Scribd

My ticket has not been responded to, and I wrote my first comment over twenty days ago! This is absolutely ridiculous, especially since I was scammed out of $9.99. I'm hoping that the service reps on this page will see this and finally get this settled.

I will copy and paste my complaint below.

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12/28/16

I started off with a free trial of Scribd, which was due to expire 12/27. I ended up barely using Scribd at all, so I logged on to today, 12/27, to cancel my account. While in the process of canceling, I was given the opportunity to take another free trial, which I decided to accept and give it a second go. However, when I checked my MasterCard, it stated that $9.99 had been withdrawn despite the fact that my free membership was not overdue and despite the fact that I have not used a full month of Scribd premium; in fact, I believe I have only used a few days of Scribd while free. I would very much like an immediate refund of the $9.99 to my account. I do now intend to cancel my account, but I am currently waiting for the refund before I do. Thank you.

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Scribd advertises "unlimited" access to materials. What they don't tll you is that once you pass some unpublished limit, for instance, two bestsellers per month, your access to many of the most popular titles is greatly diminished-- a process known as "throttling". Once throttling kicks in, you can still read and listen to materials, but many of the books you've saved will become unavailable til your next billing date. I didn't know this going in and when I found out I was annoyed, but also kind of get it. The advertising is deceptive, but for me, $10 for for 2 audiobooks is still a good deal. A couple months ago, I started getting throttled not just between books, but while I was in the middle of reading a book. I'd be halfway done, and the next time I opened the app the book was gone and I could not find it by searching. The first time it happened I thought it was some weird glitch or maybe I'd missed the notice that the book was leaving the site. The second time it happened I was more suspicious, did a little digging and realized that if I checked on the site for the book when I wasn't logged in, the book showed up just fine. That's a sure sign of throttling and that was the end for me. If I can't count on finishing a book I started due to throttling, I'm out.

I "subscribed" to this service to read 1 single file.
That's all.
I cancelled before my renewal date.
Or that's what I thought.
Then I realised I got still charged.
I cancelled again - or that is what I thought.
We played it a bit until today I figured these cheaters have 3 friggin buttons on 3 friggin different pages you have to go through to cancel.
And they are deliberately misleading you thinking you have already cancelled.

1. button end subscription button:
A new page opens and it says you have 27 days left of your subscription
But behold...
You have to scroll aaaaall the way down to the

2. Button Continue cancellation that opens a 3. Page that asks about feedback. That still does not mean you have already cancelled because you have to click on

3. Button on this 3 page: Submit & Continue

Oh wait there is a 4.! Button on the 4. Page!
They are indeed taking the p. And we should sue them all who got screwed w their subscription.

4. page bottom:
Complete cancellation. (these are not very visible either)

Anyway I did a screen video about this process.
Atrocious!

Who wanna team up against them?

Scrbd is a total nightmare! They posted on their facebook page that to help people amidst this crisis (CoVid), they are offering people a free access to the site. I thought they are here to help. So i signed up for free. But theyre too clever to require my paypal account. Last night they charged me with new subscription renewal WITHOUT GIVING ME A PRIOR NOTICE SO I COULD CANCEL BEFORE THEY CHARGE! THIS IS RIDICULOUS. I THOUGHT YOU'RE HELPING PEOPLE OUT THEN WHY ARE SCAMMING AND STEALING? I FOUND SCRIBD TO BE IRRELEVANT TO MY NEEDS AND IT'S PURE INJUSTICE THAT I WAS CHARGED FROM SOMETHING I DIDN'T FIND HELPFUL TO ME! THE $8 WAS THE ONLY REMAINING SAVINGS THAT I HAVE ANG YOU SNEAKILY STOLE IT FROM MY PAYPAL! REFUND ME! THIS IS MY TICKET NUMBER *******!

This company has the worst customer service and steals money. I subscribed for the free month and used the website to look at one book one time. After I used it, I canceled the account. To cancel the account it asks you 3 or 4 times if "you are sure you want to cancel". I canceled the account and there were no charged and then all of a sudden after 2 months of the account being canceled they started charging my bank account. I got a notification from bank a few days ago and it showed all the monthly charges for the past four months. I filed a complaint to the website and they said they will only refund me for the current month they charged me and my account will remain active for free. Well today I went on the account to see if the company stuck to their word and they disabled my account. THIS COMPANY IS A SCAM DO NOT USE IT THEY WILL STEAL YOUR MONEY!

Do NOT use this service. It is a scam. They make their revenue by charging people unknowingly when they sign up for free trials, making it impossible to cancel their service, and then refusing to refund you.

Firstly, I DIDN'T GIVE THEM ANY PAYMENT INFORMATION during the free trial. They took money via Google Pay - I assume because I signed up for the free trial with my Google account. I never inputted any card or bank details. What's worse, they failed to give me ANY email notification that I was, or would be, charged.

Secondly, when trying to cancel my subscription, there are actually 4 steps to this. I got to the 3rd step and thought I had cancelled. But no! I have to scroll all the way down and find the tiny text at the bottom of the page to give feedback and confirm.

This business is knowingly deceptive and trying to scam customers out of their money, by both taking their money without consent, and then making it impossible for them to cancel their trial. They now owe me £64.74 which they are REFUSING to refund. I have contacted both my bank and the Trading Standards office.

Interestingly, I am now unable to access my account which tells me that they have closed my account without my consent after receiving my support ticket (#*******). They will stop at nothing to avoid repaying this illegally-gotten money. Avoid at all costs.

I canceled my subcsription when I had the free trial because I didn't find what I was looking for, even though I found it on Google that it's there. It said I canceled it but I can still use it until a certain date - I did not and didn't get any email from them about ending my free trial, but I checked if it is canceled - it was. Today I found out that scribd took my money for subscription, I was surprised because I canceled it as I mentioned and I haven't noticed until now that the previous two months scribd took my money as well, I asked for a refund, but I can only get my money back for one month (You must contact us within 30 days of a charge for a refund. = that's what they say) which is quite unfair since I wasn't really using it and I'm 100% sure I canceled the subscription, so it's not my fault. Hopefully, I will get my refund and I hope that I don' lose more money for something like that

Do not fall for their free trial membership service, it is an absolute scam and you will be charged.

Their customer service is horrendous. Again, dont fall for their free trial membership, you will be charged!

Update!: It is January 30th 2019, and still no response from their customer service department despite leaving me a message on here that they will refund me. Completely bogus. Here is the proof that this company has still not refunded me despite leaving a response on trust pilot that they would.

Subject: Re: Free Trial Membership
To: support supportatscribd.com
Cc: help helpatscribd.com
Sent: Wed, Jan 16,2019 5:27 pm

Francisco,

I left a review on my experience on a website and a Scribd customer service rep replied with the attached response.

Please let me know if I can finally be refunded.

Thank you.

----------------------------------
Tue, Jan 22,2019 8:18 pm
To support supportatscribd.com
Cc help helpatscribd.com

Hello,

Is there any response to my inquiry?

I have not heard a single thing back.

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This business kept my my money and ran, fraud!

So, a year ago (11/15/2018), I subscribed to the Scribd free membership trial. Then I signed the one-year membership and I used it during the year. Although I was not planning to renew the subscription, then today (11/15/2019) the site renewed it without any notification, I was not asked if I wanted to continue or informed just before this happened, that it was about to happen. There was no warning. I would have canceled my membership immediately before the amount could have been deducted from my account. The money has been deducted from my account without my explicit and express permission. Since I don't want to use Scribd services, that begins today (11/15/2019), I have spent a few hours trying to get a refund by contacting Scribd support, but every time I press the link on the page, I get a notification telling me that I must verify my account by activating the link Scribd has sent to my registered email account, which I will receive at most within ten minutes. I have pressed the resend button multiple times and gotten no link. I have not used Scribd's services in the past months and I don't want to use it anymore. So, please, I want my money back.

I canceled my subscription long ago but they keep charging my credit card. I'm going to have to cancel my credit card!

I signed up for a free trial for scribd, with the understanding that i would need to cancel before the 21st of july. So imagine my suprise and fury when i go onto my bank account on the 18th to find that I have been charged several days early. Thinking that this was a preemptive charge, i decided to try and cancel my account. When i tried logging on to the site, it says that my payment method is invalid. When I tried to cancel through my apple subscriptions, Scribd simply was not there. I have looked everywhere and there is no way for me to cancel my subscription. I have tried emailing the company (there is no phone number to contact them from) I recieved an automated response asking for my card information. After what has happened these past few days, it will be a cold day in hell before I give them any more of my bank account info. I have already filed a complaint with my bank, and if i do not recieve a response and/or a refund within the next 48 hours I will be filing a fraud complaint with the Better Business Bureau and the FTC. Lucky for me, I have screenshots of any and all transactions with this company so they cannot try to claim that I dont have any proof. I am beyond furious right now.

Based on the reviews I've read on this website, please cancel my free trial/membership. My username is ram-*******.

On April 25,2017, I signed up for a free trial, downloaded the PDF I was looking for, and cancelled less than 5 minutes later. I went through the five or so pages where you click "Cancel Membership" in small font, submitted feedback, etc. I tried to remove the credit card I have on file, but the site only allows you to UPDATE your payment information, not remove it. During the 5 minutes that I had a free trial, my membership status stated that I would get billed $8.99 on 5/25/17. After canceling, my membership status says, "Your membership was cancelled on 4/25/17 and will end on 5/25/17." This makes no sense, since canceling my free trial means that my membership should end the same day. Browsing through the site, my account still has the ability to download PDFs and read books, which you can't do as a non-subscribed user. I don't know whether it means I'll get billed on the 25th or not, but I would like my trial permanently canceled before any charges are made to my card. Therefore, my review is tentatively 3 stars, based on whether or not I receive unwanted charges in the future.

Very dissatisfied with this website. Waisted mt money and that is all. You might find something that you need but there is no way to download. Very poorely organized website. Do not recommend...

My username is van-*******.

I assume it was late last month (March 2017), but I started a subscription to go through a book I was using for research. I didn't like what the membership offered me for the price, so I canceled the same day. Or so I thought.

On April 29, I saw through my bank that I was charged $8.99 for a service I hadn't used in over a month, on April 24. And I received no notification from Scribd that I was going to be charged for the service.

According to the service, I SHOULD end my membership with them on May 22. I'm noting the date here because if I'm charged on May 22, I have proof that Scribd is hustling me for money.

I'm going to try to work with Scribd and hope I can get my account canceled for good and a refund without going through the horror stories posted here in regards to getting charged repeatedly, even with a debit/credit card number changed. I've sent in a ticket, but if I don't hear anything from Scribd within a couple of business days, I'll annoy them every day until I get a response.

If I don't hear anything from Scribd at all, you can bet I'm going to work with my bank and my state's attorney general to get my money back. Even if it's only around nine dollars (or plus, if they charge me more).

If the Scribd representative for SiteJabber is around, my ticket number is #*******, and I've replied to my response via email, since it has my card name and number on it. And please cancel my card with your service after I'm refunded.

Ticket nr. #*******.

In August 2018 they advertised with the "free trial"-offer. Again. I was stupid enough to click on it, and what happened? I was charged. Mailing back and forth with the costumer service, they admitted that the fault was theirs, that "it should have displayed a message letting you know that the account did not qualify for the free trial offer since it's an account that has been in the system for a little close to 3 years now", yet I got no refund. But this is not all. Of course I cancelled the whole subscription - but now I just found out that they have actually been charging me monthly since August 2018 (on one of my less overviewed accounts)! If this is not a fraud I do not know what is. Absolutely unspeakable. You wonder what the costumer service education actually looks like. I have just e-mailed them and demanded a refund, but I doubt that they have shame enough to give me me money back. Theft is the word. I wish, wish, wish I had read the reviews before having anything to do with them as a scholar. I am devastated. Will warn everyone I know.

--- UPDATE:
Scribd refuse to meet my request, and claim I made the subscription. They blame their costumers for not remembering that free trials are for "new members only". Ever heard of Netflix charging the costumers who forget that and happen to click on their offer? I will now call my card issuer for a chargeback.

I got a free three month trial membership and had paid for a month membership fee, only to realize I didn't actually own any of the books I had purchased. I need to keep paying monthly to access my paid books and other contents on Scribd. Not to mention some books on Scribd they don't actually own because they allow others to upload and through membership they let you "purchase" others's materials with your monthly credits. I didn't know until the third month I couldn't access to one paid book and contact Customer Services. Absolutely discussing!
Also the App was designed such a way that it's difficult to manage. There's no confirmation language once you click or accidental click it would go immediately to your monthly credits. Examples like it prompts to one click "purchased" then you can't find it on your App, instead called something like "Manage your offsite content" or "Stored content"... and you could "purchase" the same book more than once...
I always wonder why I can't find "Purchased" tab neither my App and account.

Streaming not always easy. The UI and layout contents are all over the place.
You need to pay monthly in order to access your materials and you don't actually own them even you have paid every month... Big trap.
The site also is misleading. Never mentions those terms. When I signed up it was like 3 reading book and 1 audio book each month, credit can roll over. I wish I took a screenshot or something. It doesn't help, those terms are revealed when you go to FAQs or trouble shooting and they're slightly mentioned.