“Click to subscribe, call to cancel” is illegal, FTC says • Hacker News Board

Re: “Click to subscribe, call to cancel” is illegal, FTC says

#641

Post by mig39 » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 6:26 PM UTC

kranke155 wrote: post #243

mdp2021 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is extremely reasonable and civilized. Would you say that the rest of the legislation in Portugal is consistent, and the direction of the Country is towards good sense and reliability? I have noticed of other EU countries that a response against abuse may exist, but severely delayed and only partial (e.g. about sale of misrepresented services and other contractual scams, especially when carried out over the phon…

No. Portugal is a (atm) an radically aging country, it is rife with corruption and politics are poorly led. Brain drain is massive. Employment is extremely difficult for both the jobseeker and the employer due to poor competitiveness, low productivity and terrible regulation. Healthcare systems have been dropping off a cliff. IMO going the direction of a dying country. And I am Portuguese. Virtually anyone I know wit…

Yes, everyone I know, in my age range, has moved to France, Switzerland, Canada, etc.

We all want to retire in Portugal, but it seems there are few employment opportunities unless you know the right people.

I'm sure "retirement" is the only growth industry in Portugal these days.

Re: “Click to subscribe, call to cancel” is illegal, FTC says

#642

Post by detuur » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 6:26 PM UTC

_2d30 wrote: post #631

eckesicle wrote: post #502

Meanwhile in Scandinavia: You are legally entitled to unsubscribe from any contract in any way that is most comfortable to you. [0] For example, you can: * send them a letter * send them an email * call them and tell anyone who picks up the phone * write it on a napkin and hand it to an employee All are equally legit and legally binding. Companies obviously do not want to deal with the manual overhead, so services ty…

> You are legally entitled to unsubscribe from any contract in > any way that is most comfortable to you. [0] > For example, you can: > * send them a letter > * send them an email > * call them and tell anyone who picks up the phone > * write it on a napkin and hand it to an employee This is bad, actually. Unnecessarily raises costs. The FTC's perspective is much improved over this.

It provides regulatory pressure to make unsubscribing as easy as possible. Those costs are entirely absent if customers can click a button. Otherwise, if the regulation merely prescribes that there has to be a button, there is little consequence if the button doesn't work, or you have to jump through 50 hoops to find it like in cookie banners. The Swedish model ensures that if your button is unsatisfactory, you'll be legally obliged to pay heed to any random letter, phone call, email, or indeed even napkin that comes in.

It's a simple incentive.

Re: “Click to subscribe, call to cancel” is illegal, FTC says

#643

Post by rootusrootus » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 6:27 PM UTC

kreeben wrote: post #618

rootusrootus wrote: post #561

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This seems really annoying. The most annoying part is that in any thread like this the top comment invariably ends up being some smug observation that is clearly better than the US.

What's the English word for when you're angry about something but you aim that anger towards a whole other thing?

Who is angry? I am tired of the divisive nature of this kind of rhetoric, and I am invested enough in the HN community that I want it to stop. I do not have a lot of spare emotional capacity for Internet drama, so if it graduates from annoyance to actual anger, I will simply abandon HN.

Re: “Click to subscribe, call to cancel” is illegal, FTC says

#644

Post by baby » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 6:27 PM UTC

ghaff wrote: post #586

ratww wrote: post #542

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. The lack of distinction between Demo and IAP apps manages to hurt apps with demos, free apps and users. I really fail to see Apple's angle on this. Maybe they're trying to educate customers to accept IAPs.

If anything, I'd expect Apple to favor "fairly priced" apps you pay for upfront as was mostly the norm at the beginning. The situation is probably more that free-to-play in various degrees of obnoxiousness that don't require an initial purchase to use the app--possibly with a separate demo version--is mostly what consumers expect these days.

Or that money is where subscriptions are at, not single-time payments.

Re: “Click to subscribe, call to cancel” is illegal, FTC says

#645

Post by bredren » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 6:27 PM UTC

tombert wrote: post #536

I remember about 15 years ago, I signed up for Real Rhapsody's unlimited music service. I tried it for about two months, didn't like it, and found that canceling required me call them on a weekday during business hours (ending at 4pm eastern). I was still in high school at the time, and this is pre-smartphone so it would have been hard for me to do this during lunch, so it was pretty hard for me to cancel. Eventually…

> How uncomfortable are you that users will like your service if you have to trick them into staying subscribed?

It reeks of insecurity. The issue is that it may be an honest reflection that it fails to deliver actual value.

I can think of many examples of organizations I’ve seen that have used / are a form of dark pattern opt-out/unsub now:

- Wave Apps the accounting software with their payroll service.

- burning man org in their 2020 ticketing presale

- Ancestry.com

What the FTC needs to get into labelinf purposefully confusing unsubscribe interfaces that trick the user into not performing the action of intent as fraud.

If internal docs show intent to mislead, (which in many cases they will) companies should face criminal charges.

Re: “Click to subscribe, call to cancel” is illegal, FTC says

#646

Post by 0xffff2 » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 6:28 PM UTC

bilalq wrote: post #565

Which regulatory body can make "sign up for gym membership in person, send registered mail to cancel" illegal? Unethical subscription processes happen even outside of tech.

The link won't load for me, but based on a quote from the full FTC ruling someone else posted, I'm pretty sure it's the FTC and this rule would do just that. The ruling seem to be much broader than the headline implies.

Re: “Click to subscribe, call to cancel” is illegal, FTC says

#647

Post by indus » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

Last week I analyzed thousands of SaaS vendors that are using dark patterns in their billing loop [O].

Found out that many of the practices are borderline illegal..more so now.

Notables:

1. No notification when free trial converts to paid

2. Silent recurring renewals

3. Shady card authorization to bypass rule engines

4. Upsize during billing updates!

5. Charges during training and onboarding

[O] https://quolum.com/blog/saas/i-analyzed-saas-billing-dark-pa...

Re: “Click to subscribe, call to cancel” is illegal, FTC says

#648

Post by dahart » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

evancoop wrote: post #541

dahart wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the companies that pull this type of nefarious BS find their way into the dumpster of failed ventures What are some examples of companies that failed over this? All I’m seeing here are very large very healthy companies being named like NYT, WSJ, Sirius, etc. Seeing anecdotes of a few people trying to avoid being scammed doesn’t demonstrate a functioning market. If anything, the evidence here is the opposite of what…

Can we truly scour the internet for small-time violators? Sure, if a massive entity like NYT or WSJ fail to comply, that could be called-out and addressed. But are we prepared to enforce such a paradigm at scale?

Yes, we are prepared to enforce this. That’s precisely what laws, courts, and an enforcement agency are for. This process has worked many times in the past and it will work now and in the future.

I don’t understand your implied objection. Yes, small time violators, and big time violators alike, will be reported by their customers. Currently, customers don’t have any place at all to take their complaints, because it’s not illegal for a company to attempt to prevent a subscription cancellation.

How do you propose to call out and address the issue without a law? How are you proposing to enforce individual violations, and what is the violation exactly? You claimed that market forces were taking care of this already, but that’s not true, and runs in direct contradiction to the mountain of evidence in this thread alone.

Re: “Click to subscribe, call to cancel” is illegal, FTC says

#649

Post by codingclaws » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

b3morales wrote: post #563

dspillett wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The red light is some distance ahead, not right in front of the speed detector so that you have to immediately hammer down the break pedal and be rear-ended by the vehicle behind. Of course some will still get as close to the light as they can and hammer the breaks last moment, but they'll do that at other lights too, and other unsafe things, so the danger is not caused by the light in that instance.

Is it a normal light at an intersection, or an extra one somewhere in the middle of a block? It's not hard for me to imagine people scoffing at the mid-block light and deciding to run through it.

Neither I'd say. They're usually on long stretches of old highways with no traffic lights between roundabouts where lots of commercial and residential buildings (and thus people) are right on the curb.

Re: “Click to subscribe, call to cancel” is illegal, FTC says

#650

Post by patorjk » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

ghostpepper wrote: post #529

strenholme wrote: post #344

Since I live in California, which has a “click to subscribe means you must have click to cancel” regulation, this isn’t an issue for me. After the New York Times published their inaccurate hit piece attacking Scott Alexander and Slate Star Codex/Astral Codex Ten, I was able to cancel online just clicking my way through. I now subscribe to The Wall Street Journal, which looks to be the most neutral newspaper right now…

I eventually opened a case with VISA to get them to stop payment to the Wall Street Journal because every time I called to cancel, I got a message that their call centers were closed due to COVID. As far as I can tell there was literally no way to cancel for several months during 2020. I do enjoy their reporting as a more right-leaning alternative to the New York Times but I have learned my lesson and will never agai…

I was able to cancel my WSJ subscription last year through an online chat (it was almost identical to how I unsubscribed from the NYTimes). I definitely would have preferred a cancel button though. A few months later I resubscribed after they offered me a deal. My only issue with them is that they're kind of expensive.