Posted on 05/08/2010 7:31:51 PM PDT by OldNavyVet
Subscribers to Classmates.com might be surprised to learn that they’ve agreed to an automatic renewal clause.
It happened to me.
I learned about it after finding a $39 renewal charge on my credit card.
My credit card company subsequently gave me a $39 conditional credit based on my complaint; but that credit was revoked after Classmates disputed it.
In their paperwork, Classmates writes that members may …“terminate Subscription Services at any time by contacting our Member Care Department via email or via our live chat representative.“
I'm now at an age where “who needs it?”; but I was late in “terminating”; so I’m now locked into Classmates for another year.
Not just them...lots of others. It’s best to simply change credit card numbers every year...they you don’t have to worry.
Well, whatever you do never subscribe to Reader’s Digest. You can call and scream and threaten but they will never unsubscribe you and they will continue to charge your card.
changing #s might not stop recurring billing
There are many many companies besides Classmates.com that do automatic renewals. The real key is how difficult is it to cancel?
If there isn’t a cancel button easily available that I can just click and they force you to call “customer service” then I don’t do business with that company.
Think it was stamps.com (btw waste of money unless you ship A LOT) I had to go through the call rep, his supervisor, and then his supervisor in order to get them to cancel.
My C.U. sends me a new debit card every year with a new number. I realize a month later that I have to renew my pledge to F.R.
I’ll try hard to remember it this August.
“changing #s might not stop recurring billing”
It’s worked for me...but you could be right.
Remember AOL ... and all the accounts one would open with all those free floppies.
I got used to canceling a lot.
changing #s might not stop recurring billing
They're gonna have a difficult time getting anything -- if they don't have a valid number ... LOL ...
Most all of my classmates that were at my 30th HS reunion.. are all on FACEBOOK or Myspace.. and they’re a lot cheaper.
I guess that’s one of the reasons I never joined Classmates.
They keep sending me notes that so-and-so has just sent me a message, but I have to join in order to see it.
I agree .. at this age who cares.
One way around this is to cancel your subscription after you get it. They still bill you for the year and let you know that you have time on it, but they will cancel it after the full year without billing you again.
I hope I explained it clearly. If not email me and I’ll write it in more detail on how I did it.
Goodluck
Thankfully, I have never sent them any money and I certainly am not going to give them or anyone else a credit card number with permission to charge me whenever they felt like it. I still get stuff from them with teasers that you have to pay to see who has the possible hots for you from 40 years ago but I don’t bite.
Or anything concerning A.O.L. - so I hear anyway, I've never had any dealings with them.
My 89 year old mother who lives 300 miles from me had a hard time getting rid of her dial up internet service - until my little sister got in their faces.
Almost everybody that takes your credit card for a subscription to service has automatic renewal. It’s convenient for the people that want to stay and a money maker for the ones that don’t dot their i’s when they want to leave.
Automatic renewals are a big scam.
I remember legislation being passed in Australia and India to declare the devious practice, illegal.
Yep, this trend is definitely one of my pet peeves. You pay for a magazine subscription, purchase something online or subscribe to a website, but don’t realize that you are agreeing to allow them to renew it for the rest of your natural life. Then when you realize it, they never make it easy to cancel and get a refund, you have to call some obscure number and put up with the hard sell. Being the good conservative I am, I normally don’t support government regulation. But lets just say I wouldn’t be terribly upset if they required these companies to provide a clearly labeled “opt in” option for auto-renewal and a simple online “no questions asked” method of cancelling auto-renewels.
Hopefully a class action suit that causes bankruptcy will be in their near future.
I signed up in August 2008 for a high school reunion (and found my half-brother and half-sister I’d never met there!) and in Aug. 2009 I also had my credit card charged. I hadn’t realized it did so automatically—since I planned to stay in the program I wasn’t upset, but I did go in and change the billing to one that needed my approval *first*. Wasn’t terribly difficult to do, IIRC.
This is true. Mine also started FB pages, and the HS itself has its own FB pages for announcements, like reunions, or deaths. I’m planning to cancel my Classmates account this August, although I’ve enjoyed setting up the timeline there...wonder if I can save that?
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