Do You Really Want to Try That Free Offer?

                      Do you really want to try that free offer?

 

After reading this report and having had my own dealings with A.O.L I would be very leery to try free memberships to anything unless you were planning to commit to it. 

 

I figure on of the kindest thing I can do for my internet community is hook you up with this information:

http://www.pcworld.com/printable/article/id,128206/printable.html

Just Cancel the @#%$* Account!
It's hard to find a Web service that doesn't offer a free trial. But just try canceling. We did, and the results weren't always pretty.
Tom Spring
Friday, December 22, 2006 03:00 PM PST

It took me less than 5 minutes to sign up for a NetZero dial-up Internet account. But after canceling that account, I spent a week trying in vain to reverse a charge that the service levied after my cancellation request.

I had to call NetZero a total of five times, holding for several minutes and then enduring long and fruitless conversations with company agents every time I called. According to the NetZero representatives that I spoke to, I needed to talk to a supervisor to arrange a credit, but none was ever available when I called. In the end, I gave up and let NetZero keep the money.

To evaluate how difficult canceling an online service can be, I signed up for and then canceled 32 accounts, each at a different site. About a third of the services in my sample made the seemingly simple goal of canceling very hard to achieve (see the "Big Hassle" entries in "Want to Cancel That Service?").

Not all of my experiences were negative. Services such as a monthly New York Times TimesSelect online subscription and a monthly Consumer Reports Online account took only minutes to cancel and without lingering strings. But some others made me feel as though I'd joined the Sopranos' family business: Once I signed up, there was no quitting!
How Much Hassle?

I subscribed to the services beginning last July, and I canceled--or tried to cancel--them all between August and October. Afterward, I considered several factors in assessing how hard it was to cancel each service and to receive any promised trial-period refunds. For example, I downgraded companies that failed to provide a way to unsubscribe through their Web sites. I also dinged merchants when they continued to bill me after I had canceled, and if they made me feel like a Net gumshoe searching their Web site for clues on how to unsubscribe. And I penalized sites whose customer service personnel pressured me repeatedly to continue my subscriptions or even buy other services. Finally, I took into account how long the various companies kept me on hold, and whether they continued to send me e-mail after I had canceled.

Of course, hassle is to a certain extent in the eyes of the beholder. A 10-minute call with one company might be fine if the representative is polite and helpful. The same amount of time with another company might be highly annoying.

Companies labeled "No Hassle" made severing ties relatively easy. For instance, some of them let me cancel by filling out an online form or sending an e-mail, and then they left me alone. Companies labeled as "Some Hassle" received unsatisfactory marks on one or more criteria. Companies that earned the "Big Hassle" rating failed on several measures; they made it so hard for me to cancel that I regretted having signed up with them in the first place. For a detailed list of the criteria I used in rating the various services, see "Thirteen Strikes"; and for more about the particulars of my experiences with each service I tried, see "Service Cancellation Woes."
Not-So-Free Free Trials

Weeks after a NetZero agent told me that he was canceling my account, a charge for $14.95 appeared on my credit card bill. So I called back, providing my name and my old NetZero account information. The customer service agent told me that I would need to supply a "transaction number" from my credit card account in order to obtain a refund.

Half an hour later, I called back with a transaction number. Another NetZero agent told me that the transaction number I had supplied was wrong, and said that his supervisor would call me back within half an hour. When no supervisor called, I called back. There was still no supervisor available. The next day, I received a voice-mail message requesting that I call again. I did, but there was still no supervisor on hand. I finally decided that it wasn't worth the effort, and I gave up on getting the refund.

NetZero said later in a written statement that the company "sincerely apologized" for the trouble I had encountered, but it did not indicate to me whether the company planned to change its practices.

I had a hard time canceling my $5 monthly Gold Classmates.com account, too. I couldn't find any information on how to cancel until I entered the word cancel In the site's search engine. Classmates.com spokesperson John Uppendahl confirmed that there is no other way to find cancellation information. But that was only the first hoop I had to jump through to cancel my membership.

Classmates.com also forced me to click through several Web pages reminding me of the benefits I'd lose. Finally my clicking ended at a generic Member Support e-mail contact page containing a blank 'Your Question' field. Though the form said nothing about cancellations, I used it to request that the service cancel my subscription. The next day I received an e-mail message confirming that the service had accepted my request.

When I asked Uppendahl why canceling my account took so many steps, he replied that this was the way that Classmates.com handled cancellations. He declined to answer further questions.
Easy Sign-Up, Hard Cancel

"You can't annoy someone into liking your brand," says Harley Manning, vice president of research at Forrester Research. But some companies certainly act as though they think he's wrong.

In January 2006, America Online agreed to pay $25 million to settle a class-action lawsuit brought against it in the St. Clair County, Illinois, circuit court. The suit alleged, among other things, that AOL had billed customers for services that they had tried to cancel. The company settled a similar suit brought by the state of Ohio in 2005. In both cases, AOL denied any wrongdoing.

Sixteen days after I signed up for an AOL 90-Day Risk-Free dial-up account in Massachusetts, I decided to cancel the account. When I called AOL to do so, a representative peppered me with questions as to why I was unsubscribing and reminded me that I could maintain a free AOL e-mail account. I declined the offer, and the rep finally told me, "You will not be charged any monthly membership fees." I had similar experiences canceling the other two accounts.

But even though I canceled my 90-day trial after only 16 days, I was hit with a charge of $25.90, the monthly AOL fee, on my credit card. I also signed up for similar AOL accounts in Colorado (using a friend's address) and New York (using a relative's address). In both of those cases, my credit card was charged the monthly fee.

Later, when I called back and questioned why I had been billed, another representative told me that I had to ask for a refund, or else I wouldn't receive one--odd, given that the first rep had said that I wouldn't be billed.

An AOL spokesperson confirmed to me that members must request a refund in order to get one, and said that its customer service reps had erred each time I cancelled over the phone. Instead of telling me that I wouldn't be charged "any fees," the spokesperson said, they should have indicated to me that I wouldn't be charged "any additional fees."

MSN Internet billed me twice after I had closed that account. Likewise, Netflix charged me after I had canceled there.

These were honest mistakes, according to the companies involved. "As soon as issues like yours are brought to the attention of customer service, they are remedied immediately," Netflix spokesperson Bronagh Hanley assured me. A spokesperson for MSN echoed Netflix's statements. But in both cases I had to call to get the charges removed.

When I called to cancel RealNetworks' Real SuperPass I spoke with a company representative who kept cajoling me to change my mind. He then tried to sell me on the benefits of other RealNetworks services. All told, he asked me 13 times in several different ways to remain a customer.

Carol Rogalski, a spokesperson for RealNetworks, told me that my experience was a one-time occurrence. Then why, I asked Rogalski, had I encountered similar exit hassles earlier in the same month when I tried to unsubscribe from RealNetworks' Real Rhapsody service? According to Rogalski, RealNetworks is now conducting investigations into both incidents.
Did You Say 'Cancel'?

Click here to view full size image.
Thinking that I had properly canceled my contract with the dating service True.com within two weeks of signing up, I expected to be charged for one month of service: $50. Two months later, however, my credit card statement showed $153 in True.com charges. It turns out that rather than canceling my account, I had merely suspended it temporarily--and in the process, I had also unwittingly signed up for an additional True.com service to help me improve my profile, at $1 per month.

Click here to view full size image.
Here's where I went wrong: When I went to True.com's Customer Care page to unsubscribe, I selected 'Cancel' and the programmed instructions prompted me to type a cancellation request into a text field. After doing as instructed, I clicked 'Continue'; the next screen then asked, 'Are you sure you want to cancel?' In response I clicked yet another link labeled 'Click here to cancel your membership'.

On the next screen, instead asking me again if I wanted to cancel my membership, the routine asked me if I wanted to "suspend" my subscription. At the bottom of the window was a big 'Continue' button, and below that--in gray (not black) type in the smallest font on the page--was a link labeled 'Cancel my subscription'. I clicked the 'Continue' button, not realizing that by doing so I had merely suspended my account for seven days.

When I called True.com to ask why I had been charged, a customer service representative named Jeff noted that there is a difference between suspend and cancel. I complained about the cancellation process and pushed for a refund. Jeff agreed to reduce the outstanding charges by $50.

I might have faced additional hassles if I had disputed the charge with my credit card company. When I belatedly examined True.com's terms-of-service agreement, I found a section stipulating that if I were to "fraudulent[ly] report an authorized charge by True.com" as "unauthorized," I could be held liable for $1000 per incident in damages. I call that tough love.

True.com's president, Ruben Buell, told me that if I had followed the trail of cancellation links for one more page past the 'Suspend' turnoff, I would have been prompted to call the company's customer support line. So after all that effort, I still would have had to pick up the phone.
Why Make It So Hard to Cancel?

According to Jared Spool, founding principal of market research firm User Interface Engineering, some Web site proprietors imagine that the easier they make it to sign up, the more customers they'll get. And pursuing the same logic in reverse, they may also suppose that the harder they make it for people to unsubscribe, the more customers they'll keep.

But the companies that made it easiest to unsubscribe are ones I would consider doing business with again. As for NetZero and True.com? Not on your life.
Hall of Shame Award: A Really Big Hassle

Canceling True.com was bad--but botched billing, long and frustrating conversations with customer service reps, and supervisors who were never available when I called made NetZero my worst cancellation experience.
Breakup Tips: Best Ways to Unload an Online Service

Breaking up with an online service doesn't have to mean an ugly divorce. Avoiding hassles just requires preparation and some postnup plotting.

    * Use a single credit card to conduct all your online transactions. This will allow you to monitor all of your subscriptions from one statement.
    * Before you become a subscriber, find out how easy it is to cancel. If you can't find a cancellation page on the site, ask the service how to find it.
    * Ask what the terms of service are, before you sign up. For example, Equifax's credit monitoring service requires a three-month minimum commitment.
    * Check with the Better Business Bureau to see how common billing or cancellation complaints are against the service you're considering subscribing to.
    * If you cancel, ask for a refund. AOL says that it provides a refund only to customers who request one; EarthLink and ESPN say that they issue refunds on a case-by-case basis to customers who ask.
    * Pay with a credit card that allows you to dispute charges. MasterCard offered to resolve my refund dispute with NetZero by reversing the charge.

Want to Cancel That Service?

We field-tested 31 companies to see how easy or difficult they make it to cancel their services. The companies within each category are listed alphabetically.

    * AOL
    * BlueMountain.com
    * Classmates.com
    * ESPN
    * MSN Internet
    * Napster.com
    * NetZero
    * Real Rhapsody
    * Real SuperPass
    * True.com

    * EarthLink
    * Equifax Credit Watch Gold
    * Flickr.com
    * GameSpy Arcade
    * MLB
    * Netflix
    * RapidFax

    * Ancestry.com
    * Audible.com
    * Consumer Reports Online
    * Ediets.com
    * GameFly.com
    * GotoMyPC
    * Match.com
    * Mvelopes.com
    * Reservation Rewards
    * Salon.com
    * Stamps.com
    * The New York Times TimesSelect
    * The Wall Street Journal
    * Vonage
    * Vongo

Service Cancellation Woes

To research this story, I signed up for 32 popular online services and then attempted to cancel them. In grading how hard it was to unsubscribe, I used a point system based on 13 factors (see "Thirteen Strikes" for a complete listing of the criteria). Companies earned lots of hassle points if their Web sites provided no information on how to cancel or if they continued to bill me after I canceled. They got fewer points for less objectionable (but still annoying) behavior such as sending me e-mail messages after I'd quit.

Of course, not all of my experiences can be summed up in numbers alone. Lots of companies urged me to reconsider, for instance; but some were polite and took no for an answer, while others were infuriatingly persistent.

Here's the nitty-gritty on what happened to me with each of the services I canceled.
Big Hassles

AOL

I signed up for a 90-day AOL trial account in Massachusetts in late July. I also signed up for two other ones at roughly the same time, using a friend's address in Colorado and a family member's address in New York. In each instance, I signed up over the phone and waited for two weeks before canceling. The cancellation process wasn't difficult, though when I unsubscribed for the Massachusetts account, the company's rep peppered me with questions about why I was unsubscribing and reminded that I could keep my AOL e-mail account for free. I declined the offer, however, and the rep finally told me, "You will not be charged any monthly membership fees." I had similar experiences in canceling the other two accounts.

Despite the reps' assurances, though, AOL charged all three accounts the monthly fee of $25.90 after I had canceled them. When I called later to ask why, AOL reps told me that I had to ask for a refund or none would be given.

An AOL spokesperson said that, instead of telling me that I wouldn't be charged "any fees," the customer service reps should have indicated that I wouldn't be charged "any additional fees."

BlueMountain.com

BlueMountain.com, an interactive greeting-card site, does not provide any information on its Web site about how to cancel the service. Finally, to pull the plug, I sent an e-mail request--and promptly received a reply telling me that I'd have to call to cancel. When I did call, I had to listen to a representative plead with me to stay.

Another annoying aspect of the BlueMountain.com's cancellation process was that I continued to receive commercial e-mail messages from the service after canceling. And when I tried to unsubscribe from receiving further e-mail, the unsubscribe link on the customer service page failed to function properly on several occasions.

BlueMountain.com says that it will give its customers a better way to cancel online very soon.

Classmates.com

I had a hard time canceling my $5 monthly Gold Classmates.com account. In the first place, I couldn't find any information at the Classmates.com site on how to cancel until I entered the word cancel in the site's search engine. Classmates.com spokesperson John Uppendahl confirmed that there is no other way to find cancellation information.

But that was only the first hoop I had to jump through to escape my membership. Classmates.com also forced me to click through several Web pages consisting of reminders of the benefits I'd lose by canceling.

Finally my clicking ended at a generic Member Support e-mail contact page containing a blank 'Your Question' field. Though the form made no mention of cancellations, I used it to request that my subscription be ended.

The next day I received an e-mail message confirming that the service had accepted my request. When I asked Uppendahl why canceling my account took so many steps, he replied that this was the way Classmates.com handled cancellations. He declined to answer further questions.

Like a number of other services, Classmates.com continued to send me commercial e-mail even after I had unsubscribed from its service.

ESPN

I signed up for a $6.95 monthly ESPN Insider account, and then tried to cancel less than two weeks later. I could not find any way to cancel on ESPN's site, so I sent ESPN an e-mail requesting that my account be canceled. The company did not recognize my request, however, and it charged my credit card twice.

According to an ESPN representative, if I had visited the 'Contact Us' link at the bottom of every page on ESPN.com and gone to 'Insider Services', I would have been prompted to call to cancel. My mistake was in clicking 'Member Services' instead.

MSN Internet

I signed up for an MSN Internet dial-up account for $17.95 monthly and attempted to cancel it within the same week. MSN told me that I would not be charged, but I received two charges for $17.95 on my credit card from MSN. When I called to ask why, the customer service representative apologized and promised a refund within days (he also took the opportunity to urge me to switch to a different MSN account for broadband, which I declined to do). To MSN's credit, I received the refund within the promised time period.

Napster.com

I was a member of Napster for less than three weeks before canceling. Napster gives subscribers no way of canceling online. Instead you must cancel on your PC via Napster's software. I had to do an extensive amount of clicking before I finally found the Customer Service menu, which informed me I needed to call to cancel.

NetZero

Severing ties with my $14.95 dial-up account with NetZero Internet access service and receiving a promised refund ranked as the most loathsome cancellation experience in my tests.

When I was 24 days into a 30-day free trial of the NetZero Internet access service, I tried to cancel online. In searching the site for cancel options, I found directions to call a toll-free phone number to cancel. After a 4-minute wait, a customer service agent canceled my account and said I wouldn't be charged.

Weeks later, a NetZero charge appeared on my credit card. I called and gave my name and old NetZero account information. The customer service agent insisted that I was Tom Spring of California--not Massachusetts--despite my denials. He then told me that the billing information had been removed from my account and that I would need a "transaction number" from my credit card number to obtain a refund.

A half hour later, I was back on the phone with a transaction number. A NetZero agent told me I had the wrong transaction number and said that his supervisor would have to call me back. He promised that the callback would come within a half hour. No supervisor called me back, so I called again; no supervisor was available then either. Ultimately, the supervisor didn't call back until the next day, leaving a message on my voice mail requesting that I call NetZero again. I did so--but again, no supervisor was available. I finally conceded defeat and let NetZero keep the money.

Real Rhapsody

With Real Rhapsody, I had to weather hardball sales tactics to break free of my subscription. After requesting numerous times that I stay with the service, the agent switched gears and tried to get me to sign up for other RealNetworks paid services.

The agent asked me twice to participate in an exit interview, but I declined twice. The rep also told me that I would have to remove my billing information from the RealNetworks system manually; otherwise, RealNetworks would keep it so that--if I decided to buy something from the company later--I wouldn't have to input my billing information again.

Real SuperPass

My experience with RealNetworks' RealSuperPass resembled my dealings with Real Rhapsody. When I called to cancel RealSuperPass, I spoke with a company rep who kept trying to get me to change my mind. When he eventually gave up trying to get me to stay, he tried to sell me instead on the benefits of other RealNetworks services.

All told, he asked me 13 times in various ways to remain a customer. Carol Rogalski, a spokesperson for RealNetworks, told me that my experience was a one-time occurrence.

True.com

I took advantage of a free three-day trial of True.com, an online dating service, and canceled on the 13th day of membership. I fully expected to be charged for one month's service, at $49.99 per month. But I received a bill for $153--a hefty $103 more than that.

I was charged three times for "True Life Coaching," which was supposed to help me improve my online profile; I had never knowingly signed up for this add-on; however, in agreeing to the terms of service, I learned, I had automatically consented to the charge.

True.com does not offer a clear way to cancel service through its Web site. I resorted to going to the "customer care" section of the site, where you can send a message to the company by using a form. The drop-down menu where you select your subject offers a "cancellation" option. I filled out the form requesting to cancel. After I hit 'submit', a customer care page appeared with the question, "Are you sure you want to cancel?" I responded by clicking a button labeled 'Click here to cancel your membership'.

Another screen then appeared bearing a message in a large font that read, "Suspend your subscription." Below it was a large 'Continue' button. And below that (as I later found out), in faded gray text in the smallest font on the page, was a 'cancel my subscription' link. But when I first visited the page, I didn't even notice that link. Instead I hit the 'Continue' button, which causes my account to be suspended for seven days and then reinstated without my being notified.

When I called to ask why I had been charged, the customer service representative told me that there is a difference between "suspend" and "cancel," and he pointed me to the section of the terms-of-service agreement about "resigning" my membership. In the "resigning" section of the TOS agreement I found an explanation on how to "expire" my membership. Notwithstanding the written explication, I felt confused about the difference between canceling, resigning, and expiring.

I complained to the representative about the confusing terminology and about what I thought was a misleading cancellation process. After spending 40 minutes with me on the phone, the rep said that he would refund me one of three billing cycles.

I also found a section of the TOS contract that read: "You also agree not to dispute any authorized charge by True.com or its authorized agents." And "if you fraudulent[ly] report that an authorized charge by True.com or its authorized agents is unauthorized, you shall be liable to True.com for liquidated damages of One Thousand Dollars ($1,000.00) per incident."
Some Hassles

EarthLink

I had been a customer of EarthLink's dial-up Internet access for less than 30 days when I attempted to cancel. Discovering the necessary procedure required some sleuthing on my part of EarthLink.com's customer service section. After clicking around the support section and finding nothing about canceling, I choose 'get live help'. After typing in my request, the Live Help representative pointed me to a drop-down menu with 'cancel' as an option at the bottom of the list. The page that appeared when I clicked the link directed me to call a toll-free number.

I called the number and spoke with a rep who asked me twice why I was switching services. I said there was nothing wrong and that I just wanted to get a refund and quit. She said I was not eligible for a refund. Earthlink's terms-of-service agreement mentions a "30-day money back guarantee." I called back and spoke with someone else who said that I could get a 100 percent refund because I wasn't happy with the service and had canceled within 30 days of signing up. The rep promised me a refund within the week, and I received it. Refunds requested after 30 days of service, I was told, are handled case-by-case.

Equifax

I tried to cancel my Equifax Credit Watch Gold membership after less than two weeks on board. I couldn't find anything in the site's member services section about how to cancel my account, so I used a generic "contact us" Web form.

I received an e-mail informing me that Equifax would honor my cancel request, but also that I would continue to be billed for three months, as there was a three-month minimum commitment.

Equifax spokesperson Jennifer Costello said, "We make it as easy for consumers as possible to cancela?|Our cancellation process is clearly stated in the terms of service." She directed me to a 3903-word document. About halfway through the document, I encountered a single sentence stating that subscribers must call customer service to cancel.

Flickr.com

I found no information on the Flickr site about canceling my Flickr Pro Account. The only information about leaving that Flickr provided was details on how to delete my account.

My goal, however, was not to delete my account, but to downgrade from a paid account (at $24.95 per year) to a free, basic one. I called the company and asked about its cancellation policy. Flickr said that it didn't offer a cancellation option; and at the end of my annual paid membership, my account would have to be renewed. If I chose at that time not to renew it, I would in affect be canceling my account.

GameSpy Arcade

I failed to find any information in the GameSpy Arcade software about canceling my GameSpy Arcade subscription. When I visited the GameSpy Web site for Arcade, the cancellation instructions were nearly impossible to find. Finally, I tried searching the site's "knowledge base," where I managed to locate cancellation instructions. As I cancelled online, the site nagged me to keep my account.

MLB.com

I signed up for a monthly $14.95 MLB TV subscription and canceled after two weeks. Finding the cancellation option wasn't easy--and the procedure called for telephoning the company, rather than canceling online. I canceled over the phone as instructed, but I never received the confirmation-of-cancellation e-mail that I requested.

Netflix

On the 14th day of a 14-day Netflix trial membership, I found a notice on the site informing me that I had to call if I wanted to cancel. Although I canceled within the terms of the free trial, Netflix charged me $15.74 for a month of service anyway. I called to contest the charge, and a customer service representative told me that it was a mistake, and gave me a refund.

RapidFax

On the day that I intended to cancel my RapidFax account, technical issues that are still unclear to me prevented me from doing so. I was unable to log onto my account successfully that day at all. Consequently, I decided to e-mail my cancellation request to RapidFax. The company honored my e-mail request under the circumstances, but it said that usually it requires customers to cancel by phone.
No Hassle

Ancestry.com

I signed up for a monthly $29.95 U.S. Deluxe Membership with Ancestry.com and cancelled after one month of membership. The company's Web site directed me to cancel online, but then required me to call a toll-free number to confirm the cancellation.

Audible.com

I was a Gold member of Audible.com for 14 days, and I canceled without ever having used the service. For this reason, I received a full refund. But the customer service representative I spoke to pointed out that Audible.com does not give refunds to customers who have used the service.

Consumer Reports Online

This site posted cancellation information prominently on the site and made unsubscribing a breeze. First I went to the 'Manage My Account' link at the front of my Consumer Reports Online welcome screen. Next I clicked a 'Find Answers' link. The first question and answer on this page addressed how to cancel an account. Following the directions to cancel required just three more clicks.

eDiets.com

Cancellation information was easy to find on this diet service's Web site. The only negatives were having to call to cancel and incurring a surprise early termination fee of $25.

GameFly.com

I had no trouble finding cancellation information on GameFly's site, and the company never charged my credit card during or after the 30-day free trial. The only mildly annoying aspects of canceling were having to confirm on a couple of Web pages that I wanted to cancel and having to take a multiple-choice exit interview.

GoToMyPC

GoToMyPC poured it on thick with pleas for me to stay when I called to cancel. I wasn't too pleased by this--but compared to the number and type of hassles I experienced at other sites, the level of pressure was no big deal.

Match.com

I was a Match.com customer for less than 30 days. Finding cancellation information on the site was easy. My only cavil relates to the lengthy exit interview that quizzed me about why I was canceling.

Mvelopes.com

I canceled my Mvelopes online budgeting service less than two weeks after signing up. The site's clearly posted information about canceling directed me to call customer support. When I called the number provided by Mvelopes.com to cancel, I was directed to call a second number--but then I unsubscribed without a hitch.

Reservation Rewards

Reservation Rewards makes it easy to cancel online or, if you prefer, by calling customer service. The site's Member Benefits section provides a link to frequently asked questions. Here, one of the first questions and answers is: "How do I cancel my Membership?" From the answer given, I was able to jump directly to a page that asked me to finalize my cancellation by clicking a 'confirm' link.

Salon.com

You never "cancel" your account with Salon; you just stop them from billing you. As a result, I continued to receive daily Salon newsletters even after I had stopped the billing. But after opting out of receiving daily e-mail from Salon, I never heard from the company again.

Stamps.com

Cancellation instructions on this online postage site directed me to call a toll free number; a representative at that number canceled my account quickly.

The New York Times TimesSelect

The Times let me unsubscribe with four clicks of my mouse, qualifying it as the easiest-to-cancel service in my tests.

The Wall Street Journal Online

I signed up for a $9.95 monthly subscription to Wall Street Journal Online. When I canceled after 14 days, I received a full refund under the terms of a trial offer. The Journal Online gives you two ways to cancel: bye-mail or by phone. I initially chose e-mail; but when I didn't receive a response, I tried calling. Customer service reps handled my request quickly and efficiently, and they didn't nag me to stay.

Vonage

I had to call to cancel this service; and when I did, I had to pay attention through lengthy voice prompts and an exit interview. But in the end I got a full refund, as Vonage had promised.

Vongo

I had no trouble finding a cancellation page at Vongo's Web site, which instructed me to call a phone number to cancel. Though it lasted for 4 minutes, my call to Vongo was uneventful. It consisted of navigating phone menus and connecting with a customer service rep, who then processed my cancellation request. Despite my having canceled, though, the movie-download service still sends me e-mail messages.
Thirteen Strikes

I used 13 criteria in evaluating subscription services. Each is expressed here as a negative experience (from most annoying to least) for the would-be unsubscriber. Obviously, the ideal score would be zero hassles.

   1. Found nothing on the Web site about how to cancel the service.
   2. Received one or more bills for service after canceling.
   3. Found cancellation instructions only after extensive site sleuthing.
   4. Had to call for a refund.
   5. Experienced long hold times while canceling via phone.
   6. Had to make multiple phone calls to get customer service for a cancellation question.
   7. Had to begin the cancellation process online, and then had to call to cancel anyway.
   8. Subjected to an exit interview and/or an agent's pitch for upgraded service when canceling via phone or the Web.
   9. Had to call to cancel.
  10. Encountered a fine-print surprise.
  11. Experienced moderate hold times while canceling via phone.
  12. Found cancellation instructions only after moderate site sleuthing.
  13. Received commercial e-mail even after canceling.

In my real-world tests of 32 services, only a couple--Consumer Reports Online and The New York Times TimesSelect--posted perfect marks. But those two deserve special praise for making unsubscribing a truly hassle-free experience and for setting a standard that other services would do well to emulate.
Senior Reporter Tom Spring works out of PC World's Boston office.