The FTC sues Amazon, saying it used “trickery” and sabotaged consumers’ attempts to cancel Prime
You can log out any time you like… but you can never leave? The FTC sued Amazon yesterday, saying it fooled millions of customers into signing up for Prime with “manipulative, coercive, or deceptive” user interfaces — and then intentionally made it hard for them to cancel their subscriptions. It’s the most aggressive FTC action against Amazon under the leadership of Chair Lina Khan, a staunch critic of Big Tech power.
Primed or punked? Khan alleged that “Amazon tricked and trapped people into recurring subscriptions without their consent.”
Homeric effort: The suit says that Amazon internally referred to the process for canceling Prime as “The Iliad,” the epic Greek poem about the Trojan War.
Sure you wanna cancel? After all, you’ve only been asked five times. Prime members pay $140/year for “free” two-day shipping, plus other perks like streaming. Nearly 75% of all US households are estimated to have a Prime account, but growth has reportedly slumped. By one estimate, Prime finished last year with 168M US subscribers, down from 170M in 2021. That would mark the first time Prime growth stalled in the US (Amazon doesn’t share country-specific membership #s). As sub growth and online shopping slow, Amazon reportedly plans to launch an ad tier for Prime to drum up fresh revenue.
Convenience can’t be used conveniently… Amazon has made it #frictionless to enroll in Prime and order online (think: one click), but it also uses a “four-page, six-click, fifteen-option cancellation process,” the FTC said. Having an inconvenient cancellation option is convenient for many companies. But retaining customers could get harder as the FTC looks to crack down on designs that make it tricky for consumers to cancel services.