Trying to avoid being auto charged

[clifffaith]

Last year I gave my house bound mother a subscription to her local newspaper. Annual price is over $300. They have a $200 new subscriber deal, but then they auto charge you full price the following year unless you cancel before the renewal. I purposely used my Wyndham credit card, which I knew we’d be cancelling, to buy the subscription.

Now I’ve waited 45 days to be sure we “haven’t been a subscriber for 30 days” and I’m wanting to sign her up again at $200, but want to avoid auto renewal on my credit card. If you miss the auto renewal date, no refunds and you are stuck. The renewal date is also more than a bit nebulous because when they have “special editions” they outright say these eat into your subscription, so one year isn’t really one year. How would you buy the paper to avoid auto renewal? I’ve wondered if I could buy a Visa gift/credit card and then use that to pay? Or is there something about the account number on one of those that screams it will be empty at renewal time?

 

[susieq]

I don't see why you couldn't use that ~ good idea!!

 

[DrQ]

I’ve wondered if I could buy a Visa gift/credit card and then use that to pay? Or is there something about the account number on one of those that screams it will be empty at renewal time?

You can try it, but gift cards have account numbers which identify them as such and may get bounced when you try to enter it into the system.

 

[Passepartout]

Some congress folk are making noises that online subscriptions should be as easy to cancel as to sign up for. It will be interesting to see if this gets any traction. I'm not holding my breath.

 

[Patri]

In the past, I would pay for subscriptions with a check so they could not auto renew. When it ended I would wait until a new deal came along and sign up again. Not sure who would accept a check anymore. For me, our local papers have gone so downhill it is not worth buying them anymore.

 

[rapmarks]

I haven’t subscribed to the local newspaper for four years and they won’t let me do any special offers because I am a previous subscriber

 

[clifffaith]

Talk about perfect timing! Someone just posted a copy of their Daily Breeze bill on Facebook. Over $700 to renew the local paper. She’s called and they wouldn’t budge. Someone else seconded that price.

 

[oceanblue2]

Last year I gave my house bound mother a subscription to her local newspaper. Annual price is over $300. They have a $200 new subscriber deal, but then they auto charge you full price the following year unless you cancel before the renewal. I purposely used my Wyndham credit card, which I knew we’d be cancelling, to buy the subscription.

Now I’ve waited 45 days to be sure we “haven’t been a subscriber for 30 days” and I’m wanting to sign her up again at $200, but want to avoid auto renewal on my credit card. If you miss the auto renewal date, no refunds and you are stuck. The renewal date is also more than a bit nebulous because when they have “special editions” they outright say these eat into your subscription, so one year isn’t really one year. How would you buy the paper to avoid auto renewal? I’ve wondered if I could buy a Visa gift/credit card and then use that to pay? Or is there something about the account number on one of those that screams it will be empty at renewal time?

If your mother is located in California this new law may apply.

https://ktla.com/news/california/canceling-subscriptions-will-be-much-easier-for-california-residents-thanks-to-new-law/

 

[JudyH]

I put a date 11 1/2 months out in my phone calendar and when it comes up I call and tell them how cash strapped I am and can they offer me something and they then offer the same intro price again. This has worked with The NY Times for several years and the Baltimore Sun.

 

[Brett]

I put a date 11 1/2 months out in my phone calendar and when it comes up I call and tell them how cash strapped I am and can they offer me something and they then offer the same intro price again. This has worked with The NY Times for several years and the Baltimore Sun.

I do the exact same thing but when I was handling my mother's finances I just let her subscriptions roll over.

 

[isisdave]

With most streaming subscriptions, if you cancel you still get to watch for the rest of your paid term, so if I want one for a month I cancel it immediately after booking it. I don't do annual subscriptions, but they usually work the same way, as Faith pointed out.

I have a newspaper subscription that was $1 per week for six months; I cancelled it at the beginning of the sixth month (reminder on my Google Calendar). That one let me renew it almost immediately -- I might have switched to DW's name, I don't remember.

Some credit cards have a switch you can set online to suspend them. This is supposedly so that if you misplace your card, you can suspend it rather than cancel while you search. You could get this kind of card for subscriptions and leave it suspended. I guarantee they'll contact you if the payment fails.

Also, here's a hint for online signups -- you can put a dot anywhere in your email address before the @ and the email will still come to you, but it looks like a different address to the signup engine, so you can get the new-subscriber deal. So abc123@gmail.com can be abc.123 or a.bc123 or even a.b.c.1.2.3@gmail.com

Does it have to be the local paper? There are always deals on NYTimes, Washington Post, even Wall Street Journal.

 

[clifffaith]

With most streaming subscriptions, if you cancel you still get to watch for the rest of your paid term, so if I want one for a month I cancel it immediately after booking it. I don't do annual subscriptions, but they usually work the same way, as Faith pointed out.

I have a newspaper subscription that was $1 per week for six months; I cancelled it at the beginning of the sixth month (reminder on my Google Calendar). That one let me renew it almost immediately -- I might have switched to DW's name, I don't remember.

Some credit cards have a switch you can set online to suspend them. This is supposedly so that if you misplace your card, you can suspend it rather than cancel while you search. You could get this kind of card for subscriptions and leave it suspended. I guarantee they'll contact you if the payment fails.

Also, here's a hint for online signups -- you can put a dot anywhere in your email address before the @ and the email will still come to you, but it looks like a different address to the signup engine, so you can get the new-subscriber deal. So abc123@gmail.com can be abc.123 or a.bc123 or even a.b.c.1.2.3@gmail.com

Does it have to be the local paper? There are always deals on NYTimes, Washington Post, even Wall Street Journal.

About 2 hours ago I sent an email from my yahoo account to my iCloud account with an extra dot and it did NOT go through. And at this point no rejection notice.

ETA: NOT

 

[jp10558]

With e-mail I've used spamex.com forever, and now my Fastmail account has built in "masked email". The benefit of Spamex is when places take it, you can redirect to whatever e-mail address you want from each "disposable" address. The benefit of Fastmail's is no extra account fee over the e-mail cost, and they aren't identifiable as "disposable" so more places accept them. In either case, there's no way for someone to look at dots and work backwards to the real e-mail address - so looks a lot more like completely different e-mails at the other end, and turning one off stops SPAM too.

On the payment side, I wish it was simpler / standard to have something like the virtual card numbers. Some banks offer them, some don't, AMEX seems to require you to use an app and it's complicated enough I don't use them. But if I could use them as easily as the "disposable" e-mails above, I would. Then you could like a gift card I guess authorize a set amount and it'll just be declined after.

 

[SmithOp]

My Capital One card has the option to generate a one time use credit number for online shopping, maybe your card offers that to use for sign up. Renewal would be blocked if the try the number again.

 

[b2bailey]

Are you able to log in to newspaper's website to cancel existing subscription?
As I'm writing this, I am amazed her eyes are able to read a newspaper.

 

[clifffaith]

Are you able to log in to newspaper's website to cancel existing subscription?
As I'm writing this, I am amazed her eyes are able to read a newspaper.

I will have to see if the subscription is visible after I reinstate it. Turns out I am too cheap to pay the $8.95 surcharge they wanted for a gift card, so I’m using my Amazon card and do all I can to cancel before it renews. It takes her most of the day to read the paper because one eye was damaged seven years ago by a garden fungus they couldn’t kill and then the cornea transplant wasn’t as successful as they’d hoped. At least the paper “maybe” keeps her from doing another load of laundry. She became obsessed with laundry when my bedridden father was soiling the bed daily through his diapers. He’s been gone three years and she still does the wash at least four times a week.

 

[rapmarks]

I will have to see if the subscription is visible after I reinstate it. Turns out I am too cheap to pay the $8.95 surcharge they wanted for a gift card, so I’m using my Amazon card and do all I can to cancel before it renews. It takes her most of the day to read the paper because one eye was damaged seven years ago by a garden fungus they couldn’t kill and then the cornea transplant was as successful as they’d hoped. At least the paper “maybe” keeps her from doing another load of laundry. She became obsessed with laundry when my bedridden father was soiling the bed daily through his diapers. He’s been gone three years and she still does the wash at least four times a week.

My mother did the wash every day too. She always had to presoak things and would stop up the laundry tub and end up flooding the laundry room and hall.

 

[geekette]

Talk about perfect timing! Someone just posted a copy of their Daily Breeze bill on Facebook. Over $700 to renew the local paper. She’s called and they wouldn’t budge. Someone else seconded that price.

Holy crap! Way to lose customers.