By Arthur Vidro
By Arthur Vidro
I first experienced an “automatic renewal” back in the 1990s.
The publication was Readers’ Digest, though they were hardly alone in the now-widespread practice.
I thought it was bold of them to say they had renewed my subscription, without asking me, and would I now pay the bill.
Instead, I canceled my subscription.
If they had asked me politely I might have renewed. But they didn’t.
Automatic renewals may help some people who aren’t on top of their paperwork. But let’s face it, publishers came up with this device to benefit themselves, not to benefit readers.
A publisher playing this game of renewing your subscription on your behalf spends less money mailing out reminders and offers.
Plus, by skipping the step of asking the customer if they would like to renew, its renewal rate goes way up.
Automatic renewal keeps the periodical’s circulation numbers as high as possible, and it’s those numbers – which are subject to audit – that determine rates for advertising, which is the biggest source of revenue for most magazines and newspapers.
Sounds like a ploy devised by a marketing pro who has no concern for the consumer.
Automatic renewals can cause confusion. Many a person, especially the elderly, receive these renewals and conclude – despite having no memory of having done so – they must have renewed. And so they pay the requested fee. Even if they no longer want to subscribe.
It’s also confusing for the estates of people who have passed away, when these bills continue to pour in, demanding money for subscriptions that live on – sometimes for years – after the reader has passed away.
Even more egregious is when the automatic-renewal occurs via deduction from a bank account, without any action needed by the so-called subscriber. Dead people’s joint accounts keep renewing automatically, much to the glee of publishers.
A woman named Lila once showed me a letter she received from Marie Claire magazine. Lila had purposely let her subscription lapse, or so she thought. But this letter confused her.
It began by thanking her for “choosing to be part of our Continuous Service Program. As we recently notified you, your renewal to Marie Claire has been processed. By renewing your subscription, you have guaranteed yourself considerable savings off the newsstand price, hassle-free service, and uninterrupted delivery. You won’t miss a single issue!”
One sentence was underlined, for emphasis: “Payment is now due.”
It concluded, “Please enclose your check with the invoice below and return it in the pre-addressed envelope.”
The detachable portion, to be returned with a check, contained the word “invoice,” in all capital letters. It was the largest word on the document. It made Lila think she owed money to the publisher.
“Did you renew your subscription?” I asked.
“Not that I know of,” she answered.
“Do you want to renew it?”
“No. I wanted it to end. But this isn’t asking me to renew. It says I’ve already renewed. So I’ll have to pay. Otherwise, it might hurt my credit rating.”
“Have you phoned the publisher?”
“I don’t know how. There’s no phone number on the letter. I looked in the magazine, but there’s no number there either.”
It was true. Over the decades, many magazine publishers, wishing to avoid paying folks to answer the phone, have stopped publishing their phone numbers. Instead there’s an instruction to go to a website, so the company can garner as much information about you as possible and then sell that information to others. I shook my head at Marie Claire‘s audacity. “Let me help,” I offered.
I made a photocopy of the letter from Marie Claire, stuck it in a typewriter, and I typed – and Lila signed – the following:
Dear Marie,
What sort of scam is this? Why do you think I owe you money?
I NEVER agreed to be part of a “continuous service program” with you or with any other magazine. I have NEVER taken part in any such program.
My instinct was to telephone you and discuss the misunderstanding. However, you have consciously decided to omit your telephone number from your communications.
Perhaps if you had invited me to renew, I would have considered it; but your telling me that I already made a commitment to renew smacks of a lack of ethics and, quite frankly, rubs my fur the wrong way.
We mailed the letter. Don’t know if it was the letter or not, but soon enough Marie Claire stopped hounding Lila for money.
If you receive a bill for a subscription that you wanted to let lapse but the publisher insists otherwise, what should you do? If the bill contains a phone number for customer service, call and explain.
If it doesn’t contain a phone number, then they don’t merit an explanation. Just throw the bill away.
And if magazines continue to arrive, that’s the publisher’s problem, not yours.
Arthur Vidro’s latest short story, “Which Casino?” appears in the November 2020 issue of Mystery Weekly Magazine.
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