Europe has that law. Not all countries have fully implemented it yet but there is a deadline for all to have it.

So the rest of the story is that Ohio was the first state to pass a law requiring users be able to cancel subscriptions on-line. So we had to add it back in, but only for users in Ohio and it was burried on the site and had like 7 pages of "account saving" stuff.

Eventually most states passed similar laws and so we opened it up to all US accounts. I'm not sure what the experience is like today.

California has that law

But in California companies can (apparently) still require you to chat with a real person online and thus still need to do everything synchronously, wait in a queue, and argue with them for several minutes before they will cancel the subscription.

Personally I think that any time you grant permission to anyone to bill you automatically on a recurring basis, you need to be able to revoke that permission. This ought to be a fundamental mechanism of personal banking that you ought to be able to manage on your bank account online. It's astonishing to me that your bank can't even tell you all the ongoing recurring payments that are permitted on your account (or if they do, it's an ad hoc implementation that tries to detect recurring payment amounts, vendor names, etc.)

Which is great for California, but what about everyone else?

I think that was the point of the comment.

Often times if you change your address to be a CA address, websites will suddenly reveal an online cancel option. I swapped my parents' NYT account to be my CA address and suddenly "click here to cancel" was displayed on the website.

While I agree it should be a default setting, it's a useful little trick.

Just be careful if the CA Franchise Tax Board ever gets wind of it, they'll come after you for 10% income tax for the rest of your life.

> Which is great for California, but what about everyone else?

Vote in the next election for people/party that are more consumer friendly than industry friendly.

For all its flaws, CA had some of the most consumer and employee friendly (such as no non compete) laws.

I feel the lack of non compete is one of the main reasons tech took off in CA. That and the weather. For as much as people say starting a business in CA is hard, and it can be. For tech it is so easy I can just quit my job and start my company.

> but what about everyone else?

Vote.

I think Germany recently voted for this as well, so we will have this soonish :-) so if you can sign up online, there needs to be a similar way for cancelling.

This has been law since October 2016 in Germany. See § 309 Nr. 13 des BGB

But what would actually happen in Germany is, you would be stuck to that service due to a 3 year contract. Which you have to cancel some three months in advance or it renews for next three years.

But hey, we get startups whose usp is cancelling services.

Seems pretty normal to everyone I complain, that I still pay for my O2 bill after sending the cancellation letter(Physical piece of paper) for the umpteenth time.

Never heard of three year contracts. It's been a long time since I signed any two year contract. Most contracts I have (Internet, Gas, Energy, ..) are annual contracts. My mobile contract is cancelable monthly.

I think California has something like that.

We do indeed! Doesn't stop many people from making it a pain in the ass but stops some.

I was once a subscriber to the NYT, and will never be again because of this. I wonder if they are actually making money with this tactic or losing.

They are the most subscribed to print/digital media source in the United States. Their market share is considerable and they have the reputation to bring in new subs. They offer college students free/heavily-reduced subs to 'get em in', etc. This tactic sucks for the consumer who wants out, but the frustration keeps them from picking up the phone and committing to cancelling because 'hey, its only x dollars/month'

We should be able to just tell the credit card company to cancel recurring payments. They'll try to charge the card and get denied.

As far as I know, you're still on the hook for contractual payments, like most gym memberships and cell plans.

Credit cards should be able to send a "Cancel" signal that companies should be obligated to respond to. Problem solved, no need to trust third party websites (although I'm fine with them also being obligated to have an easy way to cancel on their site).

Of course you would be, just like if you maxed out your credit card or closed your credit card account. This doesn't pose a new or unique problem.

Capital one privacy cards are amazing for that. They paid me 250 to open one 2% cash back and unlimited privacy cards

You can.

> You can.

My understanding is that this will be reflected in credit reporting as delinquency- seems like a lose-lose in that sense. Can someone who has done this weigh in?

I requested that from one card provider and they told me that they couldn’t and I’d have to get a new card number to stop the charges.

When you say “you can”, are you just saying “you can ask”, or that you’ve had success doing this?

If the latter, mind sharing which card provider that was with?

This is how all of my cards are. Can't cancel recurring payments unless it's fraud. They must issue a new card.

If there's hope for beating this dark pattern, it lies with banks/CC companies

If I was a lawyer, I would start a service for cancelling subscriptions.

I.e., user can cancel subscription on website, system automatically writes cancellation letter, letter is sent to corresponding company address. If cancellation fails, then an official complaint is served to the company, and from there it follows the usual court process.