Canceling Sirius: So Frustrating, It's Making Me Delirious

Perhaps some of the early comment folks, below, lost their way, on their trips back to reality. The written piece is clearly a column, not an article—note the lack of references, for instance. It is the story of what one man—the author, need I say that?—experienced while trying to unsubscribe to a no-longer-desired service.

There is no attempt to extend circumstances to all subscribers, or all subscription services. So mellow out: It is the same story one would hear at the company water cooler, if there were such.

Thank you very much Brian...i appreciate this information as I too am having a hard time cancelling my free-trial as well. Then I thought..."oh brother, are they going to make me jump through hoops to do this, not another Proactiv!" Sure enough I looked it up, and I found yours (which I must say, very articulate and unbiased) and others (that were much angrier and vulgar)that described how difficult it was getting through to anyone. Harsh economic times, indeed. The big guys make sure they try every trick in the book to get your money. I'm not looking forward to being on hold but I am ready for the battle because of your article. I appreciate you taking advantage of free speech and helping ppl out. I can't believe some of these comments, they just seem bored and restless. Like, don't they remember AOL situation? Thanks BB, Love and Blessings, me

People who can't respect others opinions without the juvenile and quite frankly asinine rhetoric amuse me. They must have fun living in their fantasy world where they believe they are important.

Hi A very big thank you for posting a reply and your kind offer to help. That�??s really appreciated. I have got it all worked out already by rereading ypur suggestion and this reply again. Have a great day.

First, I read your editorial in the print version of EDN, and came here by reference of the link at the bottom. I'm a Sirius subscriber, and I haven't had the opportunity or need to cancel one of my subscriptions (yet). Regardless, we all know that these sorts of tactics are not new, nor are they sporadic for subscription-based services. Heck, you should hear how persistent the Indian (not-Native American) is at the phone bank that pesters me to renew EDN...despite having done so online. Here's a tip for paid subscription services: Use a temporary credit card number. MBNA (now part of Bank of America) allows you to generate a card number (online) that's only good for a certain amount of money and a certain duration of time. After that, charges are declined. Subscribe with one of these and they are forced to ask you for a new number for payment come renewal time. Don't want to renew? Tell them such, or even just ignore them. They aren't going to get another cent out of you without your permission. I will add the disclaimer that I would not try this technique with any service that isn't prepay-based, as they can come after you for non-payment of services.

I called in February to cancel my month to month service that had no contract. They said okay, and hung up. I then was charged for service in March and April, and the radio signal has been shut off. I''ve called 3 times since February to tell them to credit my credit card and cancel my service. Both times they said okay, but didn''t do anything. Finally today I called and threatened to sue them, and wouldn''t listen when they tried making up stuff like "that''s not refundable"...finally I was transferred to the cancellation line, I told her again if she didn''t credit my card and stop charging it I was going to sue. Was put on hold for over 10 minutes, but she finally did it. You have to get mad so they''ll finally do something, because they don''t want you to call back. Also call the executive line if you want real service. Be nice to them, and they will be nice to you: 1-888-635-5142. I should have called there first, but didn''t find it until today.

What I can''t stand about Sirius/XM is their constant interruption of the music to tell everyone how great they are. It''s like: two songs, station promo. Two more songs, another promo. And the promos themselves are so d**n pretentious. "We''re so great. So cool. You''re so lucky to be listening to us." Commercial-free, my a$$. I got a free trial with a new vehicle purchase, signed up for two more years, and just got fed up with the constant self-advertisements. ("I''m paying them for THIS??!!!?") So when the time to renew came, and they called begging me to renew, I told them I wouldn''t. They dangled three free months in front of me, but I told them I didn''t want to have to call and cancel after the three months were up. After reading this, I''m glad I stood firm. DirecTV buys their music channels from Sirius/XM, and we still have that, simply because dropping that would, for reasons known only to the accountants at DirecTV, make my rate go UP. So I listen in once in a while to see if they''ve gotten any better. Nope. Worse, if anything. Hell, on some of the stations, they have an over-compressed DJ guy introducing the songs and talking over the first several bars! What is this, AM? No, thanks.

Everyone on this board has a right to their opinions, of course people are supporting sirius, do you think we''re fools, sure we have a vested interest this co succeeds, and for someone to trash this co because it was hard to cancel his sub, in the worst environment we''ve seen in decades, is really silly and a waste of time, I mean, you could have the same problem with any co out there. Lets give credit where credit is due, if terestrial radio didn''t have the deep pockets of the parent co''s half of them would be out right now, the airwaves would be full of static, and it''s free, but if you want to listen to major talent, you have to pay for it. As a matter of fact, if our only choice for t.v. were rabbit ears, how many of us would shell out a grand for a flat panel. Someone commented,"if it''s only $142(39 cents a day) a year, than send me a check", no one here is selling sirius, we like the service and are willing to pay for it, if you can''t afford it or don''t think it''s worth the money, than don''t subscribe, I''d like to buy a ferrari, but that may well never happen, get real people. Some think sirius will be irrelevant in a couple of years, is cable t.v. irrelevant, NO, it''s all about content, this co isn''t going away, maybe common shareholders will be wiped out(I doubt it and I hope not, but you never know, and many of us shareholders understand that possibility) but the service isn''t going away anytime soon, in my humble opion, things can only get better.

AM/FM does not sound as good as satellite radio. In a car you lose your signal after a mile or two. You must love commercials and you are poor!

Maybe this is getting to be an EDA story after all. Someone should try waiting until the last week of the quarter and see if they can ink an all-you-can-eat...er...listen deal.

Alternative suggestion to canceling the service. If you call the credit card company and let them know you have cancelled the service and no longer authorize any charges by that company they will block any further charges and by default your service should end. This is particularly useful if you were actually able to get through to cancel the service.

All service providers make it very difficult to canel your service. We have all had similar experiences with cell phone, cable and magazine companies. Your experience may have been a little more difficult than "normal". How do you know? I would have obtained a larger sample size (>1) before writing something like this.

I got a years free service on Sirius when I bought my car three years ago, but apparently the dealer forgot to tell Sirius. It wouldn't have been a big deal except for the run around I got from Sirius customer support and admin dept. After a year of double and tripple billings we finally just cancled it all and swore we would never again deal with a company that can't even keep track of their accounts. It only took us 3 months and many phone calls and finally informing our credit card company to not honor any more charges from Sirius to cancel it.

I do not and have never performed internet searches to post comments to try to drive stock prices up. It''s just a comment, who actually thinks that one comment could affect the stock? It''s the negativity and the obviously biased opinion of the article and writer, if anything, that would drive the stock down. I agree with gousa, why kick a company when they are down? There was obviously something good about it, or else you would not have subscribed in the first place. I had Cingular overcharge me 8 out of 12 months, and every month I had to call in, wait on hold, and talk to numerous people to try and get my bill fixed. I couldn''t cancel because of the early termination fee. At least you only had to wait two weeks. Obviously there are people who see value in Sirius, based on the comments to your article. I agree people shouldn''t attack you personally, but I also think that as a writer you should check your facts better, or people aren''t going to read your articles.

Dear Brian, it is probable that few of the comments above were posted by regular EDN readers. Based on the patterns of topics, the word usage, names, and number of posts, most of the comments are likely associated with people who have a financial interest in Siri and perform internet searches to post comments and drive Siri stock prices up. Don''t let the negative comments bother you, and I would recommend not even bothering to respond to them. Thanks for the good work you do.

I don''t know if they were hanging up on you or not and I doubt you could say or prove for definate if they were or not either. I would say with the cut off date to renew or cancel or just continue with current contract agreement approaching soon from gawd knows how many of the over 19 million subscribers that the lines are probably pretty busy and jammed pack. Or did you not think about that? Not to mention all of the money saving cut backs on employees that some people are probably doing job duties they aren''t familiar with or experienced to doing. Also maybe the customer service people are given a vague description of what is expected of them to try and change your mind and everyone is different and maybe be going overboard even by the company standards. Maybe their job is hanging in the wind and they are afraid of losing it to someone who retains more customers. I would suggest you being an editor,do more research on the situation and not base the whole article on one persons experience and a biased opinion at that,yours. I would also figure if this was and I say was a practice of a company then there are actions of recourse such as sending a written registered letters to both corporate head quarters and billing/subscription departments. If you got renewed and billed any how after that then there is the option to file a dispute with the credit card company as well as sending them a copy of the registered letter and signature cards signed by the individuals at the company who signed for them. If the pratices are truely to your extreme with everyone then it should be addressed but you don''t know that nor do you have proof of that just one biased experience of your own. Oh and by the way I don''t think you are going to find many if any at all yearly or multi yearly contracts with any company or service that is going to cancel you early and refund your money and some like cell phone contacts charge you and early termination fee which sirius did not,just something else to think about.

I just canceled my service. I'm Howard Stern fan who now commutes 10 minutes instead of an hour. With two kids under 5, I just can't listen anymore. I called the other morning and got through in a few minutes. I explained the above to the woman and she laughed. I was put on hold for about two minutes (the amount of time I'll bet the article writer actually had to wait) and then given a full refund. While I don't have to pay, my account was only put on hold so if i want to reactivate in the next six months, it won't cost me any more. I don't see the problem.

Dear Love Sirius, I wish you the best of luck with the chance you took.

Yep, I think that guy nailed it when he mentioned Clear Channel, the evil radio empire...

Not for nothing, but certain things are hard to get out of once your in. I got a price discount and extra channels when I tried to cancel my cable, you can't blame them for trying to keep their subs, "that's there business". Radio is free if you like listening to crap, I'm sure given some time you'll realize what a great value sat/rad is, around 40cents a day, come on, you can't even get a cup of coffee for that anymore, there is always a price to pay for great content, would you be happy just having broadcast T.V. also.

SIRI will be around a long time. Buy low - sell high. This is how the wealthy make millions. You can now buy the stock at such a steal that in a couple of years - you'll be glad you did. Remember when everone sold their tech stock? It wasn't that long ago that brokers and even the public was saying tech stock will never come back! HA!

these comments are horrible. sirius just changed the TOS to deny anyone from developing an application to listen online. nicemac got shut down, and the rest are following along shortly. enjoy it while you can, cause sirius wont last much longer

SIRI is a winner and will be around to satisfy their audience for a long time. It's unique and nothing comes close. Today my stock portfolio is tanking in everyway but I've made more money than last Friday because SIRI is up and at these prices - it's a steal. Gets some courage - the stock rocks.

What a fool, what the hell does that have to do with anything

That really sucks. BUT are you sure you didn't dial the IRS or your local UNEMPLOYMENT OFFICE. Maybe you got your states DEPARTMENT OF MOTOR VEHICLES.

You, my friend, are a tool.

This begs for very simple legislation. "The cancellation process has to be exactly as simple as the subscription process". No extra steps, no different process, no crap like this.

OMG.....What a disaster! Maybe the you should write a letter to the President of the United States, better yet get him on the phone,it's ok don't worry if he's busy with NATO or Iraq, you must get the attention you want on this matter NOW! You are seeking attention are you not? Sir I suggest you make some friends fast, I'm sorry to say you sound like the type of guy who complains about everything no matter what the case may be.