Magazine subscription leads to unauthorized recurring payment
"In 2010, the Restore Online Shoppers' Confidence Act was passed, which prohibited certain activities, most of which had to do with online sites sharing your CC info with third parties.  However, the final part of the act deals with ""negative option"" marketing, which is basically what you're describing - ""We will charge you unless you say no"". It requires three components to allow a negative option: If you did not explicitly enroll in automatic payment, and made the initial purchase online (or made your most recent purchase online, I suspect) then it sounds like this was a violation of this act.  On the other hand, the act isn't terribly careful about defining terms, and is really quite vague in a lot of places, so it's possible they would argue they are not using a 'negative option' scheme but instead simply charging your bill similar to how your phone company might use autopay. If it was not online, then this probably doesn't apply.  Instead, the FTC's rule on Negative Option with regard to sale of goods applies.  Title 16 Part 425 covers this; this law is much less limiting as to what the marketer can do." "You have a subscription that costs $25 They have the capabilities to get that $25 from the card on file if you had stopped paying for it, you re-upping the cost of the subscription was more of a courtesy. They would have considered pulling the $25 themselves or it may have gone to collections (or they could courteously ask if you wanted to resubscribe, what a concept) The credit card processing agreements (with the credit card companies) and the FTC would handle such business practices, but ""illegal"" wouldn't be the word I would use. The FTC or Congress may have mandated that an easy ""opt-out"" number be associated with that kind of business practice, and left it at that."
Square does not care if you run a $10 transaction to test the system. They are concerned with its use to move meaningful amounts of money.    The only people who do this will be the Dunning-Kruger gang, who only think they are clever.  Because of course Square will hunt them down, sue, garnish and/or prosecute them!  But the expense of doing so is all on Square, making it a total lose.  The cheapest resolution is to not let it happen in the first place.   The ~3% cash advance fees, lack of rewards points, and the higher interest rate are not just for profiteering.  They reflect, and pay for, the higher risk of loaning money via cash advance: to put it indelicately, the risk of default.   Cash advance credit limits are often much lower than purchase limits.   If a merchant is selling himself phantom merchandise to get easy cash advances, it means he is not using regular ways of borrowing money.  Perhaps because he can't, because he has exhausted his other opportunities to borrow, risk managers have cut him off.  Square has no reason to care either way; but the issuing bank does, and through Visa etc., they will disallow this behavior.   **  PayPal Here's rate used here instead of Square's, to simplify math. "The only way to prevent it is to not use PayPal. The terms of usage are draconian, and by using the service you agree to them. I'm sure that when the case gets to a court of law, they will find where it is authorized. Paypal is not a bank, and the money there is basically ""entrusted"" with the company and is not insured by anyone. They don't need or have to be subject to the regulations on the banking industry, and they're no different than your neighbour carrying money for you to the grocery store when you're sick. Other options are wire transfer, services like Western Union or Moneygram, checks (better certified/cashier's checks), money orders or even cash. You can also charge via credit card, but you can get similar problems there (although it is still safer than PayPal because with credit card - the card owner must initiate the charge back, it doesn't appear on its own because they feel like it)." This does sound a bit implausible, even if it is true it is pretty grossly irresponsible and you probably shouldn't just let it slide... However there is no real benefit in wading in with accusations, I suspect that the most likely scenario is that your tenet simply didn't have the money and was looking for a way to delay payment. This may well not be particularly malicious towards you, they may just be unable to pay and need a bit of room to maneuver.  In this case the wise thing is to challenge them but without forcing them to admit that they might have lied, perhaps by suggesting that they might have been mistaken about dropping off the money but it's no big deal and negotiate a resolution. In these situations where it is one persons word against another giving them the opportunity to save face often pays off.  Equally you want to make it absolutely clear that putting a wad of cash in your mailbox is not an acceptable way to pay. Many banks will let you generate a temporary credit card number to use in this situation.  You can set the credit limit and the expiration date yourself so that the second transaction won't be accepted. I don't know of any that will let you set the credit limit to $0, but you can set it to a value under the monthly subscription fee. An answer to this question suggests that banks sometimes let the charge go through even if it exceeds the limit or the expiration date, so the plan might not work. "You should probably call the travel agency and complain. Not that they will care, but if by any chance they do - they can ask PayPal to remove the block. This is what is called ""authorization pending"". Usually, a credit card transaction has two stages: The merchant requests its payment processor to authorize the transaction. The processor will contact the card issuer with the transaction details and will get the authorization code which will be passed to the merchant. At that stage the transaction enters the ""pending"" stage on your account. The merchant submits the transaction and gets the money from its payment processor, who forwards the transaction to the card issuer and gets the money from there. The card issuer charges the card owner. The transaction should have the same authorization code received in step #1, and by matching it to the pending transaction, the card issuer removes the pending transaction, and posts the actual transaction. However, if the transaction in step #2 doesn't include the code from step #1, the match doesn't occur and you see the situation you have now: both the actual transaction and the pending are active. In this case the merchant should contact its merchant processor and request the revocation of the authorization code. The processor will then forward the request to the card issuer, who will then remove the pending transaction. As you can see - multiple parties have to actually care for that to happen, and many times they don't, because they don't have to. As to the period - it's up to the card issuer (PayPal in your case), but 1 month is a very long time. Usually it's about a week or two, unless it's a hotel/car rental. In any case - once it expires, it will go away on its own and if you don't mind for the amounts to be blocked until then - just let it expire. The fact that you used a debit card for this transaction is irrelevant. Unless it was a pin transaction, debit card transactions are processed as credit card transactions by processors. For pin transactions, there process is different and you shouldn't see doubles. If it was a pin transaction - contact PayPal and check with them what's going on. Generally, PayPal is not to be used as a ""bank account"", it is merely a payment processor, and it is advised to remove the money from there as soon as possible." Sure - I honestly don't mind membership sites, and there are a bunch of sites that I do maintain active memberships to like the New Yorker, it's all about quality. I just have to keep an eye on my subscription credit card so I can make sure I'm not getting billed for a service that I've long since forgotten about. You can report the violation to the payment network (i.e., Mastercard or Visa).  For instance here is a report form for Visa and here is one for MasterCard.  I just found those by googling; there are no doubt other ways of contacting the companies. Needless to say, you shouldn't expect that this will result in an immediate hammer of justice being brought down on the merchant.  Given the presence of large-scale fraud schemes, it's unlikely Visa is going to come after every little corner store owner who charges a naughty 50-cent surcharge.  It is also unlikely that threatening to do this will scare the merchant enough to get them to drop the fee on your individual transaction.  (Many times the cashier will be someone who has no idea how the process actually works, and won't even understand the threat.)  However, this is the real solution in that it allows the payment networks to track these violations, and (at least in theory) they could come after the merchant if they notice a lot of violations. "I can't give you proper legal advice, but if I called their customer service and used half an hour of my time to wait and explain the situation in detail, and their official response was ""just use the points,"" I would do just that. Of course you would have stronger legal standing if you had recorded their answer, or had it in writing from them. But I don't think spending these points will come crashing down on you. And morally I see absolutely no problem with spending these points; it is not as if you are stealing from someone else. These points can usually be given away in any kind of crazy manner. Sometimes there are lotteries or events where they give away 100,000 points for new customers who open up an account on a specific weekend. Sometimes they give points to customers who want to terminate their contracts as an attempt to coax them into staying. They have given you a lot of points and don't really care. As a result you are probably staying their customer forever – and will most likely tell this story to many friends. This is free advertising for them. Heck, maybe they would even make a news story out of this some day, it could be good publicity. Everyone is essentially getting these points ""for free"" but in fact the company has a business case by improving their image and customer retention with these points. So you can spend these points with a sound mind morally. Legally you would have to contact a lawyer, but I think chances for legal repercussions are small if you have done your duty, informed them and their customer service basically said it's ok." "This is most likely protecting Square's relationship with Visa/Mastercard/AMEX/etc. Credit card companies typically charge their customers a much higher interest rate with no grace period on cash advances (withdrawals made from an ATM using a credit card). If you use Square to generate something that looks like a ""merchandise transaction"" but instead just hand over a wad of banknotes, you're forcing the credit card company to apply their cheaper ""purchases"" interest rate on the transaction, plus award any applicable cashback offers†, etc. Square would absolutely profit off of this, but since it would result in less revenue for the partner credit card companies, that would quickly sour the relationship and could even result in them terminating their agreements with Square altogether. † This is the kind of activity they are trying to prevent:  1. Bill yourself $5,000 for ""merchandise"", but instead give yourself cash.  2. Earn 1.5% cashback ($75).  3. Use $4,925 of the cash and a $75 statement credit to pay your credit card statement.  4. Pocket the difference.  5. Repeat. Note, the fees involved probably negate any potential gain shown in this example, but I'm sure with enough creative thinking someone would figure out a way to game the system if it wasn't expressly forbidden in the terms of service" Of course, there is no way for us to know whether or not the clerk is trying to rip you off $1.29 at a time, but I can't understand the possible motivation for doing so.  I would imagine that most people would catch this at some point, so for a store to consistently overcharge for something like this is really bad for business. They would be risking upsetting a customer all for the potential gain of $1.29. I have to assume that it is not malice, but incompetence.  We don't know what caused the clerk to be confused, but it is not really our concern. From what I can tell, you've gotten the right price in the end.  You were ultimately charged for two drinks, and the extra $1.29 that you were charged was refunded. Since it happened three times, you have to decide how badly you want these drinks in the future.  If you choose to return, you'll just have to expect the possibility that it will ring up incorrectly, and you'll have to get it fixed.  If that seems like too much hassle, then don't return to this store. Hence why I pay bill by bill and don't authorize automatic withdrawals. Are you telling me your online banking and/or utility company don't allow you to make non automatic payments online?  If so I guess thats the answer to OP's question... While I might have to agree with PiratesSayARRR from below about missing case details, I have to say, your math seems to check out to me. Although the numbers aren't rouded off and pretty, they back out. $22,285.71 generates $334.28 of fees in a month; subtract from that the monthly cost of funds (.003333 x $22285.71)= $74.28... $334.28-74.28 = $260.00. Hate to say it, but maybe they didn't hire you for a different reason? "Yeah, I'll take the challenge...:) How trustworthy these are and what are their sources of income? These are in fact two separate questions, but the answers are related. How trustworthy? As trustworthy as they're clear about their own sources of income. If you cannot find any clue as to why, what for and how they're paying you - you probably should walk away. What's too good to be true usually is indeed too good to be true. For those of the sites that I know of their sources of income, it is usually advertisements and surveys. To get paid, you have to watch advertisements and/or answer surveys. I know of some sites who are legit, and pay people (not money, but gift cards, airline miles, etc) for participating in surveys. My own HMO (Kaiser in California) in fact pays (small amounts) to members who participate in enough surveys, so its legit. Are these sites worthwhile to consider for extra income? Not something you could live off, but definitely can get you enough gift cards for your weekly trip to Starbucks. What do I need to consider tax wise? Usually the amounts are very low, and are not paid in cash. While it is income, I doubt the IRS will chase you if you don't report the $20 Amazon gift card you got from there. It should, strictly speaking, be reported (probably as hobby income) on your tax return. Most people don't bother dealing with such small amounts though. In some cases (like the HMO I mentioned), its basically a rebate of the money paid (you pay your copays, deductibles etc. Since the surveys are only for members, you basically get your money back, not additional income). This is in fact similar to credit card rebates. Is there a best practice for handling the income? If we're talking about significant amounts (more than $20-30 a year), then you need to keep track of the income and related expenses, and report it as any other business income on your taxes, Schedule C. Is there a good test to determine what is and isn't a scam? As I said - if it looks too good to be true - it most likely is. If you're required to provide your personal/financial information without any explanation as to why, what it will be used for, and why and what for you're going to be paid - I'd walk away. Otherwise, you can also check Internet reviews, BBB ratings, FTC information and the relevant state agencies and consumer watchdogs (for example: http://www.scamadviser.com) whether they've heard of that particular site, and what is the information they have on it. A very good sign for a scam is contact information. Do they have a phone number to call to? Is it in your own country? If its not in your own country - definitely go away (for example the original link that was in the question pointed to a service whose phone number is in the UK, but listed address is in Los Angeles, CA. A clear sign of a scam). If they do have a phone number - try it, talk to them, call several times and see how many different people you're going to talk to. If its always the same person - run and hide. Do they have an address? If not - walk away. If they do - look it up. Is it a PMB/POB? A ""virtual"" office? Or do they have a proper office set up, which you can see on the map and in the listings as their office? And of course your guts. If your guts tell you its a scam - it very likely is." The first thing you should do, and should have been doing all this time if you weren't, is to take the money you would've paid in the payment plan and set it aside in a separate savings account.  If your plan was 2 years, $65 a month, then set that aside, now. That will allow you to be in a better negotiating position when this is finally resolved.  It's also possible this takes two years to be resolved - in which case you'll be in position to pay the debt off in full at that point!  It's also possible at some point in the future you'll be offered to settle for half or something like that, at which point if you've saved several months of payments that might be more practical to do. As far as what to do about the charges being removed, unless you have a specific reason for believing they're invalid, that's probably impossible.  You could go to the Public Service Commission (outlined in this article about making complaints about overcharges from ConEd); it seems like it's probably too late for that, honestly, but who knows.  If you'd made more of an effort at the time, it's possible you could've disputed them back then with PSC.   And, as far as what to do with requiring written payment plans: absolutely, 100%.  I would try to find out why you're not getting the plans.  Do they have the wrong address, perhaps?  Or is your mail sometimes poorly delivered?  Ask them to send it via certified mail (you may be charged a few dollars for this), or ask them to e-mail you a copy while you're on the phone with them (my preferred option). Bill collectors like getting their money, so they ought to help you out with this. "Context: My parents overseas (Japan) sent me a little over $100,000 to   cover an expensive tuition payment and moderate living expenses in   2014. They are not US residents, Green card holders or citizens. They did not remit the tuition payment directly to the school. I am a   resident (for tax). This is enough to answer yes. That's basically the set of requirements for filing: you received >$100K from a non-US person and you yourself are a US person. You have to report it, and unless it is taxable income - it is a gift. Taxable income is reported on the form 1040, gifts are reported on the form 3520. The fact that in Japan it is not considered a gift is irrelevant. Gift tax laws vary between countries, some (many) don't have gift taxes at all. But the reporting requirement is based on the US law and the US definition of ""gift"". As I said above, if it is not a gift per the US law, then it is taxable income (and then you report all of it regardless of the amount and pay taxes). Had they paid directly to the institution, you wouldn't need to count it as income/gift to you because you didn't actually receive the money (so no income) and it went directly to cover your qualified education expenses (so no gift), but this is not the case in your situation. Whether or not this will be reported by the IRS back to Japan - I don't know, but it was probably already reported to the authorities in Japan by the banks through which the transfers went through. As to whether it will trigger an audit - doesn't really matter. It was, most likely, reported to the IRS already by the receiving banks in the US, so not reporting it on your tax return (either as income or on form 3520) may indeed raise some flags."