Mastercard will soon require subscription services to gain explicit approval at the end of a trial period before they start billing. Good news I say!
great
I think this is sensible and will save loads of time for all parties! 
No faffing about contacting companies requesting refunds when you forget to cancel the 7 day trial after hating the paid version instantly 
And less time wasted by support staff issuing refunds for customers who might not have any intention of continuing with a full-price subscription 
This is the right direction to be going in 
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Perhaps an unpopular opinion: the major merchants that would make an effort to be compliant are already fairly good at letting customers know they will be billed, and refunding unintentional subscriptions.
There will always be a minority that are non-compliant and those will be the ones that continue to cause issues 
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I guess it might help protect people from themselves.
If they have trouble (in normal circumstances)* cancelling a trial then they should question if they should be signing up to one in the first place.
*Merchants not playing by the rules are excluded from the above.
Are there any details on when and how this will implemented by Mastercard?
coming from a business background it would be useful to understand the following
When will it commence?
Does it commence only for new customers? (or are existing impacted)
What territories will this apply in?
Will customer have to âopt inâ at the end of the trial or is âno actionâ implied acceptance
How far in advance of the trial ending must contact be made with the customer? (if no action is needed might companies send the email only minutes before paid subscription starts)
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Great news from Mastercard regarding companies responabilities for subscription services. Hope this trickles down to the Monzo system.
Turns out the original blog post yesterday was misleading. The new requirement actually only applies to subscriptions for physical products and not digital subscriptions
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Yeah, in that thread when I defended a trial should not be converted into a paid subscription without user action, mud slinging and personal attacks ensued. Today people seem to be in agreement even if thatâs not to be MasterCardâs policy after all.
Glad to see sanity making a return 
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