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I had a terrible experience with a NYT digital-only subscription, and I'll likely never subscribe again. I had a subscription for a while that I hadn't been us

by sjs382 11y ago

I had a terrible experience with a NYT digital-only subscription, and I'll likely never subscribe again. I had a subscription for a while that I hadn't been using. I only used their site when linked to it from another (like HN). I tried to cancel online, but there's no way to—you need to cancel over the phone. So, I did, sitting on hold for close to a half hour. Bad experience, but I wish it had ended there. Fast-forward two months, and I started getting emails that my subscription was past-due. Then I come to realize that they had continued to bill me every 2 weeks, but the payments had just started failing because my card expired. I emailed CS, mentioning that I had cancelled my subscription and I was being billed by mistake, and to make sure my account got cancelled this time. They "couldn't do anything about it" because my account was in their "grace period", and that I would continue to get the past due emails until the grace period ended. I ended up filing chargebacks for each charge after I had originally cancelled. To my knowledge, they never replied to or contested the chargebacks (does the customer usually get this info, if they do? it's the first and only chargeback I'd ever filed).

vitd 11y ago
My experience is that the credit card company will contact you if the merchant contests your side of the story or if they are going to give you your money back. I've been on both sides of a chargeback. Though, it may depend on the specific bank. 1) When a customer lied and tried to charge back a ~$250 software purchase where we had emailed each other a few times about it, I simply forwarded the emails to the card issuer and the case was dropped. My company got the money. 2) When I found someone locally had stolen my card number and booked a hotel and tickets to Disneyland, I told my card issuer that I had no idea what those charges were. The hotel and ticket seller wrote back contesting it, so my card issuer contacted me and I signed an affidavit saying that, "No, really, I wasn't at Disneyland 50 miles away and also buying gas by my house at the same time". I eventually got a letter saying the charges had been reversed.
- knorby 11y ago
  I was pretty amazed at what the card issuers have to put up in chargeback contests. I had to file an affidavit after someone charged my card with the wrong name and wrong zip code; the retailer accepted the charges anyway, perhaps because they were in on the fraud. What an amazingly out of date system.

by sjs382 11y ago

vitd 11y ago

My experience is that the credit card company will contact you if the merchant contests your side of the story or if they are going to give you your money back. I've been on both sides of a chargeback. Though, it may depend on the specific bank. 1) When a customer lied and tried to charge back a ~$250 software purchase where we had emailed each other a few times about it, I simply forwarded the emails to the card issuer and the case was dropped. My company got the money. 2) When I found someone locally had stolen my card number and booked a hotel and tickets to Disneyland, I told my card issuer that I had no idea what those charges were. The hotel and ticket seller wrote back contesting it, so my card issuer contacted me and I signed an affidavit saying that, "No, really, I wasn't at Disneyland 50 miles away and also buying gas by my house at the same time". I eventually got a letter saying the charges had been reversed.

knorby 11y ago
I was pretty amazed at what the card issuers have to put up in chargeback contests. I had to file an affidavit after someone charged my card with the wrong name and wrong zip code; the retailer accepted the charges anyway, perhaps because they were in on the fraud. What an amazingly out of date system.