The first time you discover you’re being charged for a free trial service is often when your review your credit card statement. Many companies practice this nasty tactic, and it often takes calling the company directly to find out that free may not really be free.

Take a look at how three companies treat “free” trial consumers differently.

Authentium uses the free trial as an automatic subscription

Authentium uses a bright green button to offer to let you try SafeCentral and protect you from identity theft for FREE.

Underneath is the very light gray “30 day free trial” notice, but I searched in vain through Authentium’s Terms of Use for any notice that you will be automatically billed once your trial is over. You must call the company and talk with a sales rep to discover that you are billed $39.99/year – a price that isn’t listed anywhere on the site

There’s nothing safe about trying a product designed to protect you from financial fraud if the company that makes it is stealth billing you. Authentium gets a big thumbs down for deception.

GoToMyPC uses the free trial as an automatic subscription

GoToMyPC offers consumers ‘Your Risk-Free Trial’ to access your PC remotely FREE for 30 days.

GoToMyPC provides a link to its Terms of Service on the trial pages. The terms include the statement “Your subscription will continue and renew automatically unless terminated by Citrix Online or until You notify Citrix Online of Your decision to change Your subscription renewal.”

Like Authentium, the company fails to inform you that signing up for the free trial subscribes you to the service and authorizes the company to automatically charge you $19.95 a month ($239.40 a year) as soon as your trial is over. You have to call and ask a sales rep to discover these costs.

There is nothing “risk-free” about trying a service that fails to clearly notify you that you will be walloped with big monthly fees at the end of the trial period.

Intego does it right

The company, offering security and privacy software, lives up to its tagline of “We protect your world” by not automatically assuming the right to convert your trial into a subscription.

Even before you begin to register, you learn that you will need to pay if you want to use the software after the trial period expires; prices are clearly displayed.

For truth in advertising and complete cost transparency Intego earns a gold star.

Defend yourself

You’ll find free trial offers for services and products for all types of devices including cell phones, game consoles, iPods and, of course, your computer.

There is no standard practice or law that specifies how Web sites must disclose their policies to automatically charge users. It’s up to you to distinguish between free trials and free-for-a-limited-time-and-then-we’re-going-to-charge-you trials.

1. Read the fine print. The terms and conditions may not make for riveting reading, but you need to know how they bind you. If the company doesn’t specifically spell out what happens after the free trial period ends, call and ask BEFORE downloading.

If your child incurs stealth fees after a trial has ended, challenge the charges. By law, a minor cannot enter into a binding contract.

1. Be particularly cautious if a company asks for credit card or billing information for a “free” trial. subscription registration process. Truly free trials shouldn’t need financial information. Asking for it means the company intends to charge or bill you either now or in the future.

2. When in doubt, call the company and ask. On their dime. Each call to customer support incurs a hefty cost for the company. So before you assume a financial charge yourself, call at the company’s expense to find out the real deal.

Linda
28 July 2008