I have been trying to get my state legislators to implement such a consumer law for over a decade.

The federal proposal will likely be ineffective unless it has an individual cause of action. What that means is that the only way (IMO) such a law works is not if the government enforces it, but rather if any consumer can sue the company in small claims court for a reasonable judgment (eg $1000 or something). Now the company has to fix their ways or feel death from a million cuts, and the cost to defend likely exceeds the cost to pay.

The other things the law needs (it may have but the article wasn’t clear) are clarity and penalties for dark patterns.

For example, “as simple as it was to subscribe” needs to be WAY more detailed, eg “takes no more time for a reasonable person to unsubscribe than it did to subscribe” and “the user must be able to use the same communication channel or mechanism (eg web, mobile app, etc) used to subscribe, in order to unsubscribe”, and “at the time of subscription, unsubscribe instructions must be provided to the user via a persistent medium such as email”, and “the unsubscribe interface must be prominently discoverable on the web site or mobile application”, etc.

And any dark patterns or intentional violations need to make the recoverable amount subject to a multiplier.

I am happy that the government is tackling this but doing it through regulatory action is not likely to help much IMO; especially in light is the recent Supreme Court decision regarding Chevron deference, it’s likely not to last through legal challenges. (IANAL)

I agree with the bit about individual cause of action, as long as it includes attorney fees too, as that is the way to go from having to file yourself, to getting juicy lawyers lined up to make bank (from my experience litigating FOIA).

In fact, with FOIA in Illinois the only way to hurt a non-compliant public body is with the attorney fees[]. There is a civil penalty per violation, but it isn't paid to the litigant, but it is paid by the public body to the county. As one government lawyer said to me, "I don't care if I lose! I just write a check out to myself!"

[] some of the lawyers I know who do this work agree to split their fees with the litigant as an incentive for them to see it through, which I don't think is technically legal, but it let's people keep the government honest and make some change for their effort

Swedish legislation has it right here. You can unsubscribe by any means you prefer. Mail, email, phone call, a notice in your local newspaper, carrier pigeon. The choice is completely with the party who wishes to terminate the agreement.

It incentivises companies to make it as simple as possible, because if they don’t the cost of manually handling requests coming in through all kinds of different channels quickly becomes excessive.

> Mail, email, phone call, a notice in your local newspaper, carrier pigeon.

How would that even... work? Doesn't this obligate every company to read every local newspaper in every customer's area? And a customer who feels like a company a hard time could just put a notice in the paper and then collect money because the company obviously won't read every newspaper? Also, what about companies wanting to give customers a hard time by canceling their subscriptions - now customers have to read every newspaper too? I must be missing something...

"legal notice in a newspaper" is still very much a thing in common law jurisdictions, with a long history, see banns going way back https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/banns

if you change your name you need to put it in the newspaper, and https://futureofnewspapers.net/how-to-place-a-legal-notice-i...

There are many different types of legal ads, with different costs to advertise. The most common type of legal notice in New York is an LLC formation notice. The State of New York requires limited liability corporations to run an ad informing the public on the formation of the new corporation. There are also FCC, SLA liquor licenses, sidewalk cafe notices, name change notices, divorce notices (also known as dissolution of marriage notices), and probate notices.

I am well aware of that, but there is a very huge and crucial difference between putting something in the newspaper for the sake of public dissemination vs. for the sake of making sure one specific known private entity gets the information. The only case I can recall off the top of my head for the latter is for things like service of judicial papers, and even then as a last resort, only when direct attempts to reach the party have failed. I am not aware of a single case where a party that is already reasonably reachable has to monitor public media for private communication.

And yet, in the US, you can have process servers publish a notice in a very specific law newspaper that only lawyers ever read, then claim that you couldn't reach someone who would never in their life read such a newspaper for decades simply to see if they've been served.

If this sounds ridiculous, it's because it is, and yet somehow, we still do it. What Sweden does sounds no different, except it's companies with millions of dollars who could actually afford to check these things.

As I mentioned, AFAIK that's only as a last resort once you've been unreachable via other means, which doesn't sound ridiculous at all. Is that not the case?

Could you point me to any description or source for this?

It doesn't describe any legal process I'm familiar with.

>there is a very huge and crucial difference between putting something in the newspaper for the sake of public dissemination vs. for the sake of making sure one specific known private entity gets the information

yes, and that huge and crucial difference in this case is that the entities in question have attorneys on staff, and those attorneys understand their responsibilities on behalf of the corporation

> Doesn't this obligate every company to read every local newspaper in every customer's area?

In my US state, a lot of important legal notices get published in the newspaper, so companies should already be effectively doing this.

What most do (and what I've always done) is to subscribe to a clipping service that will scan the classifieds, nationwide if you want, for you and forward to you the types of items you want to be made aware of.

Just what you receive, i'd assume. Where reception is a legal definition.

Essentially when a reasonable third party can be said to have received.

In English legal systems attached terms and conditions work the same way, with regard to receiving them.

> by any means you prefer

I prefer to unsubscribe by writing it on a post-it note and sticking it in a public bathroom under the sink. That way I can always sue for them not doing it!

Yes, that's true and it's good for those who know about it. It's not enough though, companies still have super easy sign ups and then refer to call customer service to unsubscribe (usually the case with cell phone plans for example). And many companies have no email or contact form, only a phone number available on their site. So there's still lots of room for improvement.

> As easy to cancel as it is to sign up

I think that’s not enough in some cases. Signing up requires inputting a bunch of data; unsubscribing should be 2 clicks at most, no logins.

How would you unsubscribe from a subscription service without logging in and confirming your account?

The same goes for all services. I was able to sign up for an ISP service (in the UK) online very easily, with a few clicks and entries onto a form to enter my details, choose my installation date, choose my speed, etc. Fast forward a few years, I'm leaving that house and need to cancel the internet - snail mail letter needed.

There is zero incentive for a company to invest in tooling and tech to make processes that lose them customers more efficient. This is something that has to be regulated and enforced. I just don't see a c-suit clamoring to spend money on making it easier to leave.

There is a reason to invest in this, the rationale goes as follows: Some of my customers will legitimately need to cancel, unsubscribe, stop using, or whatever, but they like the product. If I piss these customers off, they may recommend against using it, and refuse to ever use it again so I should accept that they're leaving with grace and maybe they'll return later. You can offer to "pause" a subscription for example, "Posted to Amundsen-Scott† for six months? Alas Swim Fun Inc don't have a pool there, but when you get back just hit resume and you can keep the same pricing, meanwhile we won't charge you".

But far too many "business leaders" are focused on short term gains at any cost and so this doesn't compute for them. They don't care that you currently like the product and would resubscribe when you get back from the pole, because that's a year or more away, they care about next quarter, and if you aren't income next quarter you're irrelevant to them, fuck you.

† Amundsen-Scott is the name of the base at the South Pole of the planet. It's a cool place. But lots of services aren't available there or would make no sense. You can't live there permanently, so those people are coming back.

I was pretty sure we'd abandoned the "but it would hurt the business and they'd change their ways" fantasy years ago, because a) it doesn't, and be) they don't. How's Equifax doing these days? Oh yeah, totally fine.

This.

In my case I enjoy reading The Economist and do not mind paying for it, but some years back I had to cancel my subscription (I was cutting back on expenses) and honestly I found that experience so much against the business values they preach that it has made me not subscribe again, even if it means not reading their publication.

(Every few years I go to check if they have made it easier to unsubscribe, but last time I checked they still had the same practices)

Edit: I can also imagine that I’m a minority and so it really pays off to keep doing this.

I avoid subscription services like the plague because of this (and other reasons).

I can't know if they're going to do this kind of crap until it is to late. Even if some one reviewed services for this they could change at any time for the worse. So I just assume it will happen and try to limit getting into that bad arrangement as much as possible.

I have a good example of this dynamic using Comcast: when we left New Haven, I had to spend a couple hours in line at a dingy, poorly staffed office terminating my account (the dude working there was fine, he needed coworkers) and then a couple months of “accidentally” still billing me. They could afford to be sloppy on billing and cancellation where I’d lived because in 2008 the competition was (I am not making this up) 128kpbs ISDN and 768-1Mbps DSL since the phone company had badly neglected its wiring.

In addition to being illegal, this was short sighted because they’re a national company. Comcast/Xfinity is one of three gigabit choices in my neighborhood and they periodically send offers with competitive pricing but each time I remember what dealing with them was like and toss it into the shredder. I’m sure the regional office would say they’re better run than the New England one, or that they have a better system, but I’m not going to find out, and there’s no way they skimped enough to save more than they could have made with over a decade of service in a new region.

The harder they make leaving, the less % chance that I'm ever coming back.

But I suppose they know and don't care.

I am also very surprised that this is the case in the UK. From my experience, it was very easy to cancel internet in the UK. As in nearly dead simple.

I tried to delete a Sony account (I had 2). Their site said to talk to support to get this done. I waited for 45 minutes, finally got to someone and they said I can’t. When I tried to mention the support site, they disconnected me, throwing me back in a 45 minute line if I felt like being hung up on again.

For a company that has been hacked multiple times, I find this unacceptable.

It's similar here in Sweden. Usually they require a call to support, officially. However, I think there is a law/policy that require them to accept unsubscriptions by mail/message, regardless of what they say on their website. I recently did this and it worked! Maybe there's something similar in the UK?

Yes that’s right. You can unsubscribe by any which way you want. Mail, phone call, pigeon. Any message sent to any employee or office in anyway is deemed acceptable for giving notice for any service or contract.

Counter-anecdote: cancelling my Virgin Media plan was very simple. I've clicked through their online cancellation process, then they've sent me a prepaid return box for the modem, and that was it.

I spent literally hours over several days on hold to cancel and when googling it this was widespread and hated.

Possibly you were very lucky, or they've buckled to the pressure caused by previous anti-consumer BS.

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/dec/19/i-was-cut-off-...

> Unlike providers who use the rival Openreach cable network, Virgin Media does not allow its six million broadband customers to cancel expired contracts online. Thirty days’ notice is required before any switch, compared with the 14 days’ notice required to switch Openreach providers.

A link to the ongoing Ofcom investigation into their shabby tactics:

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/phones-and-broadband/switching-prov...

I was shocked when I canceled cable TV and the landline on my Comcast triple-play plan--still have internet.

I had procrastinated for months because I was sure I'd go through a real workout routine. I did have to call them but don't remember any particular pain getting through to someone and then it was just "Your new bill will be [about half the old one). Return your rented voice modem. Have a nice day." Maybe it was because it was during COVID.

Nah they famously still do this thing where you have to give them 30 days notice and they will call you 2-3 times to get you to stay.

I had an internet service that could be signed up for on the internet, but required a phone call to cancel. During covid they could not staff their phone service properly so it was effectively broken (20 minute holds, getting booted from the queue, etc.), so I just closed the card and told them to pound sand.

My only concern about this is the signup processes that already take multiple pages anyways.

Take cell phones or internet, I don't have an exact number but I feel like with those given all of the information I have to put in, various agreements, etc etc once my service is in my cart I generally have 3, 4, maybe more pages of stuff to go through.

Is the "as easy to cancel as it is to sign up" showing me the same number of pages trying to convince me to stay?

Sure at least in that case it is still online, but it leaves plenty of room for dark patterns.

Could something that states something as simple as that, just lead to a slightly worse signup process in the hopes that they can then convince customers to stay longer with those dark patterns. It would be a gamble on the companys part, but could pay off.

I realize no law will be perfect, but I worry that something that simple could be abused when it would likely just be better to make a law about unsubscribing in the first place that applies across the board.

Edit:

I was thinking about this more. But what exactly is "as easy to cancel as it is to sign up"? When I sign up for a service I am paying for at a minimum I had to create a username, a password, and put in my credit card. Maybe I had to validate my email and/or phone. Maybe I had to put in my address, validate I was a student, etc etc.

Signing up is not a one click thing, so just stating that neither would canceling.

I get the spirit of saying something like that, but with simplicity I feel like also opens up room for interpretation and it doing nothing to really help except for some extreme cases (like needing to call).

But I also look at my gym membership, I could not sign up until I physically went in or at the very least talked to someone on the phone. That gives them the power to do the exact same thing when I want to cancel.

Yeah I agree with this, it's a very good point. Of course a real law needs more narrow wording. The spirit of it should be more about not allowing companies to have different means for subscribing and unsubscribing. Then there can be additional rules that prevent them from convoluting the process more than necessary.

I think this counts as over thinking. Unsubscribing is MILES harder in many countries. The unsubscribe link is buried in some unknown sub menu, customer support dumps you, or the like.

Trying to fatigue someone out of subscribing is a bad business model. If people want to leave, it should be dead simple to do so.

Why more than one-click? We already have plenty of examples of this working, everyone else needs to get on board.

I still recall a big reputable newspaper that was approaching students with free sample subscriptions to their newspaper. The sign up was super simple, to end the subscription you had to do the telephone equivalent of getting through a maze blindfolded while sacrificing your first born when the stars aligned right.

After that experience that news source is on my and many of my colleagues black lists. And we are the core demographic they would probably like to target.

Yeah.

This is how it works in Argentina. For at least 15 years IIRC.

So... EU laws?

What EU-wide law requires it to be as easy to cancel as to sign up? I’m sitting in Germany right now and I’m unaware of any such law - though it might very well be recent and not fully transposed into German law, or might be situational or not widely complied with.

It’s a good idea though, absolutely.

There is a law that requires that subscriptions can be cancelled online within "the click of a button" with automatic confirmation. (since 2022) If no such option to cancel is implemented by the provider the minimum contract duration is void and you can cancel immediately.

German reference: https://www.verbraucherzentrale.de/vertraege-reklamation/kue...

Good news! Annoyingly financial services, including insurance, are an exception. But this handles many cases.

We have the regulation in Germany, but afaik it's not EU-wide. The "Gesetz über faire Verbraucherverträge" basically says that if something can be subscribed to easily online, then the company also has to provide an easy unsubscribe. It goes into detail how such a button should look like, how labelled, what data the confirmation page has to list and how fast the confirmation has to be (immediate).

I believe the EU law sets the minimum required conditions for contracts (fair, not abusing the customer), but the individual EU-countries can implement more consumer friendly rules.

It's horrendus in Germany trying to cancel a mobile phone subscription, internet service, gym membership or the likes. You have to jump through hoops like sending a registered physical letter, 3 months before the end of the service period for it to be considered a valid cancellation ("Kün­di­gung"). Without this, you're forced into paying for another year.

EU regulation is badly needed to cut out this anti-consumer nonsense.

This is no longer true, it is limited to a one month period (after a possible 2 year minimum contract to offer "special discounts") in advance and every contract can be cancelled online.

"As easy to cancel as it is to sign up"

Hm, I would prefer two-step sign up to one-step unsubscribe.

Why the asymmetry? And what do you have in mind when you refer to "two-step sign up"?

For my convenience; and by two-step sign up I mean "enter my e-mail into a form, then receive a confirmation e-mail and click on a confirmation link to be actually subscribed".

Are you confusing this with email newsletter subscriptions? This is talking about paid membership services, the kind of thing where you need an account and often payment methods.

Yes :) Sorry.

It would stop my email doppelgänger from signing up for services under my address.

Sure, but it's a minimum. Also, the incentive here is aligned with what's best for the customer, i.e. they probably want to make their two step subscription process to become one step which automatically gives the user an easier process to unsubscribe.

> For example, to move loans from one bank to another you need some documents

How would this work? The lender may have paid for your loan (and may not have even gotten the right to service the loan). How do they make their money back? What about the mortgage-backed securities market?

Maybe I described it in a bad way. I'm talking about renegotiating the interest rate with another bank. So the original bank loan is not moved in practice, it's just paid back in full. It's law here in Sweden that the mortgage plan can't be changed (I.e. number of years etc) if you change bank, so the documents are related to this.

Ahh, this is called "refinancing" in the US.

Until they require you to dig out your CC and input the number and the cvv code to cancel, which shouldn't be needed, but hey, it's "as easy" as signing up. ;-)

Oh, sorry, that's not the card you signed up with... what do you mean you don't have the card that expired last year that rolled over when you signed up?