| A kind of related story: 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. |