I very rarely refund anything, but when I do, I send a single email that I want a refund and if it isn't done promptly I will chargeback. It's usually the best customer service I get. No security questions, no Indian call centres, no "are you sure" questions. I don't blame people for just hitting the dispute button though. Years of piss poor customer service has conditioned it.
The madness of SaaS chargebacks
21–30 of 117 posts
Re: The madness of SaaS chargebacks
#22We have very few chargebacks, not even 10 in 10 years and we consider us lucky. Stolen credit card happens more often than chargeback. I don't attribute it to better messaging or easier cancellation options, we do the same as many others, I guess it's just the type of product of customer. Even in HN comments I've seen people saying they use temporary card numbers (valid for one transaction only) or click a button to…
> They must've had bad experience with companies in the past?
Ever used a gym, airline, or subscribed to a newspaper? Many businesses are genuinely customer-hostile.
Re: The madness of SaaS chargebacks
#23Add a warning email 24 hours before the transaction. In the subject put "You'll be charged $10 for renewal in 24 hours".
> we also provide a simple, self-service way to cancel the subscription
It's hard to comment without seeing screenshots and description of the process. When people are cancelling under a perceived threat (will be charged otherwise), any inconvenience will become an extreme one.
Re: The madness of SaaS chargebacks
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, we’ve had a few cases where people tried card testing through us. But we noticed quickly and introduced the proper limits. In general, if you redirect the user to Stripe Checkout after clicking Subscribe button, all of that should be handled by Stripe itself and not affect your account. I guess )) But this is a slightly different story. With chargebacks, almost every time it was just a customer not wanting to ad…
Yep so strange given it is never easy to get a charge back. Doing one now and it is like pulling teeth. I would heavily chase up a traditional refund before doing a charge back. I suspect some banks are making it too easy.
To be honest, I’ve never personally filed a chargeback, so I don’t really know how difficult the process actually is ))
Re: The madness of SaaS chargebacks
#25> What I don’t understand is why some people can’t just reach out and request it — instead of going straight to a chargeback. Customers don't want to "reach out" if it means hunting deep in their account settings to find the cancel button, or calling a number which may or may not lead them through an endless phone tree to waste 5 minutes talking with someone on the retention team reading from a script. People don't r…
What I don't understand is why my banking app does not show a "cancel subscription" button with the payment.
When I click that button, the recurring payment is automatically canceled, and the SaaS company can check that and know that I unsubscribed. Or something along these lines.
There is already a power-asymmetry between consumers and companies. This should not extend to unsubscribing. Here, the consumer should have all the power.
Re: The madness of SaaS chargebacks
#26"Banks almost always side with the cardholder, even when we provide clear logs and evidence."
-- sigh unfortunately it's the opposite in 3rd world countries like Indonesia. I've had my cards physically stolen on the airplane. Despite having all the evidence and common sense ("I'm in city X airport and the disputed transactions happened in city Y, you're saying I went there immediately after landing and return to the airport just to queue for immigration, all in an hour?"), none of the banks accepted my chargebacks that I filed few hours after incident.
The banks are Bank Mega (national, private), BNI (state-owned) and DBS.
Re: The madness of SaaS chargebacks
#27I very rarely refund anything, but when I do, I send a single email that I want a refund and if it isn't done promptly I will chargeback. It's usually the best customer service I get. No security questions, no Indian call centres, no "are you sure" questions. I don't blame people for just hitting the dispute button though. Years of piss poor customer service has conditioned it.
We always issue a refund if a customer asks, or at least try to find a compromise if the payment was made a very long time ago. In that case, it’s usually more about a pro-rated refund.
But recently I asked for a refund from a very popular project management system, and it was a nightmare, an absolutely terrible experience. After that, I gained a new level of respect for our own support team ))
Re: The madness of SaaS chargebacks
#28> What I don’t understand is why some people can’t just reach out and request it — instead of going straight to a chargeback. Customers don't want to "reach out" if it means hunting deep in their account settings to find the cancel button, or calling a number which may or may not lead them through an endless phone tree to waste 5 minutes talking with someone on the retention team reading from a script. People don't r…
What I don't understand is why my banking app does not show a "cancel subscription" button with the payment. When I click that button, the recurring payment is automatically canceled, and the SaaS company can check that and know that I unsubscribed. Or something along these lines. There is already a power-asymmetry between consumers and companies. This should not extend to unsubscribing. Here, the consumer should hav…
How would this be tooled? A chargeback, a deep link to the cancel page, an API connection between bank and subscription?
Chargeback is easy because it's under the card co's control. Deep link would require knowing the cancel page of every sub, plus handling auth factors. API connection would two way integration, with scoped auth between every bank and every service. Hopefully managed by an SI or aggregator, but the business model sounds hard (the bank doesn't mind the chargeback, the SaaS doesn't want the cancelation, so who pays?)
Re: The madness of SaaS chargebacks
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
> no ridiculous fees incurs .. to the user. What do they charge the vendor, or it just the 30% of every transaction (which some might consider ridiculous).
That's the point, I don't subscribe to the idea that %30 is ridiculous if you don't have a full blown department to handle that. Can be argued that Apple should give people that option but for anyone who minds being charged $43.95 for transaction that goes badly will be beter off to pay Apple and have piece of mind as long as their margins allow that.
Would you prefer to be charged $43 for 1 in every 100 $10 transactions, or $3 for every $10 transaction?
edit: comment below reminds us that unhappy customers can get you banned entirely https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45248686
Re: The madness of SaaS chargebacks
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yep so strange given it is never easy to get a charge back. Doing one now and it is like pulling teeth. I would heavily chase up a traditional refund before doing a charge back. I suspect some banks are making it too easy.
To be honest, I’ve never personally filed a chargeback, so I don’t really know how difficult the process actually is ))
Yes for me it is last resort. Email chains go nowhere. Mentioned consumer protection laws but nothing. It's the next step before small claims court. Not having a fun day if doing a chargeback. It's very rare.