporate interests that line the pockets of those who appointed these judges well... that's the justice you must t…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism

I do not defend conservatives when they don't follow the letter of the law. Except perhaps in cases where the law itself is unjust - however that is not your argument here so we can ignore that. There have also been cases where I didn't understand the full law and so have had to change my mind once I realized what I'm missing - but that doesn't seem to be the case here either.

On topic is a violation of the law. It isn't just a technicality here either, it is a big deal that when there are large effects of a potential rule we ensure we take the time to figure out what the real effects of it are. There are all too often unexpected downsides to some rule/law and when those downsides are bad enough the results can be worse than the problem you are trying to prevent. (it might not be in this case - but time was not given to figure out if that is the case so we don't know)

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#416

Post by rsanek »

apwell23 wrote: post #269
whamlastxmas wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use privacy dot com cards I can turn off in a single click

doesn't stop it from being sent to collections. wtf are ppl downvoting this. i had it happen to me.

once something is in collections, you can negotiate to pay a fraction of the original price. it's actually harder to do so before then.

or, you can just not pay even through collections. rarely does it impact credit score (much). lots of kinds of debt even legally can't (eg <$500 medical debt)

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#417

Post by pinkmuffinere »

antonvs wrote: post #411
pinkmuffinere wrote: post #407

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they rightly commented that if this was allowed to stand, the FTC and every government agency would just always estimate low in these cases. I think you missed this — it isn’t some arbitrary reason to rule in an anti-consumer way. There is good reason to do so. Imo we should keep our checks and balances strong, and this is one small action that does that.

> Imo we should keep our checks and balances strong I think the tense of this sentence is not quite right. Something more like "Make checks and balances strong again" would work.

Haha, ya I agree with that too

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#418

Post by bluGill »

jordanb wrote: post #336
bluGill wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It better fits the facts that the incoming FTC wants this, but they want to do the job right. At least some of the incoming FTC was in place when they rule was passed in the first place and their statements then say they wanted the rule but they wanted the correct procedures done so that it would stand up in court.

If they wanted to change how they implement the rule they could have withdrawn it rather than continue to an adverse judgement in court. Basically the FTC is required to go through a lengthy (probably multi-year) impact analysis if they determine that the rule will cause more than $100 million in impact to the US economy. The previous administration determined that this rule would not meet the threshold, allowing qui…

You would have attacked them for withdrawing the rule as well. You have setup a can't win situation and then are attacking someone for losing.

If Liberals really wanted this rule they would have followed the law. Evidence is the conservatives when this was passed objected because the law was not being followed. They were then left in this can't win situation.

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#419

Post by blacksmith_tb »

Glyptodon wrote: post #413
rtkwe wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depends on how accurate you think the >$100 million estimated impact from the lower court is. When the FTC did the analysis they came up with a lower impact so they didn't have to do it. I'd be more willing to believe they got it right than a single judge did.

The main reason I think the court got it right is that with ~33 million businesses in the US you could argue that sending every business an email would cost them >$100 mil in just labor cost if they forward it a few times and several employees spend a reasonable amount of time reading it.

Luckily not all 33M of those businesses are wringing subscriptions out of their customers (yet), so it might be fairer if we could narrow it down to the subset who do?

What's more interesting to me is the court is basically admitting that doing the right thing for customers will cost unscrupulous businesses more than $100M they're currently fleecing those customers for, so they won't let this go ahead.

Re: US Court nullifies FTC requirement for click-to-cancel

#420

Post by rsanek »

pona-a wrote: post #189
everdrive wrote: post #188

One consequence here that people need to think about is that ALL subscription services should be viewed with suspicion. Once you sign up how much of your life will be deranged simply by trying to cancel the service. It's a hidden cost which shouldn't be forgotten.

So there's a business argument for this regulation. If the consumers feel unsafe giving their credit cards to most companies, they'll spend less on subscription services in total, harming the industry more than they gain from milking zombie customers.

i mostly use Robinhood virtual cards for services now. if i want to cancel i just cancel the card.
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