Tech firms like to make cancelling subscriptions infuriatingly hard – but regulators are starting to crack down

By Richard Whittle, University Fellow in AI and Human Decision Making, University of Salford
Stuart Mills, Assistant Professor of Economics, University of Leeds

Imagine your favourite author has a new book coming out, and your local bookshop is offering to deliver it to you for free on publication day. All you have to do in return is sign up to their new “reading club”.

This involves a monthly fee, for which you receive a new book, chosen by them, every week. You can cancel at any time by visiting the store.

It seems like a great deal – until you keep forgetting to cancel. Books arrive that you don’t read, money keeps being paid out of your account. And when you finally find time to go to the shop, they say they need the cancellation…

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