But all that may be about to change

The Federal Trade Commission is considering new regulations that would level the sign up versus cancel playing field. Called “click to cancel,” the idea is that it should be as easy to extract yourself from a subscription you no longer want as it was to sign up for it in the first place.

It’s part of the FTC’s “Negative Option Rule.” Basically the FTC is saying that companies can’t assume a customers’ silence means consent to buy something or to continue paying for something. As their brief on the subject says, “Negative option marketing generally falls into four categories: prenotification plans, continuity plans, automatic renewals, and free trial (i.e., free-to-pay or nominal-fee-topay) conversion offers.”

Rita McGrath

Thought Sparks