eHarmony auto-renew mess

mediummac

Hi all - I've seen this before on earlier threads (I can't link to them as I'm a new poster and they don't let newbies post links) but my question is a bit more specific. I signed up to eHarmony a year ago, for a 12 month subscription, paying over 3 months. You cannot turn off the auto-renew feature until after all payments have been made. As a previous poster has said, I DID go back on the site (which I'd found really disappointing) and turn off auto-renew after 3 months - but lo and behold, over the weekend I got an email from Paypal saying my subscription had been renewed for another 12 months. They've taken the first payment of £39.80 and presumably want to take the other two payments in Feb and March.

Of course it's my word against theirs that I switched off the auto-renew function. I really really don't want to renew! I've had a boyfriend since May (met on Tinder!) but more to the point, I really can't afford it - I'm studying for an MA and funds are seriously tight. I do understand that this was in their Ts&Cs, and I should have deleted the account altogether but...

I've called eHarmony who have escalated me to the next level, an email-only service. I've politely asked them in writing to help me but I am sure they get countless numbers of these begging messages every day.

My question is as follows:
On Paypal there is a page that lists all my pre-approved payments. eHarmony is listed there as Active. I've now switched it to Inactive - Paypal's site says that any company will now have to contact me to ask for payment. I'm just wondering if that will affect my credit rating? I HATE that I have to give even more money to this CRAP website - it makes me want to scream! :mad:

Thanks to anyone for any advice or shared rage they can offer!

cono1717

It won't affect your credit since you didn't give the information to them in the first place. When you log into your account what is the option that is currently selected is it still as "Auto-Renew". If so the best you can hope for is a partial refund.

mediummac

Thanks so much for getting back to me, @cono1717. I haven't touched my eHarmony account yet - I definitely want to delete it altogether, but I wasn't sure what the best thing was to do.

Yes, auto-renew is still selected (even though I swear I turned it off back in April 2015, and didn't look at it again...). They have already taken one payment of £39.50 and are presumably going to try to take another in Feb and another in March. I am sure they won't refund the first instalment that just left my account but maybe my begging email will let them have pity.

Either way, since that first £39.50 came out, I have changed the Paypal payment to 'Inactive' (on the Paypal website) - so I'm wondering what will happen when eHarmony go to take the second and third payments in Feb/March and it doesn't work - will I get in trouble?

mediummac

PS - I can't now see the Auto-Renew option on my eHarmony account because I am in the middle of a 3-month paying process - they don't let you switch off auto-renew until you've paid all instalments (by which time loads of people have forgotten all about it!). Very clever!

unholyangel

If its the same as other sites, the cancellation is deceptive. There's been quite a lot of complaints about them here and other places.

There was one a friend of mine signed up to - think it was match but not 100% sure on that - I can't tell them apart tbh. They thought they had cancelled but I happened to see a bit down the bottom that said (in smaller writing of course) that you need to click to continue and confirm your cancellation. I could understand why people would miss it though - the main body of the text made it sound like it had been cancelled already - and I probably only spotted it because I was actively checking for things like that because I know how deceptive traders can be!

mediummac

Yup, you're right @unholyangel, eHarmony appears to have a fair bit in common with Hotel California in that respect - very very hard to leave. Right now i am keen just to settle the dispute about the payments - but to be brutally honest, if they're not going to refund me and I end up having to pay the full £120, I don't want to delete the account - if I've paid so much for it I may as well have it churning away in the background just in case I become single again?! Is that awful?!

Anyway, my real concern - as above - is what will happen in a month when they try and take the second payment from Paypal.