Comment

Comment on Cable Firms to FTC: We Shouldn’t Have to Let Users Cancel Service With a Click

German consumer protection FTW

The Fair Consumer Contracts Act will in future introduce a mandatory 2-step termination process […]. Wherever the consumer can conclude a subscription contract against payment, the provider should also give the consumer the opportunity to terminate at the same point. […A] cancellation button should be included on such registration pages for memberships at the first stage (with the wording “Cancel contracts here”). This “first” cancellation button should then lead to a confirmation page on the second level, where the respective user is identified and the consumer can effectively send the cancellation (i.e. with the wording “Cancel now”).

The law (German): www.gesetze-im-internet.de/bgb/__312k.html

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Mr_Blott@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Pretty sure this law applies to the whole EU though

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- ruplicant@sh.itjust.works ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  i really don’t think so. i hope it will be so in the future
  
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  - Sinupret@feddit.de ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I was pretty sure that there is something and a lot of searching finally led me to the “Unfair Commercial Practices Directive” from 2005. There also is a guidance to that directive from 2021 that is found here: eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX…
    
    Section 4.2.7 (dark patterns) is what is interesting for this topic. In the paragraph at the end of the section it includes the sentence:
    
    unsubscribing from a service should be as easy as subscribing to the service
    
    So it appears that the EU intended it that way but because it’s only a directive, implementation differs by country. I also didn’t see anything about being able to cancel in the same way you subscribed(e.g. that they can’t force you to call or send a letter if you subscribed online), but afaik german law has a ruling like this.
    
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  - Mr_Blott@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    
    Under the GDPR, it must be “as easy to withdraw as to give consent”. You must make it very easy for people to unsubscribe: one or two clicks at most
    
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    bleistift2@feddit.de ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
    I’m not sure how the GDPR would apply to a service subscription. While the service is running, the companies have legitimate interest to keep your data, so you can’t have it removed.
    
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tormeh@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
Not sure how well this has worked in practice. Lots of bad cancellation proceedures last time I had to do it

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- FooBarrington@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago
  The law was only introduced less than 1½ years ago. It takes time for this to trickle through all layers, but things are getting better.
  
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