[hvidgaard]

> Sorry, but that usually isn't how it works.

Depends on the laws I suppose. I Denmark you cannot bind a consumer to pay for a service for any period except for a few special cases (for instance, phone service up to 6 months).

I'm from Denmark, and we have some fairly strong consumer protection laws exactly to prevent things like this. If I cancel any kind of prepaid service, not only do they have to stop charging me money after the periode is finished, they also have to give me back the money equivalent to the remaining period from the end of month + 1 month and forward.

[Silhouette]

Denmark seems to have relatively strong laws in this respect compared to most places, and from what little I've seen of them, they generally seem quite reasonable.

There is still a question of what constitutes adequate notice of cancellation, though. If you're subscribing to a service based in a country other than your own, there may be other laws that are relevant as well.

Personally, I'm a fan of the symmetry argument: you should be able to cancel a service through equivalent methods to what you could use to sign up for it, and without requiring an unreasonable amount of effort.

[pdkl95]

> what constitutes adequate notice of cancellation

While that's one aspect of the situation - and yes, a matching notification requirement is sensible - this discussion of "cancellation" is missing the important question: were goods delivered or services used?

Using a newspaper publisher as an example, if we're talking about a simple contract (for either a predefined period or specific termination criteria) where some amount of money is regularly exchanged for the regular delivery on dead trees or electronic means (email) of their publication, then there is a debt that needs to be repaid. The publisher fulfilled their obligations created by the contract.

However, this is a very different situation if no debt has been created. If the contract was a regular payment to gain access to their back archives, if you haven't used their services, then there isn't a debt[1]. Also, I suspect most businesses using contracts of this type will include some sort of clause that terminates all of their obligations if the payments stop.

The point being that there is going to depend heavily on the specifics of the situation, so it's dangerous to generalize.

[1] Some jurisdictions might treat use of the service separately than a "retainer" for access. This doesn't really change anything, though it might make the situation much more complicated.

[Silhouette]

The point being that there is going to depend heavily on the specifics of the situation, so it's dangerous to generalize.

That is certainly true. I do think a few people here seem to be taking a rather narrow interpretation of when services have been provided, though.

Say you sign up for access to an on-line newspaper, but then as it happens you're busy and don't actually read it. The newspaper still had reporters writing stories, and servers and Internet bandwidth to pay for, and admin staff dealing with the tax records triggered by your subscription, and so on. I don't see why someone should necessarily expect to get back their money under those circumstances.

Perhaps a more obvious example would be an insurance policy. For obvious reasons, you can't get a refund at the end of the period of insurance just because in practice you didn't need to make a claim.

Whenever I've been putting terms and conditions together for a new service, the lawyers always seem very careful about exactly what constitutes offer and acceptance to form the contract, when provision of services starts, how the agreement can be ended and any terms that survive termination, and other details like that.

[hvidgaard]

To consumer protection laws in Denmark state that, you cannot cancel for a periode in the past. If you've prepaid they can keep payment for "30 days end of month", but anything beyond that must be returned. For monthly payment, you must be able to cancel up until the next payment is due. It doesn't matter if the service is used or not.

[Silhouette]

Out of curiosity, are there any limitations on those Danish rules? For example, suppose someone is running subscription access to a magazine at $5/month, but wants to offer a discount if customers sign up for a whole year to say $45. This sort of promotion isn't unusual, and it's potentially beneficial to both the magazine and the reader, but from your description it wouldn't be viable under Danish law.