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Is this really a cancellation fee or is it just honoring your contract? AFAIK it's very clear on Adobe's page that your options are (1) Annual plan paid monthly

Is this really a cancellation fee or is it just honoring your contract? AFAIK it's very clear on Adobe's page that your options are (1) Annual plan paid monthly, (2) Annual plan prepaid, and depending on the product (3) Monthly plan at usually 150% higher price. https://www.adobe.com/creativecloud/plans.html https://www.adobe.com/creativecloud/plans.html If you signed up for a yearly plan paid monthly, the cancellation fee is finishing your contract. If you didn't want to agree to pay by the year maybe you shouldn't have signed up for a year of service?

marshmallow_12 6y ago
Justified or not, I personally take a dim view of cancellation fees in general. Evidently i'm not alone either.
- petee 6y ago
  I'd say especially when it's not costing Adobe anything to cancel your subscription, it's just a money grab. There are some exceptions where a fee is ok like when it's actually putting the business out financially, like Garmin & Iridium satellite service agreements, Garmin has little choice...but clearly not the case for Adobe
  - lolinder 6y ago
    The whole idea of offering annual pricing is that the income stream is more consistent, so the price can be lower. It does hurt Adobe (not much relative to their income, but still some) to have that income not materialize. If you're not happy with a cancellation fee, that's what the monthly pricing is for—you pay more month to month but can cancel any time. It's a very normal trade-off. The only real alternatives Adobe has to a cancellation fee are to only offer monthly pricing or forbid cancelling an annual contact at all.
    - angry_octet 6y ago
      The problem is not the pricing break for a longer contract, but that the yearly contract was promoted as a monthly price (with no minimum fee clearly shown). I'm sure the A/B testing showed higher takeup if they wrote it that way -- it seems cheaper! It isn't true that this is the only option. Instead of onerous lock-in like a gym membership they could have a sliding scale -- the longer you pay for it, the cheaper it gets. Their decision to go for annual lock-in is short term thinking.
  - Meph504 6y ago
    A fee is acceptable, if the consumer agrees to it, adobe wants people to pay their agreed on contract, but offer people a discount of 50% of their remaining obligation. This seems pretty fair to me, when you signed up for the contract, those purchases figure into their operations. Reverse the paradigm, if they cancelled providing you these services, would you expect a refund, or would it be a money grab to expect to get your money back when they violated the terms of the agreement?
  - legostormtroopr 6y ago
    Actually there is a cost. If a user signs up for a year contract, the business has certainty of future income. The business gives a discount for assurance of that future revenue. If the user cancels early, the cost is the lose of that future revenue on the balance sheet - and this does influence the business.
    - michaelmrose 6y ago
      The cost is the users money. If the company got a customer at 53 dollars for 10 months that they would never have acquired at the higher $80 monthly rate and the user cancels they didn't lose the 270 they would have hypothetically received in the imaginary world where the user subscribed because maybe money isn't real. They profited the $530 they received less the cost of providing the service to the customer which is liable to be slight. You can't lose other people's money you never received.
      - paxys 6y ago
        If I promise to pay you $100 for a job (and sign a contract saying so), you spend $50 of your own money in preparation for that job, and then I back out saying "that money was imaginary since I never actually paid you", are you not entitled to some compensation?
        michaelmrose 6y ago
        Why would you believe that adobe spent meaningful sums of money in preparation to service a license to run software on the users own hardware?
sherry-sherry 6y ago
Is it really that clear? https://imgur.com/a/yQFQRKF https://imgur.com/a/yQFQRKF Right before hitting 'place order' there's a link to a pop-up modal with the cancellation terms. > "Should you cancel after 14 days, you’ll be charged a lump sum amount of 50% of your remaining contract obligation and your service will continue until the end of that month’s billing period." At no point is the total amount (aka, your contract obligation) displayed, just the monthly amount. I think it's deceptive, at best.
- greggman3 6y ago
  I see the total amount here https://imgur.com/uUqd9ZY https://imgur.com/uUqd9ZY
  - sherry-sherry 6y ago
    No, the total amount (your contractual obligation) in your screenshot would be $635.88 + taxes.
    - Meph504 6y ago
      https://i.imgur.com/CZSCvw8.png https://i.imgur.com/CZSCvw8.png If you click the options you can see the prices. This is a common practice, I feel like there are people are really trying to make this a bigger deal than it is.
      - sherry-sherry 6y ago
        That's a different deal where you pay once upfront. A user shouldn't have to open a different deal to see how they'll pay for something else. Either way, that still doesn't tell you explicitly what the cancellation fee would be. In Australia there is a thing called a 'Critical Information Summary' required for phone/internet plans. This is an sample of one from an old plan with similar terms to Adobe's (monthly payment, 12 month contract): https://imgur.com/a/bBVuip2 https://imgur.com/a/bBVuip2 . It states how much it'll cost if you stay for 12/24 months. It also states the maximum that'll you'll have to pay to cancel, and how the cancel fee decreases as you go. This isn't hard... they could put it upfront, but they don't and it only benefits Adobe. Also, you might want to check those prices in the screenshot you linked, none match the price you would actually pay over 12 months, or the minimum cancel fee.
Mandatum 6y ago
This is disingenuous at best, and fraudulent at worst - and I know ACCC in Australia will take a very dim view. Take the main page for instance, the one you linked - it lists monthly prices. No mention whatsoever of "annual pricing paid monthly" - it's JUST monthly mentioned. Pic: https://imgur.com/sZPfFDI https://imgur.com/sZPfFDI When you click "See plans and pricing details" it gives you the Annual monthly and ACTUAL monthly prices. Pic: https://imgur.com/gxokkST https://imgur.com/gxokkST If you click Buy Now the ACTUAL monthly price is hidden from view in a drop-down. Pic: https://imgur.com/l05UZra https://imgur.com/l05UZra I don't know a claims court in the OECD that would rule in favour of Adobe here. Misrepresenting the monthly price up-front is false advertising. This is a dark pattern, Adobe should be shamed.
- greggman3 6y ago
  When you click the "buy" button it's made clear https://imgur.com/uUqd9ZY https://imgur.com/uUqd9ZY Reminds me of car advertising. They don't show the full price of the lease. They show the monthly payments
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - michaelmrose 6y ago
    It says one thing in the screen where you put the item effectively in your cart and another in the description of the item in your cart wherein its designed for people's eyeballs to hit the continue to payment before they attend to the fact that it says something different in the description of the item IN the cart. It's beautifully criminal in design.
  - anilakar 6y ago
    Which, BTW, is illegal under most sane consumer protection laws, where the full price of the contract must always be shown. No annual price, no annual contract. Simple.
    - medlyyy 6y ago
JMTQp8lwXL 6y ago
If I cancel my lease, the penalty is one month's rent. It doesn't seem unusual to charge a cancellation fee. But for a company like Adobe, they don't have to find a new tenant to take your spot, as a landlord would. So the claim of the cancellation seems less legitimate.
- paxys 6y ago
  That sounds generous. If I cancel my lease I have to pay 100% of the remaining balance.
  - stochtastic 6y ago
    FWIW, landlords often include unenforceable terms with respect to lease break fees [1]. This is a common pattern [2]. In my only experience with breaking a lease, my lawyer advised me to inform my landlord that I was aware of California state law, and then wait for them to negotiate. They initially counter-offered that I pay 2.5 months to break the lease, and ultimately agreed to 1 month. Probably harder to do during COVID, though, with such high vacancy rates. [1]: https://caretaker.com/learn/breaking-a-lease-early/mitigating-damages-in-california https://caretaker.com/learn/breaking-a-lease-early/mitigatin... [2]: https://academic.oup.com/jla/article/9/1/1/3852726 https://academic.oup.com/jla/article/9/1/1/3852726
    - greggman3 6y ago
      Maybe it depends on where. AFAIK you're obliged to pay the entire lease with a few exceptions that might help you get out earlier. One being a nice landlord (so not a law) https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/free-books/renters-rights-book/chapter9-5.html https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/free-books/renters-r... AFAIK what you linked to only says a landlord is required to try to find a new renter. In SF that's probably easy to find but any many places it could easily be several months all of which you'd be required to keep paying.
      - stochtastic 6y ago
tzs 6y ago
From the screenshot in the Tweet, it looks like cancelling incurs the fee and causes you to immediately lose access to the apps. If it were merely making you pay what they were contractually owed for the remaining months of your current year, you should retain access to the apps for those remaining months too.
- paxys 6y ago
  The cancellation fee is 50% of what you still owe on your contract.
  - 8128js8121 6y ago
    It should be 100% of the months you have used that year. e.g. if non contract is $20 and contract is $10, and you used the service for 5 months you owe $50
    - paxys 6y ago
      So if you have used 10 months and want to cancel you should pay $100 instead of $10?
  - danShumway 6y ago
    Okay, then give me access for 50% of the remaining year. If I'm being charged money for a service, I should have a comparable level of access to that service.
    - paxys 6y ago
      You will have access to 100% of the service if you hold up your side of the contract you signed.
      - cbmuser 6y ago
        Exactly. It’s a contract. If you cancel it early, the other contract partner has the right to get a compensation fee. That’s perfectly normal and also practised by other companies.
inetknght 6y ago
> If you didn't want to agree to pay by the year maybe you shouldn't have signed up for a year of service? This whole thing sounds a lot like a loan. If Adobe wants to provide a loan then they should be regulated like a bank. Otherwise a monthly fee isn't a loan, and a monthly fee shouldn't have a cancellation fee.
- fastball 6y ago
  It's not a loan because you're not getting use of something before you've paid for it. You're paying for something as you use it, and getting a discount because you agreed you'd use it for a year. You have to pay back the discount if you end up not using it for a year, as it should be.
  - inetknght 6y ago
    > you're not getting use of something before you've paid for it Except... that you are. > You're paying for something as you use it, and getting a discount because you agreed you'd use it for a year. So... you're getting the use of something before you've paid for the full year. That's a loan.
    - fastball 6y ago
      > Except... that you are. Hmm, no, you're still not. You are paying for the months as you use them. You merely agreed you'd use the service for a certain amount of months in exchange for a discount. Is paying rent on a year long contract is a loan? Is paying your monthly phone bill (which is on a 2 year contract) a loan? No. The phone company is not loaning you money. They're just providing the service at a certain rate contingent on an agreement to use it for a certain amount of time. I don't think the way you are using the concept "loan" is how other people (and the dictionary) uses it. Agreeing to pay something in the future for services they will render in the future is not a loan.
      - inetknght 6y ago
        > You are paying for the months as you use them. If that were true then there wouldn't be a cancellation fee. > You merely agreed you'd use the service for a certain amount of months in exchange for a discount. That's disingenuous anti-consumer corporate bullshit. > Is paying rent on a year long contract is a loan? Is paying your monthly phone bill (which is on a 2 year contract) a loan? They both should be considered worse than loans. They're not only demanding that you pay all the money if you want out but they're also fully necessary in a modern tech society. > Agreeing to pay something in the future for services they will render in the future is not a loan. It is if you have to pay for those services even if you don't want them any more.
hellbannedguy 6y ago
Digital products should be exempt from cancellation fees period. Adobe lost me at Lightroom 1. I bought it, and was happy for a year. They then got cute with subscriptions, and honestly overly complicated software. I believe most product/services should not have late fees, or cancellation fees. Every business I have ever worked at used them as steady income. In college I managed a mini storage. The owner told me he wanted me to go to a seminar. The whole seminar was about increasing late fees. Yes--literally tricks to getting tenants to forget the payment date. (If ever have to use a mini storage, prorate a month worth of rent so payment lands on the end of the month. When it lands, say on the 14th it's easy to forget.)
- lolinder 6y ago
  Adobe offers annual pricing that is cheaper than the monthly pricing. How do you suggest they avoid the cancellation fee for annual plans while still offering a discount? Would that not effectively turn their annual price into the de facto monthly price, if people could cancel at will with no repercussions?
  - wpietri 6y ago
    Canceling at will sounds great. Why should they be able to charge you for things you don't use?
    - d110af5ccf 6y ago
      Because they gave you a discount on that basis! How is it ethical to receive a discount from someone and then go back on your word?! They also offer a full price monthly option (ie no cancellation fee) if that's what you want. The "cancellation fee" is because you are breaking a contract which you agreed to in order to receive a discount. If you are actually given a meaningful choice (which I feel quite strongly that you are in this case) and you can't be bothered to understand such a basic aspect of the choice being made, then I have absolutely no sympathy for you.
      - 6y ago
jeswin 6y ago
There shouldn't be an "Annual plan, paid monthly" option. Software vendors shouldn't be in the credit and loans business. Pay monthly for monthly plans, and pay annually once for annual plans.
- lolinder 6y ago
  Is this any different from AWS offering reserved instances? The pricing structure is the same: you pay by the month but commit to a year. Reserved instances seem perfectly fair to me: what's different here?
  - upbeat_general 6y ago
    Context matters. Almost no pure software product has a cancellation fee. It's always a yearly cost or monthly where you can cancel anytime. Some things like apartment leases are not only in a different context, but it's done for a clear reason. Reserved instances on AWS I'm assuming has a similar purpose but it's also in a different context and it's hopefully made very clear to the user.
- maxerickson 6y ago
  A single annual payment is a larger liability (for both parties) than the installment plan. The way they show the prices is problematic. If 12 payments are expected, it should be reflected anywhere that price is shown. But I think it's fine if they are willing to offer a discount for agreeing to make 12 payments vs 1 payment.
- dmingod666 6y ago
  I use this plan, I don't want to pay upfront and I am happy with the lower monthly payments. This is what you do when you rent a house, 1 year contract monthly payments.
II2II 6y ago
The problem is that an annual plan charged monthly is there to entice people to spend money they do not have. If the point is to encourage people to pay for an annual plan by offering a discount, they should ask for the money up front.
- lolinder 6y ago
  They do that too, for a steeper discount. The annual contract option is good for someone who wants to pay monthly (less cash out of pocket right now) and knows they'll be using the software for at least 12 months. I would be surprised if that's not the majority of Adobe's customers, who work in a field that requires their use of Adobe software.
  - II2II 6y ago
    Sorry, I meant to say that they should only ask for the money to be paid up front. The "less cash out of pocket right now and knows they'll be using the software for at least 12 months" is just another way of saying they are indebted to the company. I don't think that is the type of relationship a software company should have with customers.
danShumway 6y ago
> Is this really a cancellation fee Their own site literally calls it a cancellation fee in the linked screenshot. People in the comments here are giving them the benefit of the doubt on everything else, so give their UX designers some credit that they labeled their own fee correctly. ---- But this is kind of a pedantic argument though. One of the big practical issues I see here (aside from whether or not people know they're signing up for a yearly commitment) is that Adobe wants to have its cake and eat it too on what an early cancellation means. Typically if you buy a year's worth of service for something, you will get access to the service until your payment period runs out. At least in my experience. If you buy a year's worth of Amazon Prime and cancel early, you'll still have access until that year ends. With Adobe, that's not the case. You pay an early cancellation fee (50% of each remaining month), and you still immediately lose access as soon as you cancel. Which is pretty crappy deceptive customer service. It's pretty clear that what they want is for customers to not cancel out of sunk cost fallacy because the user is scared to "waste" the extra fee. And then they're hoping that by the end of the year the user will forget to cancel again. Compare that with a company like Amazon, which (despite its many faults aggressively pushing Prime) will even refund you your Amazon Prime subscription if you cancel before you use any of its benefits or order anything from the site. And I don't think that's exceptional, a lot of companies have much better cancellation policies than what Adobe offers. You don't have to go to bat for them, the CC subscription terms are unusually bad for a tech service subscription.
- medlyyy 6y ago
  Wow. If Amazon is being held up as a good example, things are truly bad. My only experience is with Audible, and it is way too difficult and obscure to figure out how to cancel your subscription. Although at least once you do they don't try to pull anything except give you a discount, I suppose. Although that shouldn't be held up as a positive either. Where I am, it's literally illegal for utility companies to offer discounts or any other type of benefit to customers who wish to cancel or move to another provider. They aren't even allowed to contact you unsolicited after you have requested to cancel the service, as it could be interpreted as attempting to offer enticement to continue. Ending a subscription to a service should not be a difficult thing.
docuru 6y ago
Legally, companies can do things like this. But I think it's a sure way to spread negative image, and never got those users again. They should think and act as building services to help the users, rather than extracting money. Even though part of a business is extracting money.
- angry_octet 6y ago
  Depends upon the jurisdiction. Under Australian legislation this is likely to be considered misleading and deceptive conduct toward retail consumers, and Adobe could be subject to significant financial restitution. It's past time that consumers in the US realized their utter lack of power as individuals against corporations, and their collective might. The 'dark patterns' in online commerce, car loans, mobile payments etc are really 19th century business practices that shouldn't be accepted anymore.
  - cbmuser 6y ago
    > Depends upon the jurisdiction. Under Australian legislation this is likely to be considered misleading and deceptive conduct toward retail consumers, and Adobe could be subject to significant financial restitution. I‘m pretty sure, it isn’t. Go check the TOS of any public transport yearly subscription models and they will certainly have the exact same clause. I had to pay a penalty fee for terminating my yearly public transport subscription in Berlin early.
    - angry_octet 6y ago
      It depends if it is judged to be deceptive conduct, so it is relevant how the information is presented. Burying conditions in the terms of service or contract, but then misleading people with other information on a web page, can mean that the preferential interpretation stands. Standard verbiage in the contract like 'this contract is the only terms of the contract' is just meaningless (except for specific categories like auctions and real estate, where other provisions may still apply, like the cool off period). One example of the consumer law being applied is in regard to drip pricing, which was commonly used by airlines and hotels: https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/online-shopping/drip-pricing https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/online-shopping/drip-prici... https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/airbnb-and-edreams-give-undertakings-to-accc-for-improved-pricing-practices https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/airbnb-and-edreams-giv... Pricing rules, in this case Partial Pricing, are quite clear: If you promote a price that is only part of the total price, the total price must also be displayed at least as prominently as the partial price. This means customers should be able to identify the total price in the advertisement at least as easily as prices for any component parts. https://www.accc.gov.au/business/pricing-surcharging/displaying-prices https://www.accc.gov.au/business/pricing-surcharging/display... Also relevant: subscription traps: https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/accc-warns-consumers-to-beware-of-subscription-traps https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/accc-warns-consumers-t... I am unfamiliar with consumer protection in DE, and publicly owned services like the railways may have special pricing legislation, but new EU harmonized laws are being introduced for digital services: https://www.linklaters.com/en/insights/blogs/productliabilitylinks/2021/january/germany-introduces-new-eu-consumer-protection-rules https://www.linklaters.com/en/insights/blogs/productliabilit... Sadly, the EU system prevents any member state from having stronger protections. For subscriptions there are already strong rules about clearly indicating the total price, and the amount that is fair for early termination: https://www.osborneclarke.com/insights/distributing-games-in-subscription-models-in-europe/ https://www.osborneclarke.com/insights/distributing-games-in...
Aeolun 6y ago
Yeah, I was prepared to be outraged, but when I saw the pricing page I had to agree that it’s really, really obvious what you are signing up for.
- chrisandchris 6y ago
  Can‘t speak for the current page but some year (1 actually) I signed up for a monthly plan to extract some InDesign into SVG/PDF. After I was done, I cancelled the plan and Adobe mailed me something like „sad to see you go here‘s a free month“. What I didn‘t know and did not see ond the sign-up page was that I actually signed up for a YEARLY plan and I had to pay a huge cancellation fee. There was no indiciation or mentioning of a yearly contract (ok, maybe sonewhere deep down and so small nobody can read it). IMHO, I was tricked into this yearly plan and had to pay much money to get out. It was the day I swore never to pay for Adobe products again.
  - Aeolun 6y ago
    I agree that sounds shitty. I’m not trying to say Adobe isn’t shady as hell, it’s just that the page mentioned in OP isn’t.
eisa01 6y ago
The total price is not shown for the 12-month contract, as such it’s not compliant with Norwegian consumer law Surprising to see a company like Adobe operate on such terms, although it also applies to companies like Audi on their EV charge subscriptions for access to Ionity
- nothingisfree 6y ago
  Here's the Norway page https://www.adobe.com/no/creativecloud/plans.html https://www.adobe.com/no/creativecloud/plans.html Looks the same to me. Is it possible the law isn't what you think it is?
j45 6y ago
Feasible until you realize adobe auto renews contracts and uses a service to update expired cc with your new expiry date without any real consent or notification. Not sure if you’ve been with Adobe for any period of time and then left, it hasn’t been pretty on multiple products for me.
dmingod666 6y ago
Exactly. Why do you think it's lower for option 1? Yearly commitment. Longer term commitments give you benefits in a lot of places and have checks in place to prevent people from gaming the system. Not very hard to understand.
tobr 6y ago
> AFAIK it's very clear on Adobe's page that your options are (1) Annual plan paid monthly, (2) Annual plan prepaid, and depending on the product (3) Monthly plan at usually 150% higher price. No, it’s the opposite of very clear? It’s very misleading. They are purposefully avoiding printing the full sum they expect you to pay, just listing monthly prices without mentioning the terms, and a big “buy now” button. I understand that you should never take anything related to pricing at face value, and I would certainly double check what I get myself into before I sign up, but calling it “very clear” just doesn’t add up.
cbmuser 6y ago
Exactly. Even the public transport company in my city has a similar TOS. If you have an annual subscription and cancel it early, they will charge you the elapsed months accordingly to the monthly fee, not the yearly one and I had to pay 150 Euros for early contract termination.
- zimpenfish 6y ago
  Whereas in the UK, cancelling an annual travelcard has at most a £10 administration fee and you get a refund based on when you cancelled (although since it's discounted to 10 months cost, you probably won't get anything after that.) https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/times_fares/ticket_types/46571.aspx#Refund https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/times_fares/ticket_types/4657...
  - cbmuser 6y ago
    > Whereas in the UK, cancelling an annual travelcard has at most a £10 administration fee and you get a refund based on when you cancelled So, how do they motivate people to buy the annual subscription when there is no monetary advantage for binding yourself yearly instead of monthly. In Berlin, if you get an annual subscription instead of a monthly one, you will get two months for free. And if you cancel early instead of waiting for the whole year, you pay the difference between the monthly and yearly subscription for the months already used. I don't see anything scummy or illegal here.
    - zimpenfish 6y ago
      > In Berlin, if you get an annual subscription instead of a monthly one, you will get two months for free. Same in the UK - "it's discounted to 10 months cost"
chakhs 6y ago
It's not really obvious no, I personally made the same mistake. I thought I was subscribing to a monthly service, their UX intentionally makes it hard to understand what you're signing up for, after a few months I wanted to cancel but then found out I basically have to pay up a few hundreds and lose access to the service. It's not an "honest contract" because they make it difficult to understand
127 6y ago
Last time I used Adobe products, it was advertised as 10 euros per month, but it was a complete lie. In actuality it was 120 euros per year, and if you wanted to cancel you would have to pay the rest of that contract. I don't give any business to companies that simply lie to me. Trust is important. Adobe clearly doesn't care about creating any trust with its users. There exists very little actual effort to let users know inside this payment funnel that they are not just paying 10 euros, but 120 euros.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

marshmallow_12 6y ago

Justified or not, I personally take a dim view of cancellation fees in general. Evidently i'm not alone either.

petee 6y ago
I'd say especially when it's not costing Adobe anything to cancel your subscription, it's just a money grab. There are some exceptions where a fee is ok like when it's actually putting the business out financially, like Garmin & Iridium satellite service agreements, Garmin has little choice...but clearly not the case for Adobe
- lolinder 6y ago
  The whole idea of offering annual pricing is that the income stream is more consistent, so the price can be lower. It does hurt Adobe (not much relative to their income, but still some) to have that income not materialize. If you're not happy with a cancellation fee, that's what the monthly pricing is for—you pay more month to month but can cancel any time. It's a very normal trade-off. The only real alternatives Adobe has to a cancellation fee are to only offer monthly pricing or forbid cancelling an annual contact at all.
  - angry_octet 6y ago
    The problem is not the pricing break for a longer contract, but that the yearly contract was promoted as a monthly price (with no minimum fee clearly shown). I'm sure the A/B testing showed higher takeup if they wrote it that way -- it seems cheaper! It isn't true that this is the only option. Instead of onerous lock-in like a gym membership they could have a sliding scale -- the longer you pay for it, the cheaper it gets. Their decision to go for annual lock-in is short term thinking.
- Meph504 6y ago
  A fee is acceptable, if the consumer agrees to it, adobe wants people to pay their agreed on contract, but offer people a discount of 50% of their remaining obligation. This seems pretty fair to me, when you signed up for the contract, those purchases figure into their operations. Reverse the paradigm, if they cancelled providing you these services, would you expect a refund, or would it be a money grab to expect to get your money back when they violated the terms of the agreement?
- legostormtroopr 6y ago
  Actually there is a cost. If a user signs up for a year contract, the business has certainty of future income. The business gives a discount for assurance of that future revenue. If the user cancels early, the cost is the lose of that future revenue on the balance sheet - and this does influence the business.
  - michaelmrose 6y ago
    The cost is the users money. If the company got a customer at 53 dollars for 10 months that they would never have acquired at the higher $80 monthly rate and the user cancels they didn't lose the 270 they would have hypothetically received in the imaginary world where the user subscribed because maybe money isn't real. They profited the $530 they received less the cost of providing the service to the customer which is liable to be slight. You can't lose other people's money you never received.
    - paxys 6y ago
      If I promise to pay you $100 for a job (and sign a contract saying so), you spend $50 of your own money in preparation for that job, and then I back out saying "that money was imaginary since I never actually paid you", are you not entitled to some compensation?
      - michaelmrose 6y ago
        Why would you believe that adobe spent meaningful sums of money in preparation to service a license to run software on the users own hardware?

sherry-sherry 6y ago

Is it really that clear? https://imgur.com/a/yQFQRKF https://imgur.com/a/yQFQRKF Right before hitting 'place order' there's a link to a pop-up modal with the cancellation terms. > "Should you cancel after 14 days, you’ll be charged a lump sum amount of 50% of your remaining contract obligation and your service will continue until the end of that month’s billing period." At no point is the total amount (aka, your contract obligation) displayed, just the monthly amount. I think it's deceptive, at best.

greggman3 6y ago
I see the total amount here https://imgur.com/uUqd9ZY https://imgur.com/uUqd9ZY
- sherry-sherry 6y ago
  No, the total amount (your contractual obligation) in your screenshot would be $635.88 + taxes.
  - Meph504 6y ago
    https://i.imgur.com/CZSCvw8.png https://i.imgur.com/CZSCvw8.png If you click the options you can see the prices. This is a common practice, I feel like there are people are really trying to make this a bigger deal than it is.
    - sherry-sherry 6y ago
      That's a different deal where you pay once upfront. A user shouldn't have to open a different deal to see how they'll pay for something else. Either way, that still doesn't tell you explicitly what the cancellation fee would be. In Australia there is a thing called a 'Critical Information Summary' required for phone/internet plans. This is an sample of one from an old plan with similar terms to Adobe's (monthly payment, 12 month contract): https://imgur.com/a/bBVuip2 https://imgur.com/a/bBVuip2 . It states how much it'll cost if you stay for 12/24 months. It also states the maximum that'll you'll have to pay to cancel, and how the cancel fee decreases as you go. This isn't hard... they could put it upfront, but they don't and it only benefits Adobe. Also, you might want to check those prices in the screenshot you linked, none match the price you would actually pay over 12 months, or the minimum cancel fee.

Mandatum 6y ago

This is disingenuous at best, and fraudulent at worst - and I know ACCC in Australia will take a very dim view. Take the main page for instance, the one you linked - it lists monthly prices. No mention whatsoever of "annual pricing paid monthly" - it's JUST monthly mentioned. Pic: https://imgur.com/sZPfFDI https://imgur.com/sZPfFDI When you click "See plans and pricing details" it gives you the Annual monthly and ACTUAL monthly prices. Pic: https://imgur.com/gxokkST https://imgur.com/gxokkST If you click Buy Now the ACTUAL monthly price is hidden from view in a drop-down. Pic: https://imgur.com/l05UZra https://imgur.com/l05UZra I don't know a claims court in the OECD that would rule in favour of Adobe here. Misrepresenting the monthly price up-front is false advertising. This is a dark pattern, Adobe should be shamed.

greggman3 6y ago
When you click the "buy" button it's made clear https://imgur.com/uUqd9ZY https://imgur.com/uUqd9ZY Reminds me of car advertising. They don't show the full price of the lease. They show the monthly payments
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- michaelmrose 6y ago
  It says one thing in the screen where you put the item effectively in your cart and another in the description of the item in your cart wherein its designed for people's eyeballs to hit the continue to payment before they attend to the fact that it says something different in the description of the item IN the cart. It's beautifully criminal in design.
- anilakar 6y ago
  Which, BTW, is illegal under most sane consumer protection laws, where the full price of the contract must always be shown. No annual price, no annual contract. Simple.
  - medlyyy 6y ago

JMTQp8lwXL 6y ago

If I cancel my lease, the penalty is one month's rent. It doesn't seem unusual to charge a cancellation fee. But for a company like Adobe, they don't have to find a new tenant to take your spot, as a landlord would. So the claim of the cancellation seems less legitimate.

paxys 6y ago
That sounds generous. If I cancel my lease I have to pay 100% of the remaining balance.
- stochtastic 6y ago
  FWIW, landlords often include unenforceable terms with respect to lease break fees [1]. This is a common pattern [2]. In my only experience with breaking a lease, my lawyer advised me to inform my landlord that I was aware of California state law, and then wait for them to negotiate. They initially counter-offered that I pay 2.5 months to break the lease, and ultimately agreed to 1 month. Probably harder to do during COVID, though, with such high vacancy rates. [1]: https://caretaker.com/learn/breaking-a-lease-early/mitigating-damages-in-california https://caretaker.com/learn/breaking-a-lease-early/mitigatin... [2]: https://academic.oup.com/jla/article/9/1/1/3852726 https://academic.oup.com/jla/article/9/1/1/3852726
  - greggman3 6y ago
    Maybe it depends on where. AFAIK you're obliged to pay the entire lease with a few exceptions that might help you get out earlier. One being a nice landlord (so not a law) https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/free-books/renters-rights-book/chapter9-5.html https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/free-books/renters-r... AFAIK what you linked to only says a landlord is required to try to find a new renter. In SF that's probably easy to find but any many places it could easily be several months all of which you'd be required to keep paying.
    - stochtastic 6y ago

tzs 6y ago

From the screenshot in the Tweet, it looks like cancelling incurs the fee and causes you to immediately lose access to the apps. If it were merely making you pay what they were contractually owed for the remaining months of your current year, you should retain access to the apps for those remaining months too.

paxys 6y ago
The cancellation fee is 50% of what you still owe on your contract.
- 8128js8121 6y ago
  It should be 100% of the months you have used that year. e.g. if non contract is $20 and contract is $10, and you used the service for 5 months you owe $50
  - paxys 6y ago
    So if you have used 10 months and want to cancel you should pay $100 instead of $10?
- danShumway 6y ago
  Okay, then give me access for 50% of the remaining year. If I'm being charged money for a service, I should have a comparable level of access to that service.
  - paxys 6y ago
    You will have access to 100% of the service if you hold up your side of the contract you signed.
    - cbmuser 6y ago
      Exactly. It’s a contract. If you cancel it early, the other contract partner has the right to get a compensation fee. That’s perfectly normal and also practised by other companies.

inetknght 6y ago

> If you didn't want to agree to pay by the year maybe you shouldn't have signed up for a year of service? This whole thing sounds a lot like a loan. If Adobe wants to provide a loan then they should be regulated like a bank. Otherwise a monthly fee isn't a loan, and a monthly fee shouldn't have a cancellation fee.

fastball 6y ago
It's not a loan because you're not getting use of something before you've paid for it. You're paying for something as you use it, and getting a discount because you agreed you'd use it for a year. You have to pay back the discount if you end up not using it for a year, as it should be.
- inetknght 6y ago
  > you're not getting use of something before you've paid for it Except... that you are. > You're paying for something as you use it, and getting a discount because you agreed you'd use it for a year. So... you're getting the use of something before you've paid for the full year. That's a loan.
  - fastball 6y ago
    > Except... that you are. Hmm, no, you're still not. You are paying for the months as you use them. You merely agreed you'd use the service for a certain amount of months in exchange for a discount. Is paying rent on a year long contract is a loan? Is paying your monthly phone bill (which is on a 2 year contract) a loan? No. The phone company is not loaning you money. They're just providing the service at a certain rate contingent on an agreement to use it for a certain amount of time. I don't think the way you are using the concept "loan" is how other people (and the dictionary) uses it. Agreeing to pay something in the future for services they will render in the future is not a loan.
    - inetknght 6y ago
      > You are paying for the months as you use them. If that were true then there wouldn't be a cancellation fee. > You merely agreed you'd use the service for a certain amount of months in exchange for a discount. That's disingenuous anti-consumer corporate bullshit. > Is paying rent on a year long contract is a loan? Is paying your monthly phone bill (which is on a 2 year contract) a loan? They both should be considered worse than loans. They're not only demanding that you pay all the money if you want out but they're also fully necessary in a modern tech society. > Agreeing to pay something in the future for services they will render in the future is not a loan. It is if you have to pay for those services even if you don't want them any more.

hellbannedguy 6y ago

Digital products should be exempt from cancellation fees period. Adobe lost me at Lightroom 1. I bought it, and was happy for a year. They then got cute with subscriptions, and honestly overly complicated software. I believe most product/services should not have late fees, or cancellation fees. Every business I have ever worked at used them as steady income. In college I managed a mini storage. The owner told me he wanted me to go to a seminar. The whole seminar was about increasing late fees. Yes--literally tricks to getting tenants to forget the payment date. (If ever have to use a mini storage, prorate a month worth of rent so payment lands on the end of the month. When it lands, say on the 14th it's easy to forget.)

lolinder 6y ago
Adobe offers annual pricing that is cheaper than the monthly pricing. How do you suggest they avoid the cancellation fee for annual plans while still offering a discount? Would that not effectively turn their annual price into the de facto monthly price, if people could cancel at will with no repercussions?
- wpietri 6y ago
  Canceling at will sounds great. Why should they be able to charge you for things you don't use?
  - d110af5ccf 6y ago
    Because they gave you a discount on that basis! How is it ethical to receive a discount from someone and then go back on your word?! They also offer a full price monthly option (ie no cancellation fee) if that's what you want. The "cancellation fee" is because you are breaking a contract which you agreed to in order to receive a discount. If you are actually given a meaningful choice (which I feel quite strongly that you are in this case) and you can't be bothered to understand such a basic aspect of the choice being made, then I have absolutely no sympathy for you.
    - 6y ago

jeswin 6y ago

There shouldn't be an "Annual plan, paid monthly" option. Software vendors shouldn't be in the credit and loans business. Pay monthly for monthly plans, and pay annually once for annual plans.

lolinder 6y ago
Is this any different from AWS offering reserved instances? The pricing structure is the same: you pay by the month but commit to a year. Reserved instances seem perfectly fair to me: what's different here?
- upbeat_general 6y ago
  Context matters. Almost no pure software product has a cancellation fee. It's always a yearly cost or monthly where you can cancel anytime. Some things like apartment leases are not only in a different context, but it's done for a clear reason. Reserved instances on AWS I'm assuming has a similar purpose but it's also in a different context and it's hopefully made very clear to the user.
maxerickson 6y ago
A single annual payment is a larger liability (for both parties) than the installment plan. The way they show the prices is problematic. If 12 payments are expected, it should be reflected anywhere that price is shown. But I think it's fine if they are willing to offer a discount for agreeing to make 12 payments vs 1 payment.
dmingod666 6y ago
I use this plan, I don't want to pay upfront and I am happy with the lower monthly payments. This is what you do when you rent a house, 1 year contract monthly payments.

II2II 6y ago

The problem is that an annual plan charged monthly is there to entice people to spend money they do not have. If the point is to encourage people to pay for an annual plan by offering a discount, they should ask for the money up front.

lolinder 6y ago
They do that too, for a steeper discount. The annual contract option is good for someone who wants to pay monthly (less cash out of pocket right now) and knows they'll be using the software for at least 12 months. I would be surprised if that's not the majority of Adobe's customers, who work in a field that requires their use of Adobe software.
- II2II 6y ago
  Sorry, I meant to say that they should only ask for the money to be paid up front. The "less cash out of pocket right now and knows they'll be using the software for at least 12 months" is just another way of saying they are indebted to the company. I don't think that is the type of relationship a software company should have with customers.

danShumway 6y ago

> Is this really a cancellation fee Their own site literally calls it a cancellation fee in the linked screenshot. People in the comments here are giving them the benefit of the doubt on everything else, so give their UX designers some credit that they labeled their own fee correctly. ---- But this is kind of a pedantic argument though. One of the big practical issues I see here (aside from whether or not people know they're signing up for a yearly commitment) is that Adobe wants to have its cake and eat it too on what an early cancellation means. Typically if you buy a year's worth of service for something, you will get access to the service until your payment period runs out. At least in my experience. If you buy a year's worth of Amazon Prime and cancel early, you'll still have access until that year ends. With Adobe, that's not the case. You pay an early cancellation fee (50% of each remaining month), and you still immediately lose access as soon as you cancel. Which is pretty crappy deceptive customer service. It's pretty clear that what they want is for customers to not cancel out of sunk cost fallacy because the user is scared to "waste" the extra fee. And then they're hoping that by the end of the year the user will forget to cancel again. Compare that with a company like Amazon, which (despite its many faults aggressively pushing Prime) will even refund you your Amazon Prime subscription if you cancel before you use any of its benefits or order anything from the site. And I don't think that's exceptional, a lot of companies have much better cancellation policies than what Adobe offers. You don't have to go to bat for them, the CC subscription terms are unusually bad for a tech service subscription.

medlyyy 6y ago
Wow. If Amazon is being held up as a good example, things are truly bad. My only experience is with Audible, and it is way too difficult and obscure to figure out how to cancel your subscription. Although at least once you do they don't try to pull anything except give you a discount, I suppose. Although that shouldn't be held up as a positive either. Where I am, it's literally illegal for utility companies to offer discounts or any other type of benefit to customers who wish to cancel or move to another provider. They aren't even allowed to contact you unsolicited after you have requested to cancel the service, as it could be interpreted as attempting to offer enticement to continue. Ending a subscription to a service should not be a difficult thing.

docuru 6y ago

Legally, companies can do things like this. But I think it's a sure way to spread negative image, and never got those users again. They should think and act as building services to help the users, rather than extracting money. Even though part of a business is extracting money.

angry_octet 6y ago
Depends upon the jurisdiction. Under Australian legislation this is likely to be considered misleading and deceptive conduct toward retail consumers, and Adobe could be subject to significant financial restitution. It's past time that consumers in the US realized their utter lack of power as individuals against corporations, and their collective might. The 'dark patterns' in online commerce, car loans, mobile payments etc are really 19th century business practices that shouldn't be accepted anymore.
- cbmuser 6y ago
  > Depends upon the jurisdiction. Under Australian legislation this is likely to be considered misleading and deceptive conduct toward retail consumers, and Adobe could be subject to significant financial restitution. I‘m pretty sure, it isn’t. Go check the TOS of any public transport yearly subscription models and they will certainly have the exact same clause. I had to pay a penalty fee for terminating my yearly public transport subscription in Berlin early.
  - angry_octet 6y ago
    It depends if it is judged to be deceptive conduct, so it is relevant how the information is presented. Burying conditions in the terms of service or contract, but then misleading people with other information on a web page, can mean that the preferential interpretation stands. Standard verbiage in the contract like 'this contract is the only terms of the contract' is just meaningless (except for specific categories like auctions and real estate, where other provisions may still apply, like the cool off period). One example of the consumer law being applied is in regard to drip pricing, which was commonly used by airlines and hotels: https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/online-shopping/drip-pricing https://www.accc.gov.au/consumers/online-shopping/drip-prici... https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/airbnb-and-edreams-give-undertakings-to-accc-for-improved-pricing-practices https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/airbnb-and-edreams-giv... Pricing rules, in this case Partial Pricing, are quite clear: If you promote a price that is only part of the total price, the total price must also be displayed at least as prominently as the partial price. This means customers should be able to identify the total price in the advertisement at least as easily as prices for any component parts. https://www.accc.gov.au/business/pricing-surcharging/displaying-prices https://www.accc.gov.au/business/pricing-surcharging/display... Also relevant: subscription traps: https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/accc-warns-consumers-to-beware-of-subscription-traps https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/accc-warns-consumers-t... I am unfamiliar with consumer protection in DE, and publicly owned services like the railways may have special pricing legislation, but new EU harmonized laws are being introduced for digital services: https://www.linklaters.com/en/insights/blogs/productliabilitylinks/2021/january/germany-introduces-new-eu-consumer-protection-rules https://www.linklaters.com/en/insights/blogs/productliabilit... Sadly, the EU system prevents any member state from having stronger protections. For subscriptions there are already strong rules about clearly indicating the total price, and the amount that is fair for early termination: https://www.osborneclarke.com/insights/distributing-games-in-subscription-models-in-europe/ https://www.osborneclarke.com/insights/distributing-games-in...

Aeolun 6y ago

Yeah, I was prepared to be outraged, but when I saw the pricing page I had to agree that it’s really, really obvious what you are signing up for.

chrisandchris 6y ago
Can‘t speak for the current page but some year (1 actually) I signed up for a monthly plan to extract some InDesign into SVG/PDF. After I was done, I cancelled the plan and Adobe mailed me something like „sad to see you go here‘s a free month“. What I didn‘t know and did not see ond the sign-up page was that I actually signed up for a YEARLY plan and I had to pay a huge cancellation fee. There was no indiciation or mentioning of a yearly contract (ok, maybe sonewhere deep down and so small nobody can read it). IMHO, I was tricked into this yearly plan and had to pay much money to get out. It was the day I swore never to pay for Adobe products again.
- Aeolun 6y ago
  I agree that sounds shitty. I’m not trying to say Adobe isn’t shady as hell, it’s just that the page mentioned in OP isn’t.

eisa01 6y ago

The total price is not shown for the 12-month contract, as such it’s not compliant with Norwegian consumer law Surprising to see a company like Adobe operate on such terms, although it also applies to companies like Audi on their EV charge subscriptions for access to Ionity

nothingisfree 6y ago
Here's the Norway page https://www.adobe.com/no/creativecloud/plans.html https://www.adobe.com/no/creativecloud/plans.html Looks the same to me. Is it possible the law isn't what you think it is?

j45 6y ago

Feasible until you realize adobe auto renews contracts and uses a service to update expired cc with your new expiry date without any real consent or notification. Not sure if you’ve been with Adobe for any period of time and then left, it hasn’t been pretty on multiple products for me.

dmingod666 6y ago

Exactly. Why do you think it's lower for option 1? Yearly commitment. Longer term commitments give you benefits in a lot of places and have checks in place to prevent people from gaming the system. Not very hard to understand.

tobr 6y ago

> AFAIK it's very clear on Adobe's page that your options are (1) Annual plan paid monthly, (2) Annual plan prepaid, and depending on the product (3) Monthly plan at usually 150% higher price. No, it’s the opposite of very clear? It’s very misleading. They are purposefully avoiding printing the full sum they expect you to pay, just listing monthly prices without mentioning the terms, and a big “buy now” button. I understand that you should never take anything related to pricing at face value, and I would certainly double check what I get myself into before I sign up, but calling it “very clear” just doesn’t add up.

cbmuser 6y ago

Exactly. Even the public transport company in my city has a similar TOS. If you have an annual subscription and cancel it early, they will charge you the elapsed months accordingly to the monthly fee, not the yearly one and I had to pay 150 Euros for early contract termination.

zimpenfish 6y ago
Whereas in the UK, cancelling an annual travelcard has at most a £10 administration fee and you get a refund based on when you cancelled (although since it's discounted to 10 months cost, you probably won't get anything after that.) https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/times_fares/ticket_types/46571.aspx#Refund https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/times_fares/ticket_types/4657...
- cbmuser 6y ago
  > Whereas in the UK, cancelling an annual travelcard has at most a £10 administration fee and you get a refund based on when you cancelled So, how do they motivate people to buy the annual subscription when there is no monetary advantage for binding yourself yearly instead of monthly. In Berlin, if you get an annual subscription instead of a monthly one, you will get two months for free. And if you cancel early instead of waiting for the whole year, you pay the difference between the monthly and yearly subscription for the months already used. I don't see anything scummy or illegal here.
  - zimpenfish 6y ago
    > In Berlin, if you get an annual subscription instead of a monthly one, you will get two months for free. Same in the UK - "it's discounted to 10 months cost"

chakhs 6y ago

It's not really obvious no, I personally made the same mistake. I thought I was subscribing to a monthly service, their UX intentionally makes it hard to understand what you're signing up for, after a few months I wanted to cancel but then found out I basically have to pay up a few hundreds and lose access to the service. It's not an "honest contract" because they make it difficult to understand

127 6y ago

Last time I used Adobe products, it was advertised as 10 euros per month, but it was a complete lie. In actuality it was 120 euros per year, and if you wanted to cancel you would have to pay the rest of that contract. I don't give any business to companies that simply lie to me. Trust is important. Adobe clearly doesn't care about creating any trust with its users. There exists very little actual effort to let users know inside this payment funnel that they are not just paying 10 euros, but 120 euros.

deleted 6y ago

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