Basically the title.
Never wanted or even was advertised that shit during the buying process, and if it wasn’t for me checking my payment history, I wouldn’t even have known about it.
I obviously « cancelled » it on the spot, and am now trying to get support from them but their support email address bounced back so I think I’m just going to charge back.
Why do they have to do shady shit like that…
Edit : support reimbursed without any discussion
Realistically? I’ve never used them specifically, but in general, I’d expect that they used “dark” UI design patterns to make you unlikely to notice the “Also subscribe me to other stuff” checkbox somewhere in the process, knowing that most people don’t pay attention and will end up paying for it for a month or more.
You might have even clicked it yourself, sites often have a list of “You agree to…” checkboxes where one or more are not mandatory but they’re presented it look like they are at first glance, each will have a brief description and a link and they’ll count on you not reading the details at the link.
For an example of this, most of the “I agree to receiving the newsletter and other marketing gibberish” on signups are optional even though they’re presented in a list of things that are required. They don’t need your consent to send notifications required to use the service, or transactional messages (signup confirmations, receipts, etc).
Another type is multiple unnecessary “steps” in the checkout such as where steps 1, 2 and 4 the green “Looks good to me!” buttons take you to the next step, but in step 3 the correct answer was the little grey link that said “I don’t want this Amazing Other Product, continue without it…” while on that step the green button was the “Buy all of our other stuff? Looks good to me!”
Are they doing this? I don’t know. But it’s safer for them to do it this way than to just subscribe you to stuff outright, because people will call their credit card company for a chargeback. This way they can defend and win the chargeback (and probably refund you along the way, but they won’t get dinged by their bank as having lost a chargeback).
Also each block charges an extra buck to get SSL.
Oo
I also bought Block and as always I had no problems
Why not calm down and give them a chance, being melodramatic on here isn’t going to help. How the hell would we know what you clicked on.
30 seconds on Google and 2 more ways to contact them.
https://www.thundernews.com/contact/
Contact & Online Support
Please use the chat button on the bottom right section of the site to speak to us now
Pretty sure that’s it too. I’ll check it again tomorrow.
It might make it legal (in some countries at least), but it’s far from making it ok in my book. Definitely my last purchase with them, it’s not like there’s no alternative out there.
You know when somebody reach in to your pocket and takes your money you can be as calm as you want, but keep your opinion to yourself. Not everybody reacts the same and OP has every right to be upset. Maybe you dont work for your money but some of us do, so obviously when someone take your money for something you did not want, you are upset.
Just my 2 cents!
It’s not the first time I’m buying a block, I know what I did and I certainly didn’t subscribed to a VPN service unless I fell to some dark pattern built to trick people.
I’m not being melodramatic, thanks.
I know they have a number advertised on their site but not living in the US makes it costly, and I despise live chats but I guess I’ll go through it to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Pretty much.
Pre-checked boxes are illegal in a lot of places (or more accurately they’re not considered consent from a legal standpoint), but tricking you into the wrong option is fine.
Hard to regulate too, as long as a reasonable lawyer who read every single word on the page would understand and agree that it makes sense. Should it make it to court, their lawyer has to convince the judge-who-is-also-a-lawyer that a reasonable person would figure it out.
How about being an adult and accept the fact that negative things will happen to you in life. When these things happen, it does no good to be a drama queen on Reddit. Put your big boy panties on and deal with the situation.
The OP had multiple ways to contact the company to see what the problem was but choose to whine on Reddit instead of doing so. When he did contact them, he received his money back. Amazing how that works.
And don’t act like this was someone draining a bank account. It was a few $$ for a VPN and the very worst that could happen was he would do a chargeback and still receive his money back. Get some perspective in your life.
It’s not the first time I’m buying a block, I know what I did and I certainly didn’t subscribed to a VPN service unless I fell to some dark pattern built to trick people.
I’m not being melodramatic, thanks.
I know they have a number advertised on their site but not living in the US makes it costly, and I despise live chats but I guess I’ll go through it to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Pinging /u/Thunder_Cube ( https://www.reddit.com/user/Thunder_Cube )…
The other guy put it perfectly. OP even clearly explained that he was only sharing his experience and didn’t come here to bitch, but here you are doubling down. Maybe you don’t work for your money so you don’t understand it’s value. Really making yourself look like an idiot here bud. You should just stop responding. You’ve dug your hole deep enough.
I did both. I’m not complaining, I just share my experience with them, that’s all.
As my edit says, support reimbursed without any discussion, but thank you.
I agree with u/LoveLaughLlama, I didn’t think OP was clear at all that they were just “sharing his experience” It read to me like someone that didn’t wait a cooling off period, as imo everyone should do (Leason with living with a better half lol).
There is a big difference in the OP post and title… It read to me as a drama post, honestly 1 of the hallmarks of a Ken/Karren.
IMO an experience more-sane response would have been:
“PSA: X provider may add on VPN charges” then their story. I would also fully expect someone to get upset and say they will not purchase from the vendor again just out of principal especially if more people came out with similar experiences.
Yes the OP has the right to post and be upset, just as we have every right to respond in kind.
LOL
I don’t even know where to start with this Polyanna reply.
If OP was truly interested in “sharing his experience” he would have waited for actually contacting the provider and reaching a resolution. He even said “shady shit” in his post when there is zero evidence to support this. OP could have screwed up or the provider could have screwed up. Mistakes happen in the real world.
The fact remains as soon as OP actually contacted the provider, he was made whole.
You can ride his coat tails and Drama Llama all you want. It doesn’t change the facts.
Be sure to downvote this post so you can show the world your Righteous Fury and The Ultimate Power you wield on Reddit. LOL
Thanks for the laugh.