Bit of a rant here, but I am currently subscribed to a game development related Patreon because I wanted to follow the development of a project that was interesting to me. The reason I covered the name is that the developer is doing a fantastic job with the project, posting regularly and providing interesting and informative posts, but the main advantage of Patreon is simply that he also provides builds which I was interested in checking out.
Patreon rebilled at the beginning of the month and I thought “Fine I guess, but I don’t really want to pay $6 a month to get test builds of this game” and tried to cancel, assuming it would simply not rebill next month, but instead of cancelling rebilling, Patreon says I will immediately lose access to everything I can currently see on Patreon and new posts for this month, even though it billed me for this month literally three days ago.
There is no technical reason they can’t just cancel rebilling and allow me to access this subscription until the end of the month, but they are clearly hoping I’ll be scared to lose access to what I’ve paid for and will forget about cancelling later in the month, which would be the better time to do it, since I would benefit from access to more posts and development builds. There are a few other subscriptions I’ve used in the past that remove access to everything the instant you cancel, but even Amazon lets me continue free trials of Prime until the end of the trial period when I cancel it.
There are presumably no laws against this, or it was mentioned in some legal bullshit I ignored when signing up, but I do think that there should be a law that forces providers of subscription services to allow users to access their subscription for the entire period for which they have paid, regardless of whether they cancel their subscription if no refund is due.
Chargebacks are only meant to be used in cases of fraud
That’s simply not true. What are you doing giving advice when two minutes of Googling shows you don’t know what you’re talking about?
No, they’re primarily for fraud, or faulty/damaged products; but we’re not talking about physical items here, we’re talking about a digital subscription. Chargebacks aren’t meant for “I don’t like the way you’re handling your service”, they’re for “I have been wronged in some way”. OP hasn’t been wronged, he just doesn’t like losing access to something he no longer wishes to pay for.
There are chargeback codes that get used when filing these. For example, here’s Visa’s chargeback codes. Note that there isn’t a valid code for OP’s situation, because it’s not considered an appropriate reason for issuing a chargeback. You’re also required to make an effort to try to rectify the issue with the merchant directly first, which it does not appear that OP has attempted yet.
Two minutes of Googling. Though the Googling was unnecessary, since I already had experience previously working at a bank and processed chargebacks regularly.
he just doesn’t like losing access to something he no longer wishes to pay for.
No, he doesn’t like losing access to something he did pay for. He paid for the month and any reasonable person would expect a prorated refund or to retain access for the time that’s been paid for.
13.7 Cancelled Merchandise/Services
[…]the customer misunderstood or was never clear on the return policy.
That’s not to far off from “paying for a month of service, but receiving only two days”, don’t you think?
It’s hard to tell, because OP states that they did not want to reveal the name of the creator they’re subscribed to, so we don’t know the type of subscription they actually have. Creators on Patreon can set various subscription types, and not all of them are purely time-based. Some of them are on a per-update basis, in which case there isn’t a true “end of billing cycle” state, so cancelling the sub would just simply be an immediate cancellation.
From the 13.7 details page:
Reason code 13.7, however, specifically refers to non-processed credits that were due from a cancelled service (including subscription services) or returned merchandise.
This can be the result of a merchant error. If a cardholder had a valid reason to request a credit, but didn’t receive one, then the merchant is liable for the chargeback. Of course, it’s also possible that this could be a case of friendly fraud.
So if we assume that the creator is on a time-based subscription model, OP would be entitled to a prorated refund, which Patreon would automatically process upon cancellation, and OP could then feasibly issue a chargeback if Patreon fails to process that prorated refund. But if it’s a per-update model, then OP is not necessarily entitled to any refund at all, and a chargeback would be invalid, and thus fraudulent in and of itself.
