The American consumer protection authority, the FTC, filed a complaint against Amazon on Wednesday, accusing the online sales giant of having pushed “millions of customers” to renew their subscription to its Prime service almost without their knowledge.
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The FTC also accuses the group of having, for years, “complicated the termination process” of the subscription, details the complaint filed with a court in Seattle, where the company founded by Jeff Bezos is based.
“Amazon has tricked consumers into signing up for auto-renewing subscriptions, which not only frustrates them but also costs them money,” FTC Chair Lina Khan said in a statement. .
“These manipulation tactics harm both consumers and law-abiding businesses,” she added.
Regarding subscriptions, the FTC particularly accuses Amazon of having designed “manipulative, coercive or deceptive (…) computer or smartphone interfaces to encourage consumers to subscribe to the automatic renewal option”.
For example, it was more difficult to find the box to buy an object without subscribing, notes the FTC.
These practices “were well known” within the company and some employees pushed for them to be changed, but department officials held back on any such moves, the FTC says.
On the cancellation process, the company’s goal was, until recently, to “prevent” customers from unsubscribing by making the process “labyrinthine”, the agency argues in the largely redacted complaint. Within the company, the process was dubbed The Iliad, like the account of Achilles’ long and difficult journey in Homer’s poem.
The agency asks that these practices around the Prime subscription which, for 139 dollars per year, offers free delivery costs and access to Amazon’s video and music platforms, be definitively prohibited as well as unspecified financial compensation.
Amazon’s stock fell 1.4% around 10:20 a.m. on Wall Street after the complaint was announced.
The company did not immediately respond to a request from AFP.
Amazon agreed in May to pay more than $30 million to the FTC to end other lawsuits, this time against Ring doorbells and voice assistant Alexa, two product lines the agency has charged. failure to respect the confidentiality of user data.