I see it the opposite way — I do not want my service arbitrarily canceled just because I didn't see an email sitting in the bottom of my spam folder. Unless we're talking about some exceptionally expensive service here, any plausible price increase is unlikely to be more upsetting than total loss of a service that I apparently considered worthwhile in the first place.
IMO, the best thing is to grandfather people in. The next best thing is to just let people know what's going on, move them over and offer a refund if they are dissatisfied with the new plan.
We'll have to agree to disagree. I will always fall on the side of companies not charging me unless I explicitly agree to the terms. Partly because I'm just wired that way and partly because I'm sick of companies trying to get in on that "gym membership"/AOL billing where they have a huge percentage of customers that don't even use the service but have just forgot they are being charged.
I've had it up to here with companies pulling shit like making joining one click on the web and cancelling a multi-hour phone call. So yeah I may be a bit sensitive and reactionary about billing matters but I believe it is justified given how poorly most companies handle these issues these days.
So you believe a company can charge $99 for a yearly service and then say "by the way, we may increase prices in 30 days if we decide to do so." So what happens to the $99 I paid?
They breached the contract by charging the additional fees. A company can't change the terms and say "whoops, that plan didn't work better start charging for small orders."
> So you believe a company can charge $99 for a yearly service and then say "by the way, we may increase prices in 30 days if we decide to do so." So what happens to the $99 I paid?
Uh, it would still be paid? Price increases only apply to new billing cycles, not retroactively, so I don't understand what you're getting at here.
The point is that it's incredibly easy — and relatively standard — to incorporate the possibility of changes into a contract.
IMO, the best thing is to grandfather people in. The next best thing is to just let people know what's going on, move them over and offer a refund if they are dissatisfied with the new plan.