Polish Competition and Consumer Protection Office looked at the terms and conditions for subscriptions to various Amazon services available in Poland and in a message published in the press yesterday office chairman says:
> "(...) companies Amazon EU and Amazon Digital UK had procedures in place that allowed unilateral price changes from the new subscription period onward. This type of condition is particularly detrimental to customers in situations where a payment card (debit or credit card) has been assigned to the account, and the operator grants itself the right to automatically charge the new amount for the next subscription period."
> "We have been advocating for years that contractual terms should fairly regulate the obligations of the contracting parties. In the case of subscription services, which are gaining popularity, consumers trust the service provider and entrust their payment card data to access and pay their obligations on a regular basis. >>This does not mean that from that point on, operators can, without their consent, charge more than what consumers had previously agreed to<<."
> "It is unacceptable to automatically charge according to the amended price list in the form of blocking the funds from the connected payment card or unilaterally introducing significant changes in the contractual terms,"
It's about Amazon here but the office investigates subscription services offered by other companies as well. Amazon EU and Amazon Digital UK cooperated with the office and now will notify their customers about the upcoming changes allowing them to refuse these and break contracts without any penalites. This work for ISP providers already - they can't change contracts at own whims; tho, they can pest you with phones with "totally new tied for your needs plans".
It's possible to push companies to change their behavior but I doubt this could apply to a specific service that 23andMe is. Although, this data breach might force data protection offices from various countries to look closer what they're doing here.
Part of the initial terms of service that you agree to is that the terms can be changed by the company at any time as long as they give you X days of notice.
In the UK an unfair contract term or notice is not binding. It is defined as "contrary to the requirement of good faith, it causes a significant imbalance in the parties’ rights and obligations under the contract to the detriment of the consumer."
The absolute limits of terms of service aren't clear, but there have been tons of cases about website/software terms of service. A quick search of Westlaw finds hundreds of reported cases in my state alone. There are certain things like binding arbitration that courts have found unconscionable to be in a clickwrap agreement[0], but generally terms of service have been found fully enforceable. There's definitely been a lot of court testing.[1]
I assume you mean US courts? In other countries there have been lots of cases about TOS, in one way or another. Strange that there isn't such a thing in the us
Not the parent commenter nor a lawyer, but I believe it's something like a company can't put things that someone would never agree to in the TOS and have it be binding. But obviously that "would never agree to" part is fuzzy at best and possibly what they're referring to when saying it's not been tested. I might be mistaken about that but I have heard something to that effect from a prosecutor I know.
even if, in general, a TOS could be changed without explicit consent, a judge may well decide that agreeing to arbitration requires a higher standard than just ignoring an email
IANAL, but I believe it works the same way to say physical property. If you don't "defend" it by objecting to it or putting up fences, and let people move in or say they are changing things, it's effectively qui tacet consentire videtur (silence gives consent).
Polish Competition and Consumer Protection Office looked at the terms and conditions for subscriptions to various Amazon services available in Poland and in a message published in the press yesterday office chairman says:
> "(...) companies Amazon EU and Amazon Digital UK had procedures in place that allowed unilateral price changes from the new subscription period onward. This type of condition is particularly detrimental to customers in situations where a payment card (debit or credit card) has been assigned to the account, and the operator grants itself the right to automatically charge the new amount for the next subscription period."
> "We have been advocating for years that contractual terms should fairly regulate the obligations of the contracting parties. In the case of subscription services, which are gaining popularity, consumers trust the service provider and entrust their payment card data to access and pay their obligations on a regular basis. >>This does not mean that from that point on, operators can, without their consent, charge more than what consumers had previously agreed to<<."
> "It is unacceptable to automatically charge according to the amended price list in the form of blocking the funds from the connected payment card or unilaterally introducing significant changes in the contractual terms,"
https://uokik.gov.pl/aktualnosci.php?news_id=20132 - the message in Polish
It's about Amazon here but the office investigates subscription services offered by other companies as well. Amazon EU and Amazon Digital UK cooperated with the office and now will notify their customers about the upcoming changes allowing them to refuse these and break contracts without any penalites. This work for ISP providers already - they can't change contracts at own whims; tho, they can pest you with phones with "totally new tied for your needs plans".
It's possible to push companies to change their behavior but I doubt this could apply to a specific service that 23andMe is. Although, this data breach might force data protection offices from various countries to look closer what they're doing here.