leejo 22 hours ago

> Chargebacks are extra work for the consumer too you know.

It's not about work it's about the burden of cost due to fraud not being passed on to a consumer such that it could put them in financial difficulty. Chargebacks are there to protect the consumer and not the merchant - The 3d Secure "liability shift" (they literally call it this in the spec) flips that arrangement. Merchants are compelled to reduce their chargeback levels as they have to pay for each chargeback case, and should it become frequent their ability to process payments will be revoked.

Just turn on 3d Secure and your merchant chargeback costs reduce significantly. Nice? Not for the consumer. But I repeat myself.

> If we're philosophising, wouldn't it be better to have a honest system where the user authorizes all charges and the merchant doesn't get to auto renew subscriptions without user input just because they feel like it?

Merchants probably should notify their users with subscriptions, sure - I got one a couple of months ago from F1TV that my subscription will renew and maybe I don't want that subscription any more, or perhaps I want to change the level of my subscription. Other merchants won't be as nice, and dark patterns will creep in. Some companies have business models built on these recurring subscriptions.

I can't recall the rules around these, but I can recall that there are (were, we're going back 12 years here) systems in place to reduce issues for recurring payments. Even when a cardholder's details are updated, including replacement of a card and its PAN[1]. Any subscriptions would be retained to avoid interruption to the consumer's subscription, which might be critical for them (the consumer).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payment_card_number

1
nottorp 21 hours ago

> Any subscriptions would be retained to avoid interruption to the consumer's subscription, which might be critical for them (the consumer).

Sorry, that's complete and utter bullshit. Even if you think you're defending the customer's position, everything you said is in the vendor's favour. It "reduces friction" but only when it's in their interest.

leejo 21 hours ago

> Sorry, that's complete and utter bullshit.

I'm saying that's how it is, not how it should be.