Adobe Gets Sued for Unfair and Deceptive Business Practices. Finally!

Have you ever experienced a complex and confusing cancellation process online?

Or maybe you found it next to impossible to get a refund soon after a trial period had ended? And perhaps the same company failed to email you a friendly reminder about this a few times before that trial ended?

Or hidden and excessive termination fees?

There are new US laws on the books designed to protect consumers against these unfair and deceptive business practices.

Photo by Rubaitul Azad on Unsplash

Enter poster child—Adobe, Inc.

The Federal Trade Commission and US Department of Justice are suing Adobe for:

● “Concealing essential subscription plan information using fine print and inconspicuous hyperlinks.”

Or my personal favorite:

● “Failing to provide a straightforward mechanism for consumers to cancel their recurring, online subscriptions.”

● “Subjecting subscribers to a complicated and time-consuming cancellation process filled with unnecessary steps, delays, unsolicited offers, and warnings.”

The government is actively pursuing:

1. Comprehensive redress for affected consumers, aiming to secure substantial compensation that will help restore their losses.
2. Significant civil fines, holding the defendants accountable for their deceptive practices.
3. Demanding a permanent injunction to safeguard against future misconduct and prevent any recurrence of these violations.

These legal orders will restrict Adobe from engaging in similar deceptive activities, and so protect future consumers from falling victim to the same or similar tactics.

Greedy, Greedy, Greedy

Adobe’s revenue from subscriptions has surged, almost doubling from $7.71 billion in 2019 to $14.22 billion in 2023. This constitutes a significant part of their total annual revenue of $19.41 billion.

The lawsuit alleges that Adobe has greatly benefited from undisclosed fees and the intentionally arduous and difficult cancellation processes.

How much? Billions much. Billions made deceiving their own customers.

The FTC claims that Adobe has repeatedly refused to address some of these illegal practices because of the enormous financial benefits.

Will Adobe pay the fines and simply keep doing what they are doing? Time will tell, but I suspect not. The fines will be very high. And more consumers will start boycotting Adobe, especially now that there are many awesome and much less expensive alternatives to Photoshop, etc.

Microsoft Skype

I experienced the same shenanigans trying to cancel Skype recently. I had to resort to calling my credit card company and blocking payments.

Here is one technique that seems to work well when asking for a refund. Email customer support a link to one of these FTC webpages:

● FTC to Ramp up Enforcement against Illegal Dark Patterns that Trick or Trap Consumers into Subscriptions | Federal Trade Commission

● Getting In and Out of Free Trials, Auto-Renewals, and Negative Option Subscriptions | FTC Consumer Advice

● Penalty Offenses Concerning Bait & Switch | Federal Trade Commission

There are also apps designed to protect and prevent consumers from becoming victim of these games of deception. Please follow and subscribe as we’ll be posting in-depth reviews of these apps in future articles.

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Reference

The US Sues Adobe ⏐ Perplexity

(BTW, Perplexity is now my all-time favorite search engine. Nothing else comes remotely close. Bye-bye Google!)

US sues Adobe for hiding termination fees and making it difficult to cancel subscriptions | TechCrunch

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