Struggling to cancel a CPA on credit card??

bankjob_2

I have been reading threads on here for a while. One subject that stands out is people not being able to get companies to cancel there subscriptions. If you have a credit card then you can use the chargeback/dispute process to help.

Whether you have Visa, Mastercard or Amex the following works.
1. get email/postal address for company.
2. send them written request of cancellation.
3. KEEP COPY
4. If they bill again after the date of that letter/given the cancellation period for them obviously. Call your credit card company.
5. using the 'proof' they can then charge the money back from the company on the basis that it has been cancelled and so is unauthorised.
6. The company get a charge from their bank for chargebacks so they are not likely to do this more than once, but if they do, use the same system again.

It does not matter if the company respond or not the copy or print-out is enough to do a cancelled recurring chargeback.

Hope this helps

:o:o

never-in-doubt

bankjob wrote: »

I have been reading threads on here for a while. One subject that stands out is people not being able to get companies to cancel there subscriptions. If you have a credit card then you can use the chargeback/dispute process to help.

Whether you have Visa, Mastercard or Amex the following works.
1. get email/postal address for company.
2. send them written request of cancellation.
3. KEEP COPY
4. If they bill again after the date of that letter/given the cancellation period for them obviously. Call your credit card company.
5. using the 'proof' they can then charge the money back from the company on the basis that it has been cancelled and so is unauthorised.
6. The company get a charge from their bank for chargebacks so they are not likely to do this more than once, but if they do, use the same system again.

It does not matter if the company respond or not the copy or print-out is enough to do a cancelled recurring chargeback.

Hope this helps

:o:o

Good thread & useful to know - thanks..... I usually just say ive lost card and they stop everything but that is a little ahem, dodgy :rolleyes:

bankjob_2

at least this way the companies get punished for not doing what you ask them to in the first place so serves them right ha

never-in-doubt

bankjob wrote: »

at least this way the companies get punished for not doing what you ask them to in the first place so serves them right ha

Yes, this is useful cos I thought you could just get em cancelled - evidently not! shocking what some of them can do...... can you copy the above and paste it into the other thread about this mate?

never-in-doubt

never-in-doubt wrote: »

Yes, this is useful cos I thought you could just get em cancelled - evidently not! shocking what some of them can do...... can you copy the above and paste it into the other thread about this mate?

Here: http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=118359

Cheers matey.... :j

gnaril

This been picked up in another post

Cancelled a credit card you have a a CPA set up with does NOT i repeat NOT stop the CPA.

on the rare occasion it may get declined on the banks system however the credit card being a gauranteed form of payment has to honour any subscriptions set up on acc regardless wether acc is open or closed.

Top post here is what u have to do exactly to the letter. Providing you do this Bank initiate a chargeback enclosing copies of the info you send them and bang, credit applied to your account and a charge for the stupid merchant for messing you about.

exel1966

It's been picked up in literally hundreds of posts here on MSE. It comes up very regularly, usually as 'Credit Card Direct Debit' (no such thing) and usually it's the fault of the cardholder for not advising the retailer concerned to cancel the CPA, however there are quite a few scrupulous companies out there who make it difficult to cancel these CPA's. The !!!!!! industry is well known for it !

It's also assumed by many that cancelling a card will stop the CPA, but it does no such thing. The retailer has every right to charge the account and the card company are obliged to pay the retailer until such time the CPA is officially cancelled by the account holder ONLY, whether verbally or in writing. It matters not that you no longer have the card or use it as the account will still exist, albeit closed.

Altarf

But isn't the obvious solution to never set up a CPA in the first place.

Unless you have no option, if you have a choice between paying by DD or CPA, why would you choose to pay by a CPA that gives you far less protection than paying by DD and is much more difficult to cancel than a DD.

exel1966

Altarf wrote: »

But isn't the obvious solution to never set up a CPA in the first place.

Unless you have no option, if you have a choice between paying by DD or CPA, why would you choose to pay by a CPA that gives you far less protection than paying by DD and is much more difficult to cancel than a DD.

To those that know it's very obvious and highly reccomended that you never set one of these up, but how many people bother to read the terms when they take out these kind of subscriptions ? People tend to assume far too often, then find themselves in a predicament which could have easily been avoided.
Car insurance/AA+RAC membership/magazine subscriptions etc are extremely common scenarios. They all warn that payments will continue to be taken until subscription is cancelled.

Altarf

And for all those examples although they offer CPA, it is very very rare that you cannot pay by DD.

And it is not particularly the issue that subscriptions will continue until cancelled, that applies for both CPAs and DDs. As I am sure you are aware a DD can be cancelled by contacting your bank and telling them to do so, even on a continuing subscription (although obviously you may run into problems with the beneficiary).

With a CPA your bank will only act on the instruction of the beneficiary, and will not act on your instruction to cancel it. A CPA is the equivalent of you giving the beneficiary a stack of blank signed cheques, and putting your cheque guarantee card number on the back of all of them.

Although the OP gave some reasonable advice on how to cancel a CPA, my point was that they should have then had as point 7 the advice that once you have got yourself out of the CPA don't do it again. Only a fool signs up to a CPA if DD is offered as an alternative.

leotech

Well i have been discovering the problems with CPA's over the last week but i now i have received confirmation of cancelation so i can relax a little now as i the proof i need. But im never using a CPA again with any small company only on sites like amazon.