alexpgp | Refund...

I was an eFax customer until a few years ago, when I noticed that they had automatically charged me for another year of service, and since I had decided to pull back on unnecessary expenses—and fax was one of them—I called the company and asked them to cancel my account and refund the charge.

I was informed that the "terms and conditions" I had agreed to previously made it perfectly clear that no refunds were to be had, not even pro-rated. I was incensed enough at the time to then tell the "customer service" rep to cancel my account effective immediately, lest I inadvertently miss the deadline and get charged again for a year of service I did not want. eFax complied, and of course I've had no dealings with them since.

* * *This morning, as part of my overall "sweep" of recurring charges for various services (e.g., Spotify, si; Hulu, no, etc.), I cancelled my account with an outfit called DeepDyve, which provides access to all sorts of scientific papers. I used this service extensively last year when I was doing work for Springer, but now it was time to cut the cord.

I did so, and was pleasantly surprised to receive a refund for the most recent month's charges ($40), along with an email explaining that the company's 30-day satisfaction guarantee applied in this case, even though I had been a customer for almost a year.

I'm not complaining. :)

Cheers...