[HN Gopher] The FTC puts off enforcing its 'click-to-cancel' rule
___________________________________________________________________
The FTC puts off enforcing its 'click-to-cancel' rule
Author : speckx
Score : 287 points
Date : 2025-05-12 13:12 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theverge.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theverge.com)
| lenerdenator wrote:
| It was fun reading about all of the pro-consumer things that the
| various federal agencies were doing in the last year of the Biden
| administration thinking "yeah, none of this is gonna matter come
| January".
|
| And lo, I was right. You exist as an annuity to a shareholder.
| Nothing else.
| jfengel wrote:
| I remember everyone celebrating a regulation from the Consumer
| Financial Protection Bureau back in November. As I said at the
| time, it was nice to have one of those.
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| We have quite a number of them, and they're all pretty good.
| Here's a sample of what the CFPB has created and/or enforces:
|
| * Truth in Lending Act
|
| * Fair Credit Reporting Act
|
| * Fair Debt Collection Practices Act
|
| * Equal Credit Opportunity Act
|
| * Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act
|
| * Home Mortgage Disclosure Act
|
| * Consumer Financial Protection Act
|
| The CFPB was one of the most effective agencies for consumers
| triceratops wrote:
| By "have one" I think they meant a bureau to protect
| consumers financially.
| ars wrote:
| For the most part all that those things accomplished was
| lots of paper.
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| Paper as in money? I can point to how multiple of these
| have saved _me_ money directly. Cash dollars. Overdraft
| savings alone have numbered in _billions_ back in the
| consumers ' pockets... and that's just one piece of
| legislation that is easy to measure.
|
| A lot of people don't realize how many current credit
| card regulations didn't exist 20 years ago. For example:
| you'd have to manually figure out how much interest was
| costing you and now they have to print it right on the
| statements.
|
| They've helped rein in some of the most predatory
| industries out there in numerous ways.
| ars wrote:
| I don't feel like going through each one specifically,
| and I'm sure some of them actually reined in some
| practices, but the vast majority are just disclosures,
| i.e. some paper for the consumer to sign without reading.
| buzzerbetrayed wrote:
| Delaying the enforcement to July makes you right?
| MOARDONGZPLZ wrote:
| Please please please call me out in August if I am wrong, but
| I can absolutely guarantee this is like step 10 in further
| erosion of protections for consumers and this will never be
| enforced, certainly not in July. This is like rolling back
| overdraft fee caps, which has no benefit to consumers.
| RankingMember wrote:
| That symmetrical registration/cancellation is being slow-walked
| like this is absurd (but under this admin, certainly not
| surprising).
| lenerdenator wrote:
| It's absurd if you believe the point of government is to be by,
| for, and of the people.
|
| If you see government as a way to enhance the ability of the
| owner class to enrich themselves, it makes perfect sense.
| sorcerer-mar wrote:
| Then explain why the rule was created in the first place?
| mjcl wrote:
| Democrats see government differently than Republicans.
| sorcerer-mar wrote:
| Well yes, I agree. But GP was saying "government" writ
| large behaves XYZ.
| collingreen wrote:
| Which absolutely does not imply a monolith of people all
| working in perfect lock step.
|
| It seems like you're looking to fight on the internet -
| would you consider a different activity instead?
| sorcerer-mar wrote:
| > It's absurd if you believe the point of government is
| to be by, for, and of the people. > If you see government
| as a way to enhance the ability of the owner class to
| enrich themselves, it makes perfect sense.
|
| No I actually think it's important for people to square
| views like "government is a way to enrich the owner
| class" with actual reality, such as the fact that the
| government when administered by a different party did the
| exact opposite.
| rapind wrote:
| I would be even more specific and say that Lina Khan sees
| government differently than most Republicans and
| Democrats.
| coldpie wrote:
| I agree, though I think it is worth giving some credit to
| the people who chose her & appointed her. They didn't
| have to do that. It was one of the more impressive moves
| by the previous admin, and won them a lot of points from
| me.
| ryandrake wrote:
| This administration is making a pattern out of 1. Creating
| a rule or executive order to score easy political points
| with their base, and then 2. Immediately walking it back or
| "postponing" it once those points were scored and their
| base are not paying attention. Trolling-As-Governance.
| airstrike wrote:
| "owner class" is too outdated and myopic. It's also
| incorrect, as plenty of people born into low income
| households go on to become elected representatives.
|
| It's better to think about it in terms of "people who choose
| to pursue positions of power to benefit themselves
| financially while cosplaying as wanting to help the average
| person".
| flatline wrote:
| Just because they weren't born into the owner class (or
| "capital class") doesn't mean they didn't work their way
| into it. That's kind of the American dream.
| Retric wrote:
| You can only become wealthy later in life at which point
| you can't advantage your past self. Thus new money
| receives fewer benefits than old money from the exact
| same policies.
|
| Further having 100m at 40 doesn't suddenly bring the kind
| of social connections that going to the right schools and
| the right parties would. At the extremes, the average
| lottery winner is surrounded by people asking for help,
| the average Fortune 500 CEO's social circle aren't. So if
| they suddenly fall on hard times the lottery winner is
| stuck but that CEO may very well claw their way back.
|
| It's still possible for poor people to succeed and 3rd+
| generation wealth to fail, but the odds are wildly
| different.
| buran77 wrote:
| With any other disadvantaged/discriminated class (skin
| color, sexual orientation, gender, etc.), getting elected
| in power doesn't change the disadvantage. So the incentive
| is still there to fight for that equality.
|
| This is not so when it comes to the poor. Once in power
| they are no longer poor so the incentive to fix any issue
| related to this almost entirely evaporates.
| MadcapJake wrote:
| Elected officials should make the average salary from the
| year prior. If it's not enough to survive then they'll
| need to do something about it!
| whynoTBolth wrote:
| owner class: people who choose to pursue positions of power
| to benefit themselves financially while cosplaying as
| wanting to help the average person
|
| There now it's both. They want to own agency if the idea of
| owning stuff is too gauche for modern audiences.
| smallmancontrov wrote:
| Let's follow the money. A policy that pumps stocks by
| dumping labor + consumer rights delivers a roughly equal
| cost to everyone but delivers benefits in proportion to net
| worth. Suppose it pumps assets by 1%.
|
| A $200k NW individual gets 2x cost and $2k gain.
|
| A $3M NW individual gets 2x cost and $30k gain.
|
| A $6B NW individual gets 1x cost and $60M gain.
|
| A $400B NW individual gets 1x cost and $4B gain.
|
| If it wasn't obvious, these numbers correspond to the
| Median American, Kamala Harris, Donald Trump, and Elon
| Musk. People whining about focus on ownership and
| complaining that all politicians are bad are drawing this
| equivalence across 3-6 orders of magnitude of incentive to
| do evil.
|
| In contrast, I argue that incentives matter and that high
| NW individuals in politics have uniquely misaligned
| incentives. The focus on ownership doesn't just matter, it
| matters more than it ever did before.
| Angostura wrote:
| It's almost as if the previous administration was focussed
| more on the former, and the current administration more on
| the latter.
|
| I guess you get the government you vote for.
| NewJazz wrote:
| Well, you being collective.
| nrclark wrote:
| Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what to have
| for lunch.
| delecti wrote:
| It's more like a 9 sheep and a wolf with a great PR firm
| who convinced 5 sheep to vote against the other 4 for
| lunch plans. Those 5 sheep aren't going to come out of
| this any better than the 4 of us.
| manishsharan wrote:
| This is a lazy argument. It only serves to dissuade the
| masses from doing critical thinking and analyzing party
| platforms.
|
| It also explains why blue collar Americans vote for tax
| breaks for billionaires and union busting legislation.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| One party doesn't actually have a platform and they've
| abandoned all the principles in their past platforms. Now
| it's just agree to whatever one deranged person cooks up
| in his head after watching TV.
| reissbaker wrote:
| On this issue there is no difference between the previous
| admin and the current one. The FTC voted 3-0 to postpone.
| Even though Trump fired two of the original five, if those
| two had both voted against postponing they would have still
| lost 3-2 and the same decision would be reached -- and I
| don't think there's much evidence that the two he fired
| would've voted against postponing, anyway.
| coldpie wrote:
| This is incorrect. The party makeup of the 5 people
| changed with the new administration. Lina Khan (D) left
| and Mark Meador (R) was appointed, changing the balance
| from 3(D)-2(R) to 2(D)-3(R).
| reissbaker wrote:
| Ah, I hadn't realized that. Still, given that it was 3-0,
| all three of the former FTC commissioners would have had
| to be unanimous against deferral -- and given that all of
| them voted for deferral on Jan 19th [1] (the original
| deadline, when none had been fired and Lina Khan was
| still onboard) -- I don't think there's much change here.
|
| 1: https://techcrunch.com/2025/05/10/ftc-delays-
| enforcement-of-...
| oblio wrote:
| Nihilism is useless. We've made enormous progress since the
| first human stepped on this planet so I would say we've
| disproven nihilism for good. Modern governments are
| definitely not purely tools for the owner class to enrich
| themselves.
| fooblaster wrote:
| He's talking about the trump administration, not making a
| general point about all governments.
| squigz wrote:
| GP made no indication it was about this specific
| administration and not about government in principle.
| tobr wrote:
| It's abundantly clear from context.
| andrewflnr wrote:
| I don't think it was. Certainly that's a position that
| people have held since long before Trump.
| fuzzer371 wrote:
| It was very clear. You're just arguing to argue, and in
| bad faith.
| rixed wrote:
| I don't see the contradiction between the two propositions
| "government is for the ruling class" and "there have been
| some progress". There are even economic theories that start
| from that tenet (globally referred to as "trickle-down-
| economics").
| shlomo_z wrote:
| > but under this admin, certainly not surprising
|
| Services have been making it hard to cancel subscriptions for
| many years, under many parties and administrations. Many things
| are Trump's fault, this is not one of them.
| arunabha wrote:
| Choosing not to enforce the click to cancel rule is not
| Trump's fault? How so?
| shlomo_z wrote:
| Laws get pushed off for all kinds of reasons.
|
| It seems like this was pushed off to give businesses more
| time to comply.
|
| Many kinds of businesses have subscriptions, each with a
| different situation. Some small businesses don't even have
| a programmer.
|
| Requiring a phone call is not always (although often is) to
| make it difficult to cancel. Often it's because a company
| doesn't have the proper infrastructure for the frontend.
|
| So I think it's reasonable that they are giving companies
| some time.
|
| In the end, I hope that on July 14th this goes through, it
| will be a big win for consumers.
|
| EDIT: My answer didn't fully address the question, so let
| me add: I don't think is the result of Trump trying to be
| friends with billionaires for their money. I understand why
| it seems that way - because he literally does that. But
| this doesn't seem special or extraordinary. Enforcement of
| laws gets pushed off all the time.
| prasadjoglekar wrote:
| It would be good if folks actually read the FTC letter rather
| than having a visceral negative reaction.
|
| The Biden admin had put the May 14 deadline for certain things
| even though the rule as a whole went into effect in Jan 2025.
| Trump's commish is defending that by another 60 days.
|
| https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/negative-option...
| sillystu04 wrote:
| Visa/Mastercard have enough power to enforce this on their own.
| Although obviously regulation would've been better.
|
| If a bunch of elected officials wrote letters to execs and a
| couple of NYT articles were written about the issue,
| Visa/Mastercard might be motivated to help.
| sorcerer-mar wrote:
| Why? They get revenue from unwanted transactions too.
| doctoboggan wrote:
| Those transactions might have a higher than normal chargeback
| rate which could motivate them to get rid of them. It could
| also be a perk of the card, they could provide a subscription
| cancellation portal on their website.
| sorcerer-mar wrote:
| That would definitely be a huge perk to me!
| dspillett wrote:
| Chargebacks might upset that being a big benefit, and being
| the firm that takes a stance for customer care could be good
| advertising fodder. Though I don't see it working unless they
| both do it in step which minimises the useful effect of that
| against each other. It could still be a benefit vs other
| payment methods, what is PayPal's policy on such things?
| n_ary wrote:
| Number of people afraid to pickup the phone and talk to
| another human being instead of letting few hundred in
| forgotten subscription is larger than I previously thought.
| By that sense, without any data, I suspect that chargeback
| amount is wayyyy smaller headache compared to txn fees from
| forgotten uncancelled subscriptions.
| JohnMakin wrote:
| It has nothing to do with fear. Have you ever tried to
| call in and cancel one of these services? If you're even
| able to find the right number to reach anyone, or after
| you've already waited an absurdly long time to do so,
| you'll be transferred around until you get frustrated and
| give up, or be subjected to extremely aggressive sales
| tactics trying to pressure you to stay on. I got to the
| point with one of those DNA sites where I had to ask
| about next steps for legal action to the representative
| before they'd even consider getting to the step where I
| could cancel my subscription - and even after that, still
| got charged and had to call again.
|
| It's maybe comforting to think "oh, people just don't
| want to call, they'd rather eat the fees" when this is
| way over simplifying the problem and giving way too much
| credit to sites that operate this way.
| permo-w wrote:
| (in the UK) it really depends on your bank and even the
| type of card you use. the debit card chargebacks I did
| when I was with Natwest were always very simple. fill out
| a form, send it off, get a response by email. for the one
| CC chargeback I did I think it required a call and a lot
| more trouble. when I tried a (debit card) chargeback with
| a different bank, it was an incredible amount of trouble
| and then I think they rejected it anyway
| the_other wrote:
| How does that work when you're deaf?
| wing-_-nuts wrote:
| >Number of people afraid to pickup the phone and talk to
| another human being
|
| Try to call comcast and actually speak to a customer
| service representative. Try it. I dare you. I bought a
| new modem last year and simply needed to provision it on
| the service. I got caught in bot limbo so long my only
| recourse was to scream 'cancel my account!' over and over
| until I actually got a human on the line. I'm sure that
| will be automated away at some point too.
| permo-w wrote:
| with chargebacks there's also the concern that doing a
| chargeback for a few small things now makes you more
| likely to be rejected for something more important down
| the line
| skeletal88 wrote:
| The rule should be simple. Canceling a service should not
| be more difficult than starting it. It should be possible
| to do it in the same channel you started it. No "we only
| do cancellations over the phone, during business hours on
| tuesdays, with an hour long waiting time"
| dspillett wrote:
| _> Number of people afraid to pickup the phone and talk
| to another human being_
|
| It isn't fear of the call or the human being (though for
| some that can be part of the problem.
|
| It is that some or all of these, and other irritations,
| will be true:
|
| * The call has to be in their working hours, which is
| possibly your working hours too. I can get away with
| sitting on hold for a personal matter in work time, but
| many can't.
|
| * The call will not be short...
|
| * You will need to interact with irritating menu systems
| to get onto the relevant queues, and if you hit the wrong
| thing or an issue causes a disconnect, you will be right
| back where you started.
|
| * The interminable hold muzak and/or staticy silence...
|
| * When you finally get to that human they will have a
| long script, and it can be hard to divert them from it to
| just let you cancel. They will try to dissuade you from
| cancelling with various offers, and occasionally lies, no
| matter how much you insist that you just want to cancel.
|
| * If you call at the start of a period they'll tell you
| that if you cancel now, you'll lose the remaining X weeks
| and try get you to call back later to not lose that
| "investment". If you do call back a couple of weeks later
| you'll be told there is a notice period and you'll be
| billed for another period. There are other underhand
| tricks similar to this.
|
| * After all the upsell/resell the first person you get
| won't be able to process the cancellation. You'll be put
| back into the queuing system for some more lovely
| muzak/static.
|
| * The second person might not be able to either. Lather,
| rinse, repeat.
|
| * All this time, any technical issue that causes a
| disconnect puts you right back at the start.
|
| * If you get exasperated by all of this and start
| sounding to aggressive in your irritation, they will
| sometimes state that you are being rude (maybe I am, but
| not as rude as them wasting my time and trying to con
| me...) and hang up, meaning you have to call back and
| restart at a later time.
|
| Some years ago I cancelled a magazine subscription, that
| I signed up for in seconds online, in a call that lasted
| nearly an hour. I've been very wary of subscribing to
| anything that needs payment details ever since, a stance
| that has done me well. The only way they will stop doing
| this sort of crap is if enough people simply stop
| subscribing to things because of it, or if relevant
| legislation without easy loopholes is passed.
| jfengel wrote:
| Visa and MasterCard suffer from charge backs already, and
| don't seem to mind. They try to avoid it with AI in the
| fraud department, and they push some of the cost onto the
| merchants.
|
| They could do so much more. We still don't even have chip
| and pin in the US. They seem to think that the current
| levels of fraud loss are cheaper than the business lost
| from stopping it.
| dawnerd wrote:
| How are they suffering when they recover funds, charge
| merchants per chargeback and charge higher rates for
| merchants with higher than avg chargebacks? Seems like
| something they benefit from.
| pc86 wrote:
| Fees are not refunded and additional chargeback fees are
| levied regardless of the outcome of the dispute.
|
| How exactly are they suffering?
| hangonhn wrote:
| I honestly would use a card that promises me easier
| subscription cancellation. In fact, I sort of do already: I
| use Apple's in app payment system to handle as many
| subscriptions as possible because of how easy they make it to
| cancel. I know Apple increases the cost to the service
| provider and they in turn charge me more but the ease of
| cancellation is worth it to me.
|
| Now if a bank or card came along and provided the same (and
| maybe easy subscription management in general) they can have
| all my subscription revenue.
| gsanderson wrote:
| Regulation? Unfortunately this administration is going in the
| opposite direction.
| kgwxd wrote:
| They absolutely don't have the power to excuse debt. Just
| because a company can't charge your credit card, doesn't mean
| you don't still owe them money on paper.
| sillystu04 wrote:
| Visa/Mastercard can demand merchants meet certain standards
| of consumer care in order to participate in their networks.
|
| No consumer business can operate without access to those card
| networks.
| isleyaardvark wrote:
| The NYT itself uses the dark patterns for cancellation that
| would be forbidden by this rule.
| callc wrote:
| They should be punished, the same as every other company that
| does this.
| drdec wrote:
| I, for one, do not want to encourage Visa/Mastercard to use
| their market position to enforce policies. What they have
| already done is damage enough.
| tantalor wrote:
| > the burdens that forcing compliance by this date would impose
|
| With no consideration given to how consumers may be harmed by
| non-enforcement meanwhile.
| notfromhere wrote:
| What do you expect from an administration busy running crypto
| scams and openly taking bribes?
| chillingeffect wrote:
| And increasing amt banks are allowed to charge for bounced
| checks... :/
| mtoner23 wrote:
| Don't write bounced checks then?
| BriggyDwiggs42 wrote:
| Or, alternatively, don't punish people overly for writing
| blank checks?
| nick238 wrote:
| One of the anti-consumer behaviors that banks figured out
| was reordering transactions to increase overdraft fees
| [0]. For instance, say you made 5 purchases in a given
| day for ~$20 each, and your account had $500 in it. Then,
| you need to make an emergency $600 payment because
| something on your car broke.
|
| Banks used to have (maybe have again, as the CFPB is now
| a husk) broad latitude to resequence transactions posted
| to your account, so instead of you thinking you'd have
| one overdraft in the example, $500 down to $400, then
| once into the negative, -$200, and one overdraft fee, the
| bank could post them so it was $500 to -$100, an
| overdraft, then all 5 small transactions were also
| overdrafts, allowing them to charge 6 overdraft fees.
|
| In December 2024, the CFPB announced a proposed rule to
| cap overdraft fees for banks with over $10B in assets at
| $5 (OR treat the fee like a loan) and add additional
| regulations to avoid resequencing. On May 9th, last
| Friday, the president signed the resolution [1] to
| overturn the pending CFPB regulations, saving us from
| "unlawful government price caps" (ABA President Rob
| Nichols) and "harmed the very consumers the CFPB is
| supposed to protect" (Sen. Tim Scott, R, Banking
| Committee Chair).
|
| Comparing it to a loan, e.g. a credit card, usual
| effective overdraft fees are something like 16,000% APY
| [2] ($35 charged to the average $26 overdraft, repaid in
| a few days). Those with poor finances often might use a
| debit card instead of a credit card, which they might not
| have access to. It's a cruel joke that those with a bit
| more financial privilege can pay for things via CC
| without having the money for ~30+ days (statement close +
| payment due date) for 0%, or if they let the debt ride,
| "only" 40% APY. Not 16,000% APY.
|
| [0]: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/12/your-
| money/customers-can-...
|
| [1]: https://bankingjournal.aba.com/2025/05/with-trump-
| signing-re...
|
| [2]: https://files.consumerfinance.gov/f/documents/cfpb_o
| verdraft...
| no_wizard wrote:
| >"only" 40%
|
| If your credit is really good, it can be much lower than
| that. I haven't seen an interest rate even close to that
| high since I was in my early 20s.
| nick238 wrote:
| Point is, compared with 16000%, 0%, 5%, 10%, 40% are all
| functionally the same.
| tantalor wrote:
| I'm sure this has already been proposed but it seems
| obvious that a simple mitigation would be to only allow 1
| overdraft fee per day.
|
| Like, it should make no difference to the bank if I make
| N transactions each for amount S, or the other way
| around. Money is fungible, people!
| nilamo wrote:
| And there's no longer a CFPB to help you when it happens...
| ahartmetz wrote:
| In any case, service providers are handling the burden of easy
| signup just fine...
| avidiax wrote:
| Yeah, they can always make signing up impossible just like
| cancelling is impossible.
|
| Disable the easy sign-up button and force customers to call
| to sign up.
|
| Seems like no burden at all to implement.
| bee_rider wrote:
| With all the dark patterns and bullshit in every service, it has
| become too difficult to pay for things. Even services I like, and
| I think are run by ethical people--you never know who'll get
| bought.
|
| Of course, like everybody else, I block ads. Although, when I
| didn't I didn't click on the things anyway.
|
| I dunno. For a while I felt bad consuming stuff without paying.
| But in the end, the internet has become so hostile and
| manipulative, I guess... I'm just going to wait it out.
| Eventually hopefully it will all collapse and a viable business
| model will be discovered.
| brador wrote:
| A better system idea - every data point of user data needs a
| datetime stamp and source.
|
| Any request for your own private data will then come with
| datetime stamps and source origins for every piece of data they
| have of you.
|
| Thereby allowing you to cut off at the source and request
| deletion, which they must then propagate upstream or risk a fine
| per data point.
| jfengel wrote:
| I suspect they have that already. They're not the types to let
| any potentially useful bit of data just vanish.
|
| But they're not required to give it to you, and they won't.
| fastball wrote:
| Sounds like an incredible vector of regulatory capture for Big
| Tech.
| ChrisArchitect wrote:
| Official release: https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-
| releases/2025/05/...
| SoftTalker wrote:
| "If you can sign up online, you must be able to cancel online,
| too."
|
| That leaves a lot of room for the "Cancel" option to be buried in
| an obscure hard to find part of the website. I'd have hoped there
| was a requirement for it to be as prominent and as easy to find
| as the "Subscribe" option (and maybe there is, just not mentioned
| in this piece?)
| fastball wrote:
| Do you actually want there to be a big "Cancel" button in the
| top right corner of every subscribed service?
|
| I personally don't want that. Click to cancel? Sure. But
| perfectly symmetrical is not something I need and in many cases
| not something I want.
| consp wrote:
| > Do you actually want there to be a big "Cancel" button in
| the top right corner of every subscribed service?
|
| Yes, since the alternative is what you have now: impossible
| to find and if you find it highly annoying. Even if you have
| the law which says "canceling must be as easy as subscribing"
| like where I live it still isn't even close due to efforts of
| government creating a law but failing (by design) to fund the
| agency tasked with keeping the companies in check.
| wing-_-nuts wrote:
| >Do you actually want there to be a big "Cancel" button in
| the top right corner of every subscribed service?
|
| _ABSOLUTELY_ YES
| accrual wrote:
| Even better would be a little field showing the rate and
| due date: [Cancel] [USD 12.99/mo billed
| on the 20th]
| hurfebuff wrote:
| Would you want a "click to subscribe" function that works
| like that?
|
| I wouldn't, I would like some form of confirmation before
| buying a subscription. I don't see the problem in a
| unsubscribe function having a symmetrical confirmation in any
| service that doesn't try to trick me into a subscription. And
| actually, even more so for services that try to trick me...
| reverendsteveii wrote:
| I want the big cancel button
| 0_____0 wrote:
| I think realistically three clicks would be fine.
|
| Click to settings Click to cancel Click to confirm cancel
|
| Usually signing up takes more effort than that! I didn't
| even have to type anything.
| jjulius wrote:
| >Do you actually want there to be a big "Cancel" button in
| the top right corner of every subscribed service?
|
| Yes.
| tchalla wrote:
| It's ok that you don't need something. That's fine. That
| said, we don't define policies based on your need. So, I
| won't disqualify your need. I would ask you to think more
| than you.
| jabroni_salad wrote:
| Could you describe your ideal cancellation workflow?
| tzs wrote:
| I'd be happy with this.
|
| 1. Login
|
| 2. Go to your account page.
|
| 3. That should have a link to billing management.
|
| 4. Somewhere on the billing management screen there should
| be some easy to figure out way to cancel.
|
| Details will vary but in general cancelling logically makes
| the most sense as part of payment management, so it belongs
| where other payment management goes such as adding or
| updating a credit card.
|
| If the site wants to it would be fine to have a separate
| subscription management section that is linked to on the
| account page parallel to billing management. That might
| make sense if it is a service where there are options users
| can add to or remove from subscriptions.
|
| For example a streaming service might have separate paid
| options such as higher video resolution, more simultaneous
| streams allowed, removing ads, and adding specialized
| content (e.g., porn, foreign language videos).
|
| That wouldn't really belong under billing so putting it in
| a separate subscription management section would be better,
| and then cancelling would best fit there too. Billing
| management would then just be managing your payment
| methods.
| SoftTalker wrote:
| Wherever the site has a link to "Subscribe" or "Upgrade"
| there should be a link to "Manage My Subscription" and
| that should take you to someplace where "Cancel" is easy
| to find.
| BriggyDwiggs42 wrote:
| Yup
| TulliusCicero wrote:
| If it's directly on the account profile page that's probably
| a reasonable compromise.
| rtkwe wrote:
| The one line description, of course, leaves tons of holes the
| actual rule does patch. The impulse to believe a rule or law
| has been implemented in the most smooth brained way possible is
| rarely correct. The actual rule includes language that say it
| should be as easy as the original sign up.
|
| https://www.swlaw.com/publication/ftc-click-to-cancel-rule/#...
| BurningFrog wrote:
| I understand the sentiment, but this kind of thinking is why
| you have to click away a cookie dialog 50 times a day in
| Europe.
| nathanappere wrote:
| Note that you do not on websites that are not trying to use
| your data without your consent. Rephrased: the issue might
| not be the law.
| joquarky wrote:
| The quest for perfection stalls progress.
| tiagod wrote:
| The solution my country had to this is to simply have a unified
| government website for contract cancellations, where you
| provide your contract details and they're forwarded to the
| provider.
| bilsbie wrote:
| I wish businesses would realize this actually hurts their sales.
|
| I've put off joining a gym for years because I don't want the
| hassle of I want to cancel.
|
| Also I never do free trials assuming they'll be hard to cancel.
| yoyohello13 wrote:
| It doesn't though. They've done the math and the profit gained
| by adding friction to cancel outweighs the loss of business
| gizzlon wrote:
| How do you measure those you never see? Qualitative?
|
| I'm definitely in the newer-touch-something-if-it-seems-hard-
| to-cancel camp. How do you measure that I didn't sign up?
| vasusen wrote:
| I have seen the results of these A/B tests closely on a major
| consumer site and I can tell you it definitely hurts the
| business to make cancelation really easy.
| TheCoelacanth wrote:
| How do you A/B test your company's reputation as being
| difficult to cancel? You can't exactly serve up different
| word-of-mouth to different users.
| mrguyorama wrote:
| Believing that "reputation" actually matters for American
| businesses is laughable.
|
| Craftsman tools are STILL riding the reputation they had
| half a century ago, despite being made out of the cheapest
| chinesium and losing their impressive warranty stance.
|
| The American consumer has demonstrated an absurd inability
| to consider past events as useful information to predict
| future results.
|
| Things continue to enshittify because the 3 consumers who
| recognize that quality is going down are vastly outweighed
| by the increase in consumption by the rest of your market.
|
| Kitchenaid still sells plenty of mixers that die after a
| year. Hell, American car brands are still successful
| businesses even though they have made only a few reasonably
| competitive vehicles since the 50s.
|
| Disney and Netflix are still making plenty of money despite
| making it difficult to share accounts.
| const_cast wrote:
| This is the danger of data-driven decision making.
|
| You can only gather a very, very small subset of all data.
| So now you're basing your decisions off of a tiny picture,
| so you end up with sometimes strange conclusions.
| Conclusions that, intuitively, make no sense. But the data
| says so, so I guess that's what we do.
| porridgeraisin wrote:
| Yep... I've been in a meeting where we were shown the result
| of moving a cancel button's position on the page to a more
| crowded place so it would be noticed less. It actually works
| people click on it less. I couldn't believe it. Thankfully,
| the feature got vetoed and cancelled (the end result was
| really visually horrendous).
| lostlogin wrote:
| How do you A/B test the OP when they won't sign up due to a
| perception that they can't cancel?
| uselesswords wrote:
| What's with this rising trend of authoritative comments on HN
| thinking their individual rationale/experience generalizes. It
| wasn't this bad just a few years ago, but now I'm seeing just
| outright absurd generalizations like this.
| lostlogin wrote:
| Ironically, this is quite the generalisation of HN users.
| uselesswords wrote:
| I'm my own villain
| sirbutters wrote:
| Reminds me of that one time I ordered a super shuttle to the
| airport, and the website had an offer to get 15% off if I
| subscribed to that random thing (first month free, cancel
| anytime). I'm good at immediately marking my calendar to cancel
| as soon as I got what I want, so I thought this would be a walk
| in the park. And surely enough, as soon as I was out of the
| shuttle and got my discount, I immediately cancelled that
| subscription. Fast forward to 18 months later when I notice a
| $16.99 charge I do not recognize. I look at my previous
| statement, it's there too, the one before, it's there. I go
| back 18 months and I see I have been charged $16.99 per month
| ever since. Bonkers. I try to look up the merchant but I don't
| find anything in my emails that match. I forgot how I made the
| connection but at some point I find that subscription. I call
| the guys and I ask what's going on since I cancelled 18 months
| ago. They say "oh, but actually when you accepted the terms,
| you also agreed to sign up to that completely unrelated
| subscription, so yes, you cancelled with us, but you did not
| cancel that other business". I call that second business and
| tell them I've never used whatever service they offer, and that
| sneaky scheme is unacceptable. They say "ok, we can refund the
| last 3 months", I say "no, you refund me the entire 18 months",
| they say "no", I say "let me talk to a manager". Manager picks
| up, I say "refund the entire 18 months or I report you to the
| FTC". And finally they refunded the whole thing. Would not
| recommend.
| arwhatever wrote:
| It seems like delaying enforcement of anti-scam(ish) behaviors
| like this increases the average profitability of scam(ish)
| behaviors, and therefore creates an incentive to engage in
| scam(ish) behaviors in the first place.
|
| It seems (to me) as if such behaviors were stamped out more
| rapidly not only would fewer customers be affected, there would
| be less incentive to try the scam(ish) behaviors in the first
| place.
| tlogan wrote:
| This is something that should be governed by legislation (law)
| --passed by lawmakers, as we've seen in California - not by
| executive agencies. The FTC, as part of the executive branch
| (kinda independent but heavily influenced by the administration
| in power), shouldn't be in the business of creating new laws.
|
| But I get it now: when Biden directs the FTC to act, it's
| considered legitimate use of executive power. When Trump directs
| an agency not to act, it's authoritarian overreach.
| sapphicsnail wrote:
| Do you not think the Trump administration is more
| authoritarian?
| tlogan wrote:
| The Trump administration can arguably be seen as less
| authoritarian, given its efforts to reduce the size of the
| federal government and its agencies.
|
| His style is certainly authoritarian, but that's not the same
| as the actual impact on me, my family, and my community.
| arwhatever wrote:
| I'm listening to hold music right now, 30 minutes into my attempt
| at cancelling 3mbps home DSL service (not a typo), for which the
| price has crept up to $71 USD/mo.
|
| I first spoke with a customer service agent whose accent I
| couldn't understand very well. I have him ALL my account
| information. He mumbled something about being unable to forward
| me to the actual customer service agent (then what is your role,
| dude?), then came back on and said he couldn't forward me and so
| I would have to call them myself.
|
| He gave me the same number I had already called. I pointed this
| out to him and he gave me some other number, which is where I'm
| listening to on-hold music now.
|
| Right now the on-hold music is interrupted to sell me shit.
| shlomo_z wrote:
| I feel your pain. This is extremely annoying. I wish you the
| best of luck!
| arwhatever wrote:
| Done, and done. 14 + 44 minute phone calls, gave all of my
| information to 3 redundant people, including explaining to
| confused agents that I don't recall the account pin, well you
| have to have the account pin, well actually the previous
| person accepted my answer to my personal security question
| and the person before that texted me a temporary pin but now
| for some reason those alternate methods don't work for you?
| accrual wrote:
| I wonder what would happen if one sent a cancellation letter
| via certified mail, then just stopped paying. If they come
| after you, well - you canceled.
| arwhatever wrote:
| Perhaps the letter alone would be adequate.
|
| But frustratingly, the AT&T website appeared to allow you to
| replace your current (auto-pay) billing method with some
| other billing method, but I didn't see any way to remove all
| current billing methods, which makes just stopping paying
| nigh impossible. :-(
| zaphod12 wrote:
| most credit cards allow you to create a temporary card
| number. Create one, set it to be the billing method, and
| then revoke it. crazy that we need to resort to that sort
| of thing, but it does work!
| kamarg wrote:
| Does this fix whatever method companies use to continue
| billing you monthly when you are issued a new card
| because the old one was lost/expired/etc?
| barbazoo wrote:
| I have several credit cards, none of the providers allow
| me to create a temporary number. Plus, one wouldn't be
| enough because you'd need one for every vendor you might
| want o cancel in the future.
| Suppafly wrote:
| Canceling your credit card doesn't magically get you out
| of owing money that you're contractually obligated to
| pay. It might get them to eventually cancel your service
| for non-payment, but it's not a guarantee. They might
| just keep billing you until it's worth thousands and then
| mess up your credit or pursue you in court for payment.
| thechao wrote:
| I've talked to my rep about the idea of "credit card
| cancellation": the idea that you should be able to go
| through your bank (or you credit card provider's web app)
| go to a recurring charge and click "cancel" from there.
| I'm pretty sure most major credit card companies would be
| on board; what's stopping them is the legal thicket of
| contracts that are in the way. What the CC providers need
| is a clear framework from the legislature to support
| them. The FTC ain't enough.
| hamilyon2 wrote:
| Genuine question. Why country with so much freedoms
| tolerates this particular injustice so much.
|
| Freedom to pay is very fundamental for free speech, I think
| courts and legislatures made this very very clear multiple
| times.
|
| There are whole countries where you don't need Apple as
| intermediary to cancel any subscription without notice. In
| these countries it is up to companies to sue you if they
| think you are in wrong, and "they made it hard to cancel
| subscription" is basically all defence consumer ever needs.
|
| So they never win.
|
| So they never sue.
| Suppafly wrote:
| >If they come after you, well - you canceled.
|
| Then you have to go court to decide which of you is right,
| much easier to sit on the phone for a couple hours.
| catlikesshrimp wrote:
| Non US Call centers can't handle cancellations. If they can't
| convince you to postpone, they have to transfer you to some US
| Call center specifically for Retention or something like that.
|
| The transfer process impacts the metrics of the agent. You
| know, like call length, customer survey, customer callbacks,
| etc
|
| Well transfers are also a metric. That specific agent might
| prefer a "callback" over a "transfer" that month.
|
| W/e Your best strategy is to open the call with: "hi, I want to
| cancel my service" And don't give details about any problem,
| you just want to cancel. Period.
|
| If the agen't "can't transfer" ask for a supervisor. Could be 5
| - 15 more minutes but at least you don't have to call again.
|
| If you ask for "an American" or "someone who can speak
| english", depending on the call center company, you can get a
| call drop, a soft retention, a transfer to the agent beside, or
| a transfer to a call center in the US. YMMV
|
| my two cents
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| Why not send a registered letter?
| justin66 wrote:
| That will work. Because it's registered.
| mrguyorama wrote:
| Because without any form of regulation, the ISP has no
| requirement to honor that letter?
|
| The whole point of "click to cancel" was to deal with the
| fact that a business, by contract law, can make it almost
| entirely impossible to stop owing them money through entirely
| legal means. The courts do not consider being on hold for 18
| hours onerous enough to void a contract, so it's perfectly
| legal to require you to follow the "cancellation process",
| whatever that is.
|
| Welcome to a world without consumer protections beyond basic
| contract law! American courts have long held the position
| that, if you agree to a contract, it really doesn't matter
| how onerous it is. Fuck you, caveat emptor and all that.
|
| If you want to improve the situation without new regulation,
| we should push for courts to take a more reasonable stance:
| That contract law does not protect absurd contracts. This is
| _supposed_ to be the current situation, but what it takes to
| get your contract declared null because it 's unfair or
| onerous is just insane right now, because our courts have
| spent at least 50 years praying at the alter of "let
| businesses do literally anything they want under contract
| law"
| tacon wrote:
| >Because without any form of regulation, the ISP has no
| requirement to honor that letter?
|
| Is this your personal exerience, or are you making
| assumptions?
|
| I would love to hear how this process possibly fails to
| unsubscribe anyone:
|
| 1. Go to your state's corporate website and get/buy the
| name and address of the corporate registered agent for your
| ISP or whatever. In Texas that costs $1.
|
| 2. Write or ask ChatGPT to write a demand letter that they
| cancel your service as of the date of your letter. If they
| don't, threaten to sue them in small claims court. In
| Texas, threaten triple damages under the Deceptive Trade
| Practices Act. (ChatGPT will help you write demands using
| the "laundry list" of deceptive acts.)
|
| 3. Send letter return receipt requested.
|
| 4. A lawyer on their side is now involved. They will
| _never_ _ever_ show up in any small claims court for this.
| And if they do, the judge is so on your side for this!
|
| Heck, this works for a bunch of things, once you assert
| your rights. For example, I made a Coinbase account when
| they first existed and played with $10 of bitcoin. There it
| sat for six years or so, and then I tried to log in again.
| Their identity bullshit was demanding to use a phone number
| from an older phone and they stonewalled. So I sent a
| demand letter as above and, surprise!, my account was
| magically re-enabled for my $3 of bitcoin.
| awalsh128 wrote:
| Sorry, this sucks as someone who has experienced this
| themselves. As a former customer support person, ask for a
| supervisor. Also be firm and serious without being rude or
| berating. Lastly never buy the "our systems are having
| trouble". That is support speak for "I have no clue, call back
| and talk to someone else".
| grvdrm wrote:
| Can you do a fraude dispute on your CC?
| const_cast wrote:
| > Right now the on-hold music is interrupted to sell me shit.
|
| Jesus Christ, this is like those gasoline pumps that blare ads
| at you while you pump. On that little screen right above the
| plaque that says "you better not go in your car or this whole
| place will fucking explode or something".
|
| Since when is it chill to hold people hostage for ads, let
| alone LOUD ads? I don't want to hear this!
|
| PS: little tip for gasoline pump ads: one button always mutes
| them. Think it's a compliance thing. Almost never labeled, so
| just try all the buttons.
| p1mrx wrote:
| > gasoline pump ads: one button always mutes them
|
| I don't think this is true anymore. I've pushed all 8 buttons
| on a pump near me, and it didn't mute. Almost purchased a car
| wash though. Thankfully my primary car is electric.
| kylehotchkiss wrote:
| Ugh, this is something the current admin's electorate could
| greatly benefit from. How significant of a revenue cut was this
| gonna cause businesses to justify immediately taking an anti-
| consumer stance?
| nixpulvis wrote:
| I want to see a candidate run largely on a consumer protection
| platform. We've been letting companies get away with more and
| more bullshit and it needs to stop.
| Gud wrote:
| Hi, European here.
|
| To hear these horror stories how hard it is to cancel a service
| in the US makes me wonder how the Americans put up with this.
| arwhatever wrote:
| My perception is that consumer protections are much weaker in
| the U.S. than in the E.U. It would be interesting if anyone has
| made any attempt at quantifying this.
|
| We all know that there are other countries where far, far worse
| abuses of power take place, but I've wondered if the U.S. might
| be at some really unfortunate nexus of strong contract law
| enforcement + particularly poor consumer protections that leads
| to these particularly madding subscription cancellation-type
| services discussed in this thread.
| nick238 wrote:
| One of our defining American neuroses is an extreme aversion to
| anything remotely paternalistic.
| lostlogin wrote:
| Fellow non-American:
|
| Add in the random percentage increase in price when you try to
| buy something in a store from hidden taxes.
|
| Also add the culture of tipping, rather than paying staff.
| drdec wrote:
| > Add in the random percentage increase in price when you try
| to buy something in a store from hidden taxes.
|
| It's not random.
|
| Those of us with a state tax are familiar with the rules and
| the rates. Those with a modicum of arithmetic ability have a
| pretty good idea what the total is coming to.
|
| Not saying "this is better" just that it is not as bad as you
| apparently think.
| lostlogin wrote:
| I've only been to the US as a visitor, and found the
| percentages varied between shops and goods. I'm sure there
| is a pattern, but it really does seem crazy that it isn't
| shown on the price tag.
| twoquestions wrote:
| Why do regular people like this? For real, is it all "Those
| People Have it Worse", or do they just like the government making
| things worse for it's own sake?
|
| There's people who like this who will never benefit at all, does
| anyone know why?
|
| I don't get it. Then again I don't get the appeal of tearing the
| wings off of flies either.
| lostlogin wrote:
| > Why do regular people like this? For real, is it all "Those
| People Have it Worse", or do they just like the government
| making things worse for its own sake?
|
| Could you explain what you're referring to? Isn't the FTC
| trying to make it better (with key staff getting fired as they
| try)?
| twoquestions wrote:
| POTUS fired two Dem members of the FTC, and the remainder
| voted to delay enforcement.
|
| Some people like this, where companies get to effectively
| scam people by deliberately not enforcing rules preventing
| it. I don't know why people like this. I speculated that it
| was due to some dumb new bigotry of some sort, as a wild
| guess as to why people like it when the gov't harms people
| for no reason.
| typedef_struct wrote:
| How about 'click-to-bill'. If I don't touch your service you
| can't charge me.
| darknavi wrote:
| Kagi's policy is in the direction of that:
|
| https://help.kagi.com/kagi/plans/plan-types.html#fair-pricin...
| bdangubic wrote:
| Kagi is doing it the right way...
| OptionOfT wrote:
| Most, if not all of these service are billed before you get
| access. Ergo, if they cannot bill you, they can immediately
| revoke access.
|
| The system is built in such a way that they get a lot of
| information about you (e.g. SSN for internet access) subsequently
| used to ensure cancellation is extremely painful.
|
| If they didn't have this information, failure to bill would be
| immediate service pausing/termination, so it's not even that non-
| payment results in money lost for the company.
|
| For email accounts I create burners. I wish I could do the same
| in real life.
| Suppafly wrote:
| Of course they did, everything pro-consumer gets canceled or put
| off during republican administrations.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2025-05-12 23:01 UTC)