Most of this chatlog is "you" adding more noise than is necessary for this transaction.
Maybe, but there still remains the issue that such a pointless chat is even required to cancel in the first place.
Before buying a NYT subscription, here's what it'll take to cancel it
81–90 of 845 posts
Re: Before buying a NYT subscription, here's what it'll take to cancel it
#82Honestly only case where I'm willing to overlook it. It's so hard for them to stay in the black. I can't imagine, in this age. For a serious newspaper that does good investigative journalism, I'll accept some desperate measures to keep subscribers and not hold it against them. Any other company and I'd call them garbage, but the NYT does a lot of good. (Same would go for other top investigative journals that have pub…
If they really need to rely on dark patterns just to survive - which I highly doubt is the case - then they simply don’t deserve to survive. Yes, it sucks, but that’s how the free market works.
Presumably not, if they use dark patterns and not only survive, but thrive. Right?
Re: Before buying a NYT subscription, here's what it'll take to cancel it
#83I had a similar experience with them as well. It definitely surprised me and made me grumpy, but it honestly took half the time as this one because I didn’t put up a fight.
I remember being similarly disgruntled by canceling Prime. Lots of misleading calls-to-action across multiple screens. But something about being forced to talk to a human being really rubbed me the wrong way with the Times.
Re: Before buying a NYT subscription, here's what it'll take to cancel it
#84In theory signing up online in California gives a consumer the right to cancel online, but I don't know how closely that's enforced, or if a non-resident of the state can vpn the signup.
Would this not count as "online"? Or is the law specific that a person not be in the loop?
Re: Before buying a NYT subscription, here's what it'll take to cancel it
#85I've never been able to cancel any subscription with ease, so nowadays I always use Privacy to get temporary credit cards. When I want the subscription cancelled, I try the provider's website, if it doesn't work, I just cancel the card all together.
Woah, I had no clue that Privacy existed before but it looks really cool! What do you think of the service? Have you had any problems with it?
I have used it and it seems to work pretty well, they just set up a complete integration with 1Password so I trust them because of that as well.
Re: Before buying a NYT subscription, here's what it'll take to cancel it
#86The marketing/sales talk like, “Am I to understand you’d like to cancel even though our product could be saving you $xx in time and money?” repulses me to no end. I understand they’re trying to keep a customer. I just hate the leading questions. I hate that I feel like they’re trying to outwit me, or trick me into realizing I’m so silly for wanting to cancel something. Even though I might cancel products, the cancell…
Reminds me of the old MCI telemarketers. You'd tell them you're not interested in their long distance service, and the rejoinder would be "You don't want to save money?"
I've been witness to a number of cold callers having their heritage and species loudly questioned for using this tactic.
Re: Before buying a NYT subscription, here's what it'll take to cancel it
#87Imagine having a business model so fragile that your only line of defense is to obscure the cancellation process through these tactics. Do they really think that they can curve their churn this way? I mean best you’re doing is getting maybe another month or so of revenue from a customer who is just pushing the pain of cancelling because they are busy or lazy. And at the end instead of getting what could be a dormant…
This happened to me with audible. They didn't have the cancel subscription on the app. Had to hunt for it on the site. Was asked if i was suuuuuuure i wanted to leave, 3 separate times before it canceled. Definitely not thinking of doing that again, or like i do for some streaming services, pay for a couple months, stop, then pay for a few more. Utterly rediculous.
Same, then you get bombarded with ads on Amazon for a free trial despite the fact you're logged into your Amazon account and Amazon knows damn well you're not eligible for the free trial anymore. I quit Audible after prices stopped being related to length. At the $17 a pop for the three-hour books I was buying it was going to cost me $900 to get the whole series. Nope!
Re: Before buying a NYT subscription, here's what it'll take to cancel it
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
NYT has been a net negative on society since 2016, rapidly so since 2019.
What would you recommend, then?
Substack. Citizen journalism is the future. The MSM solely exist to make every problem your problem through an omnipresent stream of manufactured outrage.
Re: Before buying a NYT subscription, here's what it'll take to cancel it
#89This is nothing. Try cancelling the "monthly" Adobe Creative Suite subscription without paying out the remaining 11 months!
To their credit, they tell you pretty plainly that the monthly subscription is a year-long commitment.
I also find that they're usually pretty willing to keep adding new customer promos if you threaten to cancel because their price went up.
Re: Before buying a NYT subscription, here's what it'll take to cancel it
#90They do the same stuff with the paper end. Back in the day used to get it delivered... excruciating time canceling it... for a couple weeks it would keep showing up on the doorstep, and they couldn’t tell me why the cancel didn’t go through.
The process was so abysmal I vowed never to do business with them. It’s a shame.
I dealt with a lot of print companies for some of my business back in the day. The business people would always complain that the editorial boards hated what they did... but then they just replied, “who’s going to pay your salary to write your articles”.
I still think journalism needs a better business model. Ads conflict with honest content, and subscriptions don’t pay the bills when it’s easy to get free news from other less reputable sources.