I am not pleased with Avast, not in the slightest. While I’m not the smartest guy in the room, I’m not an idiot, either. I awoke to the rude discovery this morning that Avast decided that I needed a new subscription, and since they had my CC number, they would just help themselves.
A closer inspection of the fine print reveals that they’re going to continue to help themselves. Ok, fine, I can cancel, right?
No. I can’t.
There’s no -working- process for cancelling a subscription. When you attempt to log into the avast store by way of the cancel option in the renewal email they send (Which google flags as spam, thanks google), it refuses to log you in, citing “Enter a valid email address”.
I’m still working on this, but as it stands, you can be assured I’m going share my experience with everyone I know. Hell, I’ll even share it with people I don’t know. Maybe I’ll even get an “Avast Sucks” t-shirt, or a couple of bumper stickers.
I most certainly did not choose to have automatic renewal enabled. It would appear to be the default ‘non-option’ As per the fine print on the sales slip “By completing your purchase, you have authorized Digital River to automatically renew your purchased license for successive renewal terms equal in length to your initial license term but no longer than 1 year, at the then-current renewal license price (plus applicable taxes) using your payment information provided for your initial purchase, until you cancel.”
While I could live with #1 under normal circumstances, did I mention that the process for turning auto renew off is broken? no matter what you do, it kicks back the error ‘enter a valid email address’ when you try to log in to cancel. While I’m sure it’s an accident, it sure is a -convenient- one. No, using a different browser didn’t help. Same error under IE, firefox/mozilla, and chrome.
I’m already really angry. Do you really think your smug reply is somehow going to make me -less- angry?
your link is broken. “Avast WEBforum An Error Has Occurred! The topic or board you are looking for appears to be either missing or off limits to you. Back” is what I get when I click on it.
So, yeah. thanks for helping me solidify my negative opinion of all things avast.
1]
It sure was your own choice.
You could have disabled it with your initial order.
Don’t blame others for not looking carefully at what is displayed at your screen.
Only thing you had to do was removing a checkmark.
2]
Browsers have nothing to do with the email address you enter.
Are you sure you haven’t made a type mismatch when trying to login and change the setting?
You don’t even need to provide a email address.
Order number and password will do.
3]
It is not a “smug” reply at all.
I’m just trying to explain things to you.
4]
The link works, but I can’t help it and can’t see if you have access to a certain section on this webboard or not.
That is all up to avast, not me.
The first link tries to sell me Digital River’s payment processing system as a service. no real help there. The second link takes me back to the internal avast link that’s broken. So, no joy there.
Thank you very much for trying to help, it’s appretiated. It’s clear I’m going to have to wait til avast’s customer service people are awake to fix this.
As far as courtesy goes, I have a pretty standard policy of giving what I get. I am, however, pretty mad. This seems like pretty sleazy behavior on avast’s part. no option but auto-renew, -and- the process to shut off auto-renew is broken, leaving the only option being to cancel the credit card used.
The first link tries to sell me Digital River's payment processing system as a service. no real help there.
No they don't. Besides that there is clearly a link to Customer Service Page where you can login with your order number and password or with your email address and 5 digits of your credit card.
My advise (no offense and nothing personal), calm down first before doing/trying something.
People who are mad often make wrong decisions/missing important things/saying things they later regret.
Go away from the system, sleep a night or whatever and have a look later with a fresh mind.
If for whatever reason you don’t succeed to login on the Digital River website, you can always contact them (through email).
I don’t really care about who’s fault it is that auto renew is enabled. I’m moderately annoyed, because it’s an option I didn’t want, which has resulted in me paying for 3 years worth of subscriptions to a program I don’t use. Yeah, when I went digging, I found out I’ve been paying for avast for 3 years. But that’s not important.
What I really care about, is that the process for shutting it off is BROKEN. Your reply on #2 tells me we’re not communicating clearly.
When you go through the process, you eventually come to this page. No matter what web site you start at, you -always- come to this point, right here.
Which prompts for an email address and a password. When you enter it, it kicks back an error about needing a valid email address. Thinking it might be an error in the way chrome handles html, I tried IE. Same error. Firefox, also same.
Now, before you say “ah, you’re using the wrong email address”, this is the same email and password pair that I used to log into avast’s customer service system, and it works, there.
I'm moderately annoyed, because it's an option I didn't want
As I said before, it was your own choice. If you didn't wanted it you should have not chosen it.
When you go through the process, you eventually come to this page.
No you don't. I just tried and was able to login and saw my orders and the options to change things. It is working fine.
Now, before you say "ah, you're using the wrong email address", this is the same email and password pair that I used to log into avast's customer service system, and it works, there.
That doesn't mean it is the same email address you have used when ordering. Besides that, the page is asking for order number + pw or email +5 digits of your credit card, NOT email + pasword
If you have followed all the steps given above and are still unable to cancel your subscription, then if I were you I would simply dispute the charge with my credit card bank. Once a refund is issued by the bank then simply uninstall whatever version of avast you have on your computer and then install the free version (that is of course assuming that you want to stay with avast).
Gandalf - Thank you kindly. I was looking at that as my ‘last option’ as it’s a huge pain. I was hoping it was something simple, and that someone in the forum would be able to say ‘oh yes, just click here’.
However, it’s clearly not fixable this level.
Eddy - you might want to take some time and meditate on why Gandalf1369 and iroc9555 recieved polite replies, and you… did not.
This will be my last posting here, as I will be taking Gandalf’s advice, and taking it up with the bank.
Just to add, I recently renewed my Premier Subscription via Avast GUI and the transaction was handled by Nexway. The ‘Auto Renewal’ was enforce by default and the box was not visible!!!
I had to ‘click’ on a small link in the top left corner of the Invoice before confirming, that said “more information” which then opened a separate page that had the box visible then to uncheck.
Yes, it’s totally reasonable and clear to me how many users would never catch this if they weren’t looking for it.
Thanks lukas for the confirmation, the acknowledgement is appreciated, now the real work begins, getting this resolved so the process works fairly and that ‘at the very least’ the auto renewal option Box NEEDS to be Clearly and unmistakably visible.
