Ignoring the Fine Print Can Cost You a Mint

I got something of a wake-up call last night. I like to pride myself on having some savvy about life overall, the Internet, and certainly about making purchases using a credit card on the Internet. I'm on here on the Net a lot doing research, updating the sites and zines I contribute to, and interacting with some of the workshops and creative support groups I enjoy. I write, therefore I also pride myself in reading the fine print on just about everything - especially everything I'm thinking of charging to a credit card.

Last night though, I saw something in a very respectable venue that offered an informational download for about $2. It was information about something I was very interested in, about which I'd actually begun to do some research on, and, quite frankly, something that looked like it might give me a 'leg up' regarding another venture I was considering. I looked it over thoroughly, I thought. I read it a couple of times and finally, satisfied, I processed the transaction and hit send.

Talk about a big mistake! That was a monster error!

Shortly after hitting the send button I started to get email confirmations that told me about all the things I had just committed to purchase. A membership to this for $39.95 that would be charged to my credit card, another membership for this that would be $39.95 monthly unless I canceled within a couple of days, something else that would be $7.95 monthly, and still something else that would be billed to my card monthly for another $9.95. What! I didn't order any of that - or did I? Did I really read the fine print like I thought I did, or did I just peruse it, assuming all was on the up and up?

I immediately contacted my bank to cry foul. I contacted them in writing telling them the whole story. I looked over all the paperwork associated with the transaction and found information finally that said if I canceled within a certain very brief time frame I would not be charged, but this information was deeply buried in the midst of tons of other verbiage and the dollar amounts of the charges you would be billed if you did not cancel within the time frame given was not shown with dollar signs and numbers, which would have immediately caught your attention, but was written out, i.e., "you will be charged thirty-nine dollars and twenty-five cents each month thereafter."

You had to call to cancel and calls could only be made during the day, during the normal work week! I did a little Google search of the "thing" I'd just purchased and found Google littered with red flags and complaints about people who had encountered the same experience. Some complained that although they had called and canceled the charges were still rolling in. Others complained that they had been advised they had waited too long and the charges were permanent. I was not amused by what I was reading.

I was surprised, though, when I made my own call to cancel that the wait was not extraordinarily long before I reached a customer service person. I told them I was calling to cancel and that I had not ordered that barrage of stuff that I'd been sent confirmations on and that I had already faxed my bank copies of everything they had sent me via email letting my bank know these were not transactions I had agreed to. That information seemed to have been the key. I was immediately given cancellation numbers on each of the items I called to cancel and was emailed separate confirming emails for each of them as well with the cancellation information spelled out.

The message here, and the lesson relearned is that you must absolutely, unequivocally read the fine print of the terms and conditions of any and everything you are committing to on the Internet. Everything. I may have averted undesired charges of close to $100 monthly on my credit card by taking these actions, but this could have just as easily been a $1000 monthly charge or even more I was trying to combat.

Read the fine print!