Luxplus do I have any rights for refund

mumat30

I purchased 1 item from Luxplus in 2018 and was unaware I was subscribing to a lifetime of paying £8.99 a month. I have now been paying them since 2018 from my PayPal account. Never, ever did they send me any communications to advise I had subscribed or to notify me that my membership was being renewed as would happen with any other subscription, Do I have to say goodbye to over £560 pounds and need to chalk it up to being an idiot? 

Ayr_Rage

Unless their Ts and Cs are still the same as when you made you purchase it'll be difficult to prove exactly what you signed up for.

However, I think most people would have twigged what was going on in the month(s) following the purchase.

born_again

https://www.paypal.com/us/cshelp/article/what-is-an-automatic-payment-and-how-do-i-update-or-cancel-one-help240

Simple task to cancel via Pay Pal.

sheramber

Did you buy and the cheaper member's price nd take advantage of the free trial? 

This  meant you  signed up as member with a monthly membership fee after the free trial ended?

When shopping at Luxplus you can choose between two different prices: Member Price and Normal Price. If you choose to buy at Member Price, you will automatically add a membership to your shopping cart. If you already have a membership, simply log into your account before shopping on luxplus.co.uk. If you are a new member, you will be offered a free intro period. If you have previously been a member of Luxplus, you will be added a monthly membership at the price of £8.99 with your order and reactivate your membership. 

If you do not want to be a member, you can choose to buy your items at Normal Prices. In that case, you will not be added a membership in the payment process.  

RefluentBeans

Following on from your other post - it’s sort of how these companies work. They assume most will forget to cancel and then make money off that. Is it shady? Yes. Is it illegal - unclear. 

There’s currently massive reviews ongoing for multiple different industries who use subscription and auto-renewal contracts. The best practice is to tell consumers with enough time to cancel the contract (eg 7 days for a monthly contract 30 days for a yearly rolling contract), sending payment confirmations, identifying customers who are inactive and still on long terms rolling contracts, and more.

This, I believe, is soon to be regulated (and should be) but currently there’s not much to do other than stop the subscription. Can also ask for a refund but I don’t think they’re obligated to pay you. The only exception is if the contract was unfair when you signed up. They should have told you that you were signing up to a subscription. Given that PayPal has a section for automatic payments, and it seems to make it clear in the retailers (current) terms it’s a subscription, I don’t think you can really say you didn’t know (unless the original terms were different). 

If you do feel you have a claim and the terms were unfair, you can tell the company that, and resolve it that way; then if that doesn’t work you can resolve through small claims. But for that you have to have a legal basis, and as much as this practice needs regulations, it currently doesn’t really have any, so relying on unfair terms really.  

born_again

They really can't make it much clearer. It one of the 2 rotating banners on their home page.

cmthephoenix

born_again said:

They really can't make it much clearer. It one of the 2 rotating banners on their home page.

The OP is claiming that it can't have been that clearly identifiable when they purchased in 2018. They are assuming this on the basis that if it was that clear then there is no way they could have missed it. I know when I purchased from them at the end of 2019 it was made abundantly clear. Even without the reduced rate for the subscription it was still by far the cheapest way to get the product I wanted (maybe funded by people that hadn't read that the even cheaper price was obtained by signing up to a subscription service).

powerful_Rogue

RefluentBeans said:

Following on from your other post - it’s sort of how these companies work. They assume most will forget to cancel and then make money off that. Is it shady? Yes. Is it illegal - unclear. 

There’s currently massive reviews ongoing for multiple different industries who use subscription and auto-renewal contracts. The best practice is to tell consumers with enough time to cancel the contract (eg 7 days for a monthly contract 30 days for a yearly rolling contract), sending payment confirmations, identifying customers who are inactive and still on long terms rolling contracts, and more.

This, I believe, is soon to be regulated (and should be) but currently there’s not much to do other than stop the subscription. Can also ask for a refund but I don’t think they’re obligated to pay you. The only exception is if the contract was unfair when you signed up. They should have told you that you were signing up to a subscription. Given that PayPal has a section for automatic payments, and it seems to make it clear in the retailers (current) terms it’s a subscription, I don’t think you can really say you didn’t know (unless the original terms were different). 

If you do feel you have a claim and the terms were unfair, you can tell the company that, and resolve it that way; then if that doesn’t work you can resolve through small claims. But for that you have to have a legal basis, and as much as this practice needs regulations, it currently doesn’t really have any, so relying on unfair terms really.  

What makes it shady when it's clearly advertised? It's certainly not illegal, membership schemes have been around a lot longer then the internet.

Pollycat

There's a company called BUUKS (which is also a Danish company) that operates in the same way (member/non-member prices) that has been discussed on here.
Lots of posters insisting that there was no information that they were signing up to a monthly membership when buying at the cheaper price.
And...lots of regular posters pointing out that the information was there.

Similar to the 'copycat' websites offering to get passports, visas, GHIC, book driving tests etc. which have pretty clear statements (imho) that they are not affiliated to the genuine websites.

Like powerful_Rogue, I can't see how it is shady or possibly illegal.
Of course, that's based on what the website shows now but who knows what the website said 5 years ago.