All tools · Subscription Audit
What Is the FTC's Click-to-Cancel Rule and What Are My Rights
Use the free tool — Subscription Audit
What This Guide Covers
You are here because a charge on your statement looked unfamiliar, or because canceling something felt harder than it should. This page explains the FTC's Click-to-Cancel rule in plain words, and what you can actually do about a subscription you no longer want.
The FTC's Click-to-Cancel Rule
The Federal Trade Commission finalized a rule often called "Click to Cancel." The core idea: canceling a subscription must be as easy as signing up for it. Companies are not supposed to make you call, wait, or navigate extra steps just to stop paying. This is not legal advice — it is a summary of the FTC's own announcement.
Your Rights Under This Rule
In plain terms, the rule is meant to stop companies from stalling you when you try to cancel. If a merchant makes cancellation deliberately hard — long hold times, hidden cancel buttons, forced phone calls when you signed up online — you have two backstops:
- Ask your card issuer to block future charges from that merchant.
- Point to the FTC's Click-to-Cancel rule when you push back.
This is general information, not legal advice. Confirm your specific situation with the FTC or a consumer-protection professional.
Signs You're Paying for Something Forgotten
Surveys vary, but consumer research (C+R) found people report paying $200+/yr for subscriptions they forgot about. Common patterns worth checking:
- Duplicate charges from app stores for the same type of service.
- Small, trial-sized amounts that quietly kept recurring after a free trial ended.
- Two overlapping subscriptions doing the same job.
Source: Consumer research (C+R)
How to Cancel — Step by Step
Most app-based subscriptions cancel in about two screens on your phone, not through the company's website or a phone call:
- iPhone: Settings → Subscriptions.
- Android: Play Store → Payments.
Source: Apple / Google subscription settings
For anything not tied to an app store, check your account settings on the merchant's own site first — under the Click-to-Cancel rule, that path should not be harder than the sign-up path was.
What to Do Next
You do not have to sort this out from memory. The free tool reads the transaction lines you paste — even messy copy-paste works — and identifies each recurring charge in plain words, shows the yearly cost, and points to the standard cancel path for it. Nothing you paste is stored. Before pasting, remove any full card numbers — if one slips through, do not have it repeated back, and remove it.
Subscription Audit makes best-effort identifications of recurring charges; it can be wrong and it is not financial advice. Verify with your own statements before disputing anything.
Subscription Audit makes best-effort identifications of recurring charges; it can be wrong and it is not financial advice. Verify with your own statements. Nothing you paste is stored.