[sowbug]

Businesses do not have an entitlement to profit. Suspending customers for using a fairly expensive subscription plan -- especially forfeiting an annual prepayment for a day or two of coloring outside the lines -- sure does make Google appear entitled to profit without ever risking its own pricing model.

[sigmar]

> Suspending customers for using a fairly expensive subscription plan -- especially forfeiting an annual prepayment for a day or two of coloring outside the lines

they're being suspended for using a private api outside of the app for which the api was intended. If you make a clone of the hbo app, so that you can watch hbo shows without ads by logging in with your discounted ads-included membership, your account will also be suspended.

[sowbug]

The facts are straightforward, even without analogies. But since we're using them...

You are at the grocery store, checking out. The total comes to $250. You pay, but then remember you had a coupon. You present it to the cashier, who calls the manager over. The manager informed you that you've attempted to use an expired coupon, which is a violation of Paragraph 53 subsection d of their Terms of Service. They keep your groceries and your $250, and they ban you from the store.

Google is acting here like it was entitled to a profitable transaction, and is even entitled to punish anyone who tries to make it a losing transaction. But they're not the police. No crime was committed.

Regular businesses win some and lose some. A store buys widgets for $10 and hopes to sell them for $20, but sometimes they miscalculate and have to unload them for $5. Overall they hope their winners exceed their losers. That's business.

[lelanthran]

> They keep your groceries and your $250, and they ban you from the store.

If you signed an agreement with the grocery store that says they will ban you with no refunds for doing $FOO, and you do $FOO, then you can't expect any sympathy when you get banned, now can you?

In any case, your analogy is broken, because this is a monthly subscription, not a once-off purchase: when you pay for a month of subscription and then get banned, you don't expect to get that month's payment back.

[sowbug]

At least one person in the support thread paid for a year and appears to have had it all forfeited, not refunded. If you're OK with that, then I urge you to reconsider. There is a big difference between contract, civil, and criminal law. People who break contracts aren't criminals. Sprawling corporations do not need yet more power, beyond the might they already have, to act like private police forces.

[sigmar]

my point wasn't an analogy. the facts are that it is a private api being used with a subscription service. neither hbo nor google are required to do business with people that abuse the api.

[sowbug]

We are in violent agreement about that point. Where we seem to disagree is that I don't think they're entitled to also keep the customer's annual subscription payment when they've decided they want out of the contract.

[renewiltord]

I think they could make a good case for a prorated refund in either small claims or as a class action.

[meling]

What happens if the customer ask his credit card company to do a chargeback?

[lelanthran]

> What happens if the customer ask his credit card company to do a chargeback?

Then google will presumably perma-ban that user (and all accounts for that user) across all its services (gmail, etc).

[sehansen]

A purchase transaction is a different thing from a subscription. It would be a more meaningful comparison if your example happened at Costco where you need a membership to shop. You'd get either your groceries or your $250 back, but you'd be banned from the store and you wouldn't get your membership fee refunded.

[lelanthran]

> Suspending customers for [snipped]

They are being banned (not suspended) for breaking the ToS, not for what you imagine them to be suspended for.

It doesn't matter how expensive a provider plan you purchase, the provider is free to end their contract with you, permanently if they want to, if you breach their terms of service.

You also get the same freedom.

[layer8]

The issue is that Google apparently keeps charging the subscription despite the ban, so is not ending the contract in that sense.

[overfeed]

Equally, customers are not entitled to make set the terms, or pricing decisions for businesses. They can always move their custom elsewhere if they disagree with ToS or pricing.

[sowbug]

Of course. That's why I personally don't use an ad blocker. I just close the tab if it's too annoying.