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I analyzed SaaS billing dark patterns

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Re: I analyzed SaaS billing dark patterns

#121

Post by indus »

CPLX wrote: post #52
indus wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting idea. But isn't there a risk that if the company that gets your certified mail, reads it, and then cancels your account?

Sure I suppose that's a risk. But then they'd be in breach of the contract since the letter definitely doesn't say to cancel the account, it says that this is notice given to all extant notice clauses that could result in additional billing, renewal, and so on. It's worded well I'm paraphrasing. As a practical matter though I don't think there's much to worry about. These guys don't have a process to field letters li…

> The joy comes from the elegance of it all. If they want to play a game of exploiting the fact that people don't read the fine print then they should be prepared for a fair contest.

:clap:

Re: I analyzed SaaS billing dark patterns

#122

Post by indus »

notyourday wrote: post #24
brooklinnash wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's your thought on alternatives, like Ahrefs' $7 for 7 days trial?

Unrestricted service at the highest plan level, 1 to 2 weeks, credit card not only required but is authorized for the plan price - do not settle transaction as it is still a free trial. This ensures: 1. Whoever tries the service at least theoretically met minimum qualification to be a customer - they have a credit card and can authorize several hundred dollars on it. 2. We get the real lead. 3. We limit the number of…

Interesting take.

Hotels do it, authorize you for N nights during check-in capture/sale during check-out.

Re: I analyzed SaaS billing dark patterns

#123

Post by rovr138 »

heavyset_go wrote: post #113

The dark pattern I like the least is the one where providers do not let you set a limit or budget for charges to your account per billing period. For example, I've yet to find a cloud provider that lets you, say, put a $200 a month spending limit on your account. The best we get is a notification system.

Imagine the issues on something like AWS, Google Cloud, Digital Ocean, Rackspace, etc.

Imagine if a company sets a limit. One that allows for burst and growth. Then they forget to update it, and then one day, all their servers, data and everything else is gone.

Even if things are offline, they accrue costs, so the only thing to do when a limit is reached is destroy everything.

What’s the balance?

Re: I analyzed SaaS billing dark patterns

#124

Post by heavyset_go »

rovr138 wrote: post #123
heavyset_go wrote: post #113

The dark pattern I like the least is the one where providers do not let you set a limit or budget for charges to your account per billing period. For example, I've yet to find a cloud provider that lets you, say, put a $200 a month spending limit on your account. The best we get is a notification system.

Imagine the issues on something like AWS, Google Cloud, Digital Ocean, Rackspace, etc. Imagine if a company sets a limit. One that allows for burst and growth. Then they forget to update it, and then one day, all their servers, data and everything else is gone. Even if things are offline, they accrue costs, so the only thing to do when a limit is reached is destroy everything. What’s the balance?

> Then they forget to update it, and then one day, all their servers, data and everything else is gone. Even if things are offline, they accrue costs, so the only thing to do when a limit is reached is destroy everything.

That's not the only thing you can do.

It takes quite a while from non-payment for OVH to take down their clients' services and delete their data, for example. They give customers a month long grace period before taking their service offline, and then there's another waiting period before they delete the data. At any point clients can resume service with payment.

Re: I analyzed SaaS billing dark patterns

#125

Post by [deleted] »

Msw242 wrote: post #82
kevincox wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Credit cards act as a "cost" of sorts. Credit cards are a limited resource, it is not free to acquire more credit cards. By requiring a valid credit card you are basically relying upon the verification that credit card issuers do to prevent unlimited abuse.

Virtual cards solve this. Create a card with $1 limit. Problem solved.

[deleted]

Re: I analyzed SaaS billing dark patterns

#127

Post by scrose »

SavantIdiot wrote: post #83

Forgetting to kill your cloud instances and getting charged isn't a dark pattern, no more than forgetting to fill your gas tank isn't an automotive manufacturing dark pattern, or leaving your water running in the basement sink and forgetting all winter and then having a fight with your husband just before Christmas because the water bill is $1000 and you're the only one that uses the basement utility sink but only in…

Forgetting to shut down an instance in the cloud is the least worrying problem. In AWS, everything has a price. And some things don’t have a price until they’re the only thing left(ie. Elastic IPs that only charge once they are not assigned to an instance). For someone new to AWS and testing things out, a closer analogy would be like moving into a new house and trying to find out which pipes are leaking

Re: I analyzed SaaS billing dark patterns

#128

Post by phist_mcgee »

SavantIdiot wrote: post #83

Forgetting to kill your cloud instances and getting charged isn't a dark pattern, no more than forgetting to fill your gas tank isn't an automotive manufacturing dark pattern, or leaving your water running in the basement sink and forgetting all winter and then having a fight with your husband just before Christmas because the water bill is $1000 and you're the only one that uses the basement utility sink but only in…

I would say it's dark because the platform does not usually place any emphsasis in letting you know it's still there or not. There are no built in safety rails (like a check fuel light) that can help. These platforms are designed to be obtuse.

Re: I analyzed SaaS billing dark patterns

#129

Post by sillycube »

The payment gateway HyperWallet doesn't even let me send email to them without an account. I want to ask the transaction fee before joining but you need an account. I don't understand what service level it is.

It's under Paypal so I don't feel surprised at all. Just another enterprisey payment company

Re: I analyzed SaaS billing dark patterns

#130

Post by mahalol »

bredren wrote: post #96
jpomykala wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think we are on the same boat. How to do detect abusing the service?

Multiple consecutive signups from the same IP address is one way. But as GP said, this and other signals require coding abuse detection, and then you must find a way to enforce this. This is not the kind of activity you want to be involved in while validating a product concept and working toward pmf.

In NZ some ISPs use cg-nat meaning that you will have many people under one public IPv4 address. Going by this logic you could ban a whole ISP in one go.
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