Don't trust changing your card either. I had a predatory LA Fitness membership. When they made me jump through one too many hoops to cancel, I called up WF and had them issue me a new card (Visa). Well, Visa, in their infinite wisdom, gave my new credit card number to LA Fitness and they kept on charging me for almost two years before I noticed. I don't remember the name of that program at Visa, but I'm sure they and other CC companies continue to do this. Should be illegal.

Netflix does this as well, and is how I found out about it. They claim that since you didn't cancel the service, it was clearly a lapse in your updating of the new number so they just helped you out. Of course it is in everyone's favor except yours when this happens.

It's only not in your favor if you changed your card to cancel Netflix specifically, in which case you should've just logged in and canceled.

If someone steals my card, and uses it to pay for Netflix, how will I log in and cancel?

The simplest, safe route is to not give companies the newly updated number. If my Netflix lapses because I forgot to update the number after a card change (whatever the reason), they can email me, and then I will log in to my account and update the card on file.

> If someone steals my card, and uses it to pay for Netflix, how will I log in and cancel?

You dispute the charge, just like any other unauthorized transaction. That's quite different than changing your card number under their feet, and will be received as such by Netflix.

Don't you cancel your card when it has been stolen?

Do companies that do subscriptions know when multiple accounts are using the same card number? Just curious if they try to use something like that for fraud detection or anything. Then again, I don't think they'd care. Just take the monies and let the card people deal with it.

During the whole clamping down on password sharing era, I'd be very surprised if some folks haven't had to pay for multiple Netflix subscriptions (for summer houses, or their kids off at college, that sort of thing...)

Don't trust cancelling your card either. I closed my account at Capital One, paid the final balance, and six months later I noticed a steep drop in my credit score. I had a $3 monthly charge that kept recurring even though I had closed my account.

Also, because my account was "closed," I didn't receive any statements notifying me that I was being charged. I only discovered this issue when my credit score dropped by 100 points.

Closing a credit line penalizes your credit score in general. It's why the standard recommendation is generally to leave the accounts open, forever.

Another thing for the FTC to investigate/stop.

Closing a personal credit card, in my experience, temporarily drops the score a few points and then it goes back to normal. It's a myth promulgated by banks to keep accounts open.

If so, that just raises the question: of what benefit is it to the banks to keep unused accounts open? The maintenance costs may be low, but they're still nonzero.

Ask Wells Fargo -> https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/wells-fargo-agrees-pay-3-bill...

And yet if you have a "dormant" checking or savings acccount, many banks will start charging you a monthly fee.

The bank allowing a charge on a closed account is some bullshit.

You have to report the card is lost or stolen then the new number will not propagate. You likely asked for a replacement card which will propagate the new number through the network.

Great tips thanks.

That bank-facing service from Visa is called VAU - Visa Account Updater.

https://developer.visa.com/capabilities/vau

I am really amazed how people can go years with not knowing what companies are regularly charging them money.

American Express asks you (or at least used to) if you want to allow recurring billing when canceling.

The problem is that that does not release you from your contractual obligation to pay every month. The company is still free to (and often does) send you to collections.

I'd argue that heavily lopsided TOS in favor of the company, that can be changed at any time by said company, and your access can be cut off unless you agree to the updated TOS, does not make a contractual obligation. In a B2C context, the business is the more sophisticated entity so it's up to them to make sure everyone knows what they are agreeing to. They could have put up a bold summary of "this is a yearly contract, you will be charged $79.99 to cancel, please type YEARLY CONTRACT in the box" somewhere in the signup flow. Had they done it, the case could be dismissed.

> Had they done it, the case could be dismissed.

You mean this case? Why should that get it dismissed?

This is about abusive (and unlawful) business practices, not a lack of knowledge on the consumer's end. If the customer had full knowledge of the terms before agreeing it would still be unlawful, the law generally doesn't care that the two parties consented to an abusive business relationship.

You put the ball in their court. They have to do something to get your money, which you might contest or ignore.

But ye it is not optimal. You'd probably want to have some record of trying to cancel.

That's fine with me. We can then let that "debt" linger until it is bought up by some company willing to settle for pennies on the dollar

Meanwhile, you can’t get a mortgage or a car loan because your SiriusXM bill remains unpaid because you “fixed the glitch.”

Sure, caveats are always included, but if you don't need a mortgage or a car loan, fuck 'em.

Not just a mortgage or car loan. Credit checks[1] are being used by landlords to decide whether or not to allow you to rent. They are being used by employers to decide whether or not to hire you. They are being used by utility companies and insurance companies to decide whether or not to do business with you.

It's slowly getting to the point where a low credit score will bar you from participating in major areas of the economy.

1: https://www.experian.com/blogs/ask-experian/what-is-credit-c...

21st century debtor's prison. No walls, chains or guards required!

Then it ruins your credit, and technically the three bureaus disallow "pay for delete" agreements between consumers and debt collectors which would get it off of your report entirely (some still do it).

One outstanding charge won't tank your score.

Amex will let you permanently block a merchant that has previously charged you from making any further charges, but you have to call and ask for it. Goldman Sachs, under the guise of Apple Card, does not permit this by phone or by app. I have no other experiences to report data on. (Note that this does not exempt you from any contractual obligations to pay ETFs or whatever.)

Wow that is great. I’ve been told that was impossible by several cards and ended up reissuing.

It needs to be some integration with the actual provider. You should be able to cancel through your CC, but they ought to get notified you canceled.

This is a huge advantage for subscriptions that go through Apple or Google since they have a central dashboard to cancel.

This is the way. Easy solution when forced to do business with actors with dark cancellation patterns.

Also good when forced to do archaic practices like writing credit card numbers on a form or saying them over the phone.

Came here to recommend this wonderful service...

Allows you to create unique CC#'s for every single company, and you can ship to any address (because the "address verification" will always respond <OKAY>).

For Apple Pay, they did recently introduce this (or maybe it has been a thing for a bit).

https://rr.judge.sh/IMG_1150.PNG

It doesn't matter, because it's a contract. Even if you cancel your card, Adobe can send it to collections, and it will show up as unpaid debt and negatively impact your credit score, which means you might pay more for your next mortgage or car loan.

This is not uncommon for businesses that use annual subscriptions. Certain gyms are particularly known for this. And with Adobe being so sneaky and aggressive about subscriptions, it wouldn't even surprise me.

This doesn't sound right to me.

Damages are generally limited to the extent to which a contract is performed or not performed, and the non-breaching party generally has a duty to mitigate damages.

So, in other words, you can't continue to perform once the other side has stopped performing and then later claim damages for non-performance you were aware of.

It's possible the contract itself specifies otherwise for this situation, but courts are generally not sympathetic to this sort of end-run around common law contract law.

I'm not saying companies have not tried to collect on this basis. I'm saying that if they were taken to court over the practice that they might lose. If Adobe really does this, it might strengthen the case against them.

In some countries/banks you can generate one-off CC numbers that are tied to your real one. I use it all the time for online services.