I don't think the Biden administration gets enough credit for its very consistent pro-consumer and anti-monopoly stance. It's not a top-of-mind issue to most voters, as it's something most people only think about when they're annoyed, but I think aggressive enforcement in these areas is ultimately much better for the economy than the free-for-all scam ethos offered by the MAGA candidate.
FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
581–590 of 793 posts
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#582My workaround to this has been to email the company telling them I want to cancel. Once I either don't get a reply, or get a reply saying "just call us and we'll cancel!", I dispute the next charge with American Express and have the email record of trying to cancel. I believe they also offer a "stop allowing charges by this merchant" feature that cuts off future charges.
This is good to know. I had Dropbox billing through PayPal and could never cancel charges in anyway through the Dropbox site. Realized I had to disassociate PayPal and the recurring charge said “payment failed”. Finally effectively canceled.
Speaking to owners of server hosts, I think this is pretty common; PP ghost subscriptions continue after the mervhant removes it.
It happened to me once after I deleted a subscription for a server on my dashboard, yet was still being billed.
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#583Earlier quoted context omitted.
At least they didn't make you make a phone call and have a rep try to prevent you from doing so for an hour (looking at you NYT).
NYT has had click to cancel for a few years at this point. Were they later than they should be? Yes. Are they bad now? No.
Not bad now? Yeah, right. They're still barely complying with the law.
I hope this new law comes with domain cancellation and registration blocking penalties.
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#584When people try and say that regulating stuff like this is impossible, I often think about how unreasonably great the regulations around “Unsubscribe” links in emails are. There really seems to be no loophole or workaround despite there being huge incentive for there to be one. Every time I click an “Unsubscribe” link in an email (it seems like they’re forced to say “Unsubscribe” and not use weasel words to hide the…
Unsubscribe links are a fantastic regulation, but there is a workaround. I must have received at least a dozen emails from Brown after graduating despite unsubscribing to every email they sent. The trouble is they're endlessly creative about the lists they put you on. I'd get one email from "Alumni Connections" and then another from "Faculty Spotlight" and then another from "Global Outreach" and then another from "Ev…
They probably don't consider themselves (and, as a University, could probably make a strong case) that it's not Unsolicited Commercial Email (UCE), which is the only thing that CAN-SPAM applies to.
And I have to disagree with the OP, though, because the only people who obey CAN-SPAM are the people who are generally not actually real spammers.
CAN-SPAM really only helps you get unsubscribed from marketing emails, not actually spam at all. As with all laws, outlaws will ignore them while law-abiding citizens get caught by them. Real spammers don't care and casually flout laws until, finally, they get caught by technological means.
As usual, the regulations are too little, too late, and apply to a completely different group of people than is even named in the title.
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#585Earlier quoted context omitted.
What I have noticed companies do is resume emails after a year or so. They probably think people would forget about unsubscribing them after a year, and for the most part they are right. If I catch any of these email lists not respecting my unsubscribing, I immediately mark them as "spam". Gmail then doesn't send them to my inbox anymore. I don't think just one person marking them as spam hurts them, but at least I f…
I go one step further and for the lists which I don't remember subscribing to, I never click "Unsubscribe" - it's "Spam" right away.
Same for me. Spam or phishing, depending on how annoyed I am.
Some site I haven't used in 5 years reminding me to login and check out their deals? Sounds like a phishing trap to me.
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#586Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wait wait, are you saying you don't need to do that? You and I live in different worlds
I don't, I just press this button (not my screenshot) https://www.badsender.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/bouton-...
I've pushed buttons like that and the one Google offers, to find the parties still gleefully spam. Widgets can ~lie~ mislead, you know
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#587Earlier quoted context omitted.
Unsubscribe links are a fantastic regulation, but there is a workaround. I must have received at least a dozen emails from Brown after graduating despite unsubscribing to every email they sent. The trouble is they're endlessly creative about the lists they put you on. I'd get one email from "Alumni Connections" and then another from "Faculty Spotlight" and then another from "Global Outreach" and then another from "Ev…
What I have noticed companies do is resume emails after a year or so. They probably think people would forget about unsubscribing them after a year, and for the most part they are right. If I catch any of these email lists not respecting my unsubscribing, I immediately mark them as "spam". Gmail then doesn't send them to my inbox anymore. I don't think just one person marking them as spam hurts them, but at least I f…
This is where we need something like GDPR, which makes it so that they can't auto subscribe you to a new list whenever they feel like resubscribing you.
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#588Earlier quoted context omitted.
No, from Super PACS (they were the Citizens United in _Citizens United_) to gerrymandering the Republicans do it first and worst. It's not even close. It's nice to think "both sides" but it's misinformed.
Gerrymandering is entirely bipartisan: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/26/nyregion/redistricting-ma... https://apnews.com/article/redistricting-california-gerryman... There is three times as much outside money going to the Democratic candidate for the Presidency as the Republican one: https://www.opensecrets.org/outside-spending/by_candidate
You may have misread "first and worst". Democrats eventually follow suit, but the cherry picked example of CA doesn't account for the partisan overrepresention of Republicans in gerrymandrered congressional districts. It's not even close on a national level.
For Super PACs: again this is from Citizens United which was pushed by Republicans and confirmed by an activist Republican Supreme Court. They own that 100 percent now and forevermore.
Sorry, again I know people want to be "ackshually bothsides" but it doesn't apply here.
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#589Earlier quoted context omitted.
My PayPal story (in short, search my comments if you want more detail) - I bought a cheap game ( I contacted PayPal, who opened a case, according to their agreement with Steam (which I'm not party to). PayPal found Steam to be in breach of their agreement (PayPal & Steam's). I was refunded. Then Steam enacted petty revenge against me, and continue to do so. PayPal acted laudibly, imo, but there seems to be nothing on…
The real problem here is that the banks make the rules and they like rules that allow them to covertly screw everyone. What you really want is a system where a customer who issues a chargeback that isn't disputed gets the money back, but the merchant also doesn't get a chargeback fee because there is no dispute. And then if there is a dispute (and the customer still wants to do the chargeback), the chargeback fee is…
> you do a chargeback, the merchant gets … a chargeback fee … But the merchants respond by banning customers who do this
If I've had to do a chargeback, I'm highly unlikely to want to spend further money with that company in future, so they can "ban" me all they like.
Re: FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions
#590When people try and say that regulating stuff like this is impossible, I often think about how unreasonably great the regulations around “Unsubscribe” links in emails are. There really seems to be no loophole or workaround despite there being huge incentive for there to be one. Every time I click an “Unsubscribe” link in an email (it seems like they’re forced to say “Unsubscribe” and not use weasel words to hide the…
Well, the workaround to unsubscribe is just spam. It’s hard to argue that I get effectively fewer emails as a result of those regulations, even though I like them. I just get effectively infinite emails. There’s no effective difference between 10,000 spam emails a day and 11,000. The fact that Banana Republic actually stops sending me email when I tell them to is nice (for me and them really) but not practically meaningful.
To the extent that I see anything other than spam email it’s just because of spam filters not anything regulatory. If you don’t believe me just run an email server with no spam filter.
This regulation might actually be better though because it applies to only services users have given a credit card to. Those services are thus 100% dependent on access to the federal banking system, which can easily be revoked.