Easy In, Not Out
My Story
Telling this story, I’ll be telling my age. But, back in the day when Internet and email services were just being introduced to the public there was primarily one major player. Many of us got floppy disks in the mail offering great deals for this new technology. We would be able to surf the internet for news. And instead of having to call or write letters to family and friends, we would be able to communicate with each other in a chat room and/or through email services. At that time, email wasn’t a tool to funnel advertisements. We actually used email to check on each other, update each other on what we were doing, and to share information. All we had to do was plop the disk in, sign up for the service, and input our credit card information. We had it, my siblings had it, my parents had it, my friends had it. Little by little we discovered just about everybody we knew had it.
Eventually other internet service provides came on the scene offering competitive and sometimes better deals. Trying to get out of our initial contract was a beast. I’m persistent, so I put my feet to the grind and got it cancelled. But my parents weren’t so successful. Years later, when assisting them with a computer issue, we discovered they were still paying for this service- plus another internet service. They said they tried to cancel it but weren’t successful. It wasn’t because they couldn’t get through to a live represen-tative, it was the representative not accepting, “No,” for an answer. They wore them down and/or made them feel silly for not seeing the value of their service.
I remember the day I helped them finally take care of this. I called, told the representative they wanted to cancel the service, provided the reason, and they made us an offer. “What about if we…” I responded, “No.” Then they made another offer, and another, and another, and another. I was persistent “No… No…No…No.” I told them were scamming and strong-arming people who couldn’t fight back. And after an unnecessarily long call and great persistence on my end, the service was finally cancelled.
What You Should Know
You have probably accepted some great offers in your lifetime. It was probably very easy to enroll. Just do this one
thing. But then when you wanted to stop the service, you had to do these three things, in this particular way, and in this particular timeframe. It was a game of, “Catch me, if you can.”
You may have to take time off work, and spend hours on the telephone, just to get through to a live person. You have to catch them during their business hours, which happen to be your work hours. You have to get passed their automated system, which doesn’t always accept you saying, “Representative” to get to a live Rep. You may be passed on from one rep to the next- to those with increasing skill in persuasion. They pass you on from one department to the next, only for the call to be “mistakenly” dropped, thereby requiring you to call back. They leave you hold, hoping you’ll give up and hang up. Some-times, they wear you down with one offer after offer, and make you feel stupid for passing on such a great deal.
These companies bank on you procrastinating- doesn’t matter what the reason. Or they bank on you becoming frustrated, worn down, or giving up. It’s all completely legal. It’s in the fast-talking language at the end of the commercial or ad. It’s in the legally binding fine print at the end of the ad or contract. And they aren’t slimy companies, from the surface. Many are reputable and credible busi-nesses. And I would venture to say, none of them explicitly teach these tactics, they just put the incentive in front of their reps and turn a blind eye to how they carry it out- as long as they get the job done.
All companies aren’t like this. There are many companies that make it reasonably easy to stop a subscription or service. It won’t be as easy as starting, but they still make it quite simple to cancel. But you won’t know this unless you take the time to listen to the fast-talk, to read the fine print, to ask the necessary questions, and evaluate your willingness to fight when and if the time comes.
If you know you aren’t going to have what it takes and you don’t have someone else you can rely on; that deal, might not be a deal for you. You probably shouldn’t do it. However, if you are pre-pared to do whatever it takes, you could win out by partici-pating in a good or great deal- especially if you know you want that service anyway and would be willing to pay regular price for it.
Conclusion
Don’t automatically pass up a great deal. Sometimes, it really is a great deal. Just know it may be easy to get in, but not so easy to get out. At some point down the line, you may have to fight.
