Bill Me Later
Accidental $8 charge more than doubled, cancel by phone

I initially signed up for this to get $10 off an eBay purchase, bracing myself for any scamminess and making sure to pay off the balance so there would be no balance. I went to try to cancel my account, but even though I could open the account easily online, they do not let you cancel your account without calling in. So I just let it be, thinking I would be safe because the account was all paid off.

A year or two later I was playing a video game and decided to spend $8 on the game through PayPal. I glanced over the details of the purchase but missed where PayPal had changed the default payment method to Bill Me Later. I only noticed that it was charged to Bill Me Later a month or two later, after having purchased something else from eBay and noticing that Bill Me Later had been set as the default option. By this time the fees were more than double the initial $8 I had accidentally charged, and not a peep from Bill Me Later about it.

So I had enough. I decided to pay the money and make sure to cancel the account. Unfortunately, I did not know the password to get into the account, and the password recovery options on the site were intentionally difficult. It would not show me my password even when presented with the correct information. I forget how I eventually ended up paying my bill, but I think I got to my Bill Me Later account through my PayPal account.

Then I called in to cancel the account. When I called, the only prompt was for my account number. Another trick! If you do not have the information to log in to the site, there is no other place where the account number is listed. I mashed the 0 and # keys and finally got to speak to customer service and cancel the account.

This was about a month ago. Today I got some spam mail from "Adobe System Incorporated newsletter@adobe-systems.com via transact. Billmelater. Bounce. Ed10.net". It says, "Copyright 2012 Adobe Systems Incorporated. All rights reserved," but there is no unsubscribe option, which to my knowledge is mandatory under the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003. I do not know what Bill Me Later has to do with this - whether they are selling email addresses, or some hacker got hold of a list of emails from them and is spamming malware links, or what. I just know I want nothing to do with this company, and I wish no one else had to put up with their sleazy, scummy, scammy behavior either. I was careful when I signed up for this "service" and still got burned.

Company: Bill Me Later
Country: USA
Site: billmelater.com

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