Hope you like your DDI Subscription!

[reveal]

Saw this over on the Consumerist

Hasbro Casts Spell of Greater Invisibility over D&D Cancellation page

Apparently trying to cancel your DDI account is not a simple, easy process, with some users unable to cancel at all.

It looks like the errors may have been fixed. This morning I removed my payment info (the CC to be charged when it auto-renewed) but then had errors when trying to verify it (i.e. get into my account again). I was able to verify it this morning, so they may have fixed it.

I posted some steps which are listed on the ENW News page (Canceling D&DI Auto-Renew for Dummies) for those still trying to do it. It's not as simple as you would think, unfortunately.

 

[soulcatcher78]

While it took a couple of emails and about a 36 hour period, I didn't have any trouble (more than the above) cancelling the auto renew. There will always be issues and until they can get WotC and the billing company to remove that silly feature, it will plague them.

 

[Scribble]

It's better then the xbox live one... apparently if you remove your credit card info they automatically ban you from xbox live, until you call customer service.

 

[Shemeska]

There has been a flood of complaint posts over on their boards in the past month about people being unable to get the autorenew cancelled. In many cases the system is buggy to the point where people attempting to contact WotC customer service to get it cancelled just have page errors and looping run-arounds that prevent them from doing so.

And most of the response from WotC reps I've seen on the Wizards boards has tended to be "here's a work around" or "what's wrong with your cookies/cache/settings?" rather than "we have bad code and we're working hard to fix that code to prevent these problems in the future".

If they're getting bad press about it, maybe they'll invest in fixing the problems. It's just going to get worse if they don't, and combined with the late/vaporeware status of much of the DDI, they risk sinking their ship before it's even out of the habor, let alone at full sail.

 

[Duncan Haldane]

When I ordered my subscription I immediately canceled the auto-renew, because of the nice little text that they could review the cost and services and automatically renew me at the new price if I didn't.

For all I know it might be costing 10 times more in a year, and I didn't want that to be automatically charged to me.

Duncan

 

[catsclaw227]

In response to the thread title...

Thanks! I really do like it. The mags have been very good, the compendium is very cool, and the encounter builder has been helpful for my adventure conversions.

In response to the thread body...

It's a bummer it isn't smooth. Though the cancellation process is no more obfuscated than much of the creditcard subscription renewal processes out there. I am sure they'll figure out the kinks well before my year is up.

 

[mearlus]

I plan on renewing my subscription as well, however just in case as with all online purchases I use a 'virtual' credit card # from my cc provider and it expires at the end of the month it is generated. That way even if they tried to bill me it'd error out.

I do this more so if the online vendors db's of credit card #'s isn't secure or gets hacked.

Wizards definitely should be a little more pro-active with their problem. They shouldn't be telling folks it's their browsers problem, their website should be compliant with most major current browsers (not just IE!!).

 

[Rechan]

I'm loving it.

 

[Jeff Wilder]

No idea. But if WotC is secretly storing credit card info after the user deletes, that's an even bigger problem than auto-renew.

Guess I'll find out in October!

It's not "secretly," if your contract specifies auto-renew and there's a process for amending the contract (i.e., canceling auto-renew). It's right out in the open and completely legal.

BTW, typically it's also not as simple as telling your credit card company not to allow further charges. Many credit card companies will require you to close the card account and open another, which is a pain. And if they do cut the charges, when WotC tries to charge and can't, it could impact your credit rating.

Long story short, go through their cancellation process, and while you're doing so express your displeasure at its opacity. If enough people do that, they'll change it.

 

[catsclaw227]

Also, keep in mind, that with some auto-renew subscriptions, the credit card and auto renewal information is not always kept with the company, but instead with the merchant bank that has their credit card processing - i.e. the company that lets them charge your visa card for a service.

A charge gets marked as auto-renew in the original charge, and just removing the credit card information from the company site won't remove the auto-renew, nor the charge informaton with the merchant bank.

You should always follow the companies auto renew processes if you want to ensure that your auto-renew doesn't occur and you will have documentation of the process.