Have you ever signed up for something you didn’t really want but it came with a freebie and now you need to cancel it? Or maybe you just can’t afford all these subscription streamers that keep raising their prices? No matter why you want or need to cancel a subscription there’s something you need to know that these companies don’t WANT you to know. You can cancel as easy as you signed up.
This is actually federal law that states that however easy it was for you to sign up for a subscription, those companies need to make it as easy to cancel the same subscription. Here’s some of the actual parts of the law, that I found from a simple Google search:
“Under the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) “Click-to-Cancel” rule, companies are required to make canceling a subscription or recurring membership as easy as signing up.
Key requirements under this rule:
- Same Medium: If you subscribed online, the company must let you cancel online using the same method (e.g., clicking a button on a website or app).
- No Extra Hoops: They cannot force you to interact with a live representative or a virtual chatbot to cancel if you didn’t have to do that to sign up.
- No Surprise Pitches: Companies are prohibited from attempting to upsell or persuade you to stay (i.e., making “save-a-sale” offers) without your explicit permission during the cancellation process.
- Phone Subscriptions: If you enrolled over the phone, the company must provide a dedicated phone number during normal business hours for cancellations."
This rule is already almost 2 years old, but I never heard about it until I saw this post on Threads. One of the reasons why is because companies don’t want you to know that you can cancel as easy as you signed up, like 2 clicks or 1 email. They want you to think you have to call them to cancel so they can make you wait on hold forever, talk to multiple “retention specialists” who constantly try to make you keep paying by giving you tiny discounts, or saying they’ll just pause your subscription, or some other way to do literally ANYTHING but cancel your subscription, so you keep paying them in the long run.
Here’s an easy way to cancel, if they’re giving you the runaround.
1) Hang up! You don’t have to call them, unless you signed up in person, and even then you have to have a way to cancel online. And if you do call to cancel and they try to keep talking you into it, just say you’re reporting them to the FTC unless they cancel you immediately.
2) If you’re trying to cancel online and it seems impossible to even find the option, or the chatbot tries to send you to a retention specialist, remember this from the Threads post I linked to earlier:
“When the chatbot says “I can transfer you to an agent,” or the website hides the button behind five menus, send this exact line by email or in-app chat:
“I signed up online in [Month/Year]. I am cancelling through the same channel. Please confirm this cancellation is processed effective immediately and send written confirmation.”
That’s all you need to do. And if they make it harder than that, again tell them you’re reporting them to the FTC, and see how quickly they cancel your subscription for you.
