In the Prime of strife
It’s easy to subscribe to Amazon and other services in error. Here’s what to look out for Financial worries or just looking for better value for money? Consumer champion Fergus Muirhead can help
Q
I HAVE a bit of a problem with Amazon. When using the site to make a purchase recently, I seemed to have signed up for Amazon Prime, even although I didn’t mean to.
I’ve been charged £79 but can’t see my membership on my account. Will I be entitled to a refund?
A
THE short answer is yes and I’m delighted to say Amazon acted really quickly when I contacted them and you should have your refund by now. In a statement explaining what happened, Amazon told me: “Amazon Prime has millions of members in the UK who are enjoying a long list of benefits – streaming and downloading of TV shows, films and music; one-day delivery on millions of products; early access to Lightning Deals; unlimited photo storage; and access to Kindle books at no additional charge. “All customers who join the Prime programme actively decide to sign up and the sign-up process is clear and transparent: we explain that free trials automatically convert to a paid membership and that the annual membership renews automatically. We also describe how customers can choose to cancel or not renew at any time. “In addition, we send an email to every customer who enrols in Prime that again summarises this information. We’d encourage any customer who has a question about their Prime membership to contact our customer services team by phone, email or chat at any time.
“We listen to all customer feedback we receive and continually make improvements to Prime.”
There are a few interesting points in that statement that are worthy of further discussion since not all companies are as clear with their policies as Amazon, although it does seem that you slipped through the “all customers who join the Prime programme actively decide to sign up”.
Many of us are using online services to access books, TV programmes, music, newspapers and magazines. It’s very easy to take out a trial subscription for any
one of these services and it’s an area that was mentioned in the Chancellor’s budget a couple of weeks ago, when he explained that he was going to be consulting with interested parties over the next few months before introducing legislation to make sure that consumers are properly protected in this area.
When you sign up for a free trial, you will normally be asked for your credit card or bank details and somewhere in the finer print you will be told that if you don’t cancel your subscription at the end of the trial then your credit card will be charged – sometimes on a month-bymonth basis and sometimes for a full annual subscription.
There may be another sentence in these terms and conditions that says that you won’t receive any reminders and that your subscription will start automatically at the end of the free trial period.
If you are going to cancel your subscription then make sure you do it in plenty of time.
Don’t leave it until the day the free trial ends, or even the day before. Give yourself a week or so to make sure you can notify the company concerned that you don’t want to proceed at the end of the free trial.
Sometimes companies will apply for a credit card or direct debit payment a few days in advance so you need to make sure that you have cancelled your subscription before they apply for a payment.
When you start the free trial, make sure that you make a note in your diary to remind you the date on which you need to cancel the subscription before you have to start paying.
That assumes, of course, that you will cancel. Lots of these free trial offers are really very good and are a great way to try out a new service. If you enjoy the service during the free trial then you won’t cancel it. In that case you need to make sure that you keep a note of when payments are likely to be taken from your bank account or credit card and how much these payments are likely to be.
Once you start to pay for a service, you need to make sure you understand the rights and responsibilities you have if you decide to end it. Some agreements might need you to give three months’ notice, or even six months’ notice. Others, like Amazon Prime, will allow you to cancel or not renew at any time.