Another IPS money grab

[Lizard King]

The wording is a little worrying, when you click cancel under the renewal section the header says "Cancel: IPS Community Suite"

Which sounds like you're cancelling the license itself

It says below:

This will immediately cancel access to download your software, access technical support and use IPS Extras. You will not be sent any further renewal invoices.

It is not worrying , it is carefully designed so that Users will Choose NOT to cancel their renewals. It is a matter of Extortion tactic and i recall this as a very bad business practiice.

 

[ozzy47]

Yeah, it really sucks that they have such crappy business practices.

 

[Klaatu]

So if you have an expired license you can't even download older versions of the software? That can't be right?

 

[AdamD]

So if you have an expired license you can't even download older versions of the software? That can't be right?

Correct.
It blocks you from downloading anything.

 

[Steve]

They always said to keep a backup of downloaded versions, which is bollocks. Every other forum software provider lets you download the last version you had access to, why is it so difficult? One of the reason I sold my IPB license many moons ago...

 

[GTB]

The wording is a little worrying, when you click cancel under the renewal section the header says "Cancel: IPS Community Suite"

Which sounds like you're cancelling the license itself

It says below:

This will immediately cancel access to download your software, access technical support and use IPS Extras. You will not be sent any further renewal invoices.

Why should cancelling auto renewal lose you access to technical support and downloading what you paid for, even the extras.

If your license is still valid?

 

[we_are_borg]

Why should cancelling auto renewal lose you access to technical support and downloading what you paid for, even the extras.

If your license is still valid?

Because they do not care if you lose access, you want to cancel so if you do that with out reading and later on want to stay you need to pay for the same time you had. Same with the renewal fee out of credit they know that people will stop payment and wait until they need the next version by enable-ling auto renew they drain that flow real fast, as company you then also know that after 2 years you do not own any credit anymore what you gave, so now they can calculate when does licenses have nothing left.

Its they worst money making scheme that they invented at IPB again you create negativity around your brand. Most companies give you the courtesy of downloading licenses you had access to when you joined.

 

[cheated_ips_cust]

Here the thread on IPS: https://community.invisionpower.com/topic/421057-i-want-my-credit-back-disagree-automatic-renewal/ , but they closed then.

 

[cheated_ips_cust]

That criminal company stole now my complete account credit.

I'm sorry for your frustration.

- We can certainly evaluate something to remind of automatic renewal. We actually had this for quite some time and it generated complaints and confusion -- even though the e-mail was clear that the invoice would be auto-paid, clients would login and manually pay, often resulting in a double-charge. I think most want to set and forget, but we can work on improving this so it's clear services will be auto-renewed.

- Deactivating immediately for Forums licenses is a bug in the system. This is fixed in Commerce which we were converting to in November. I'll check the feasibility of applying a fix now. It's not been an issue as nearly everyone either wants to renew or simply lets the license expire. Yours is a unique situation.

With the above said, I have to admit to being a bit baffled at the notion of complaining about free money. You were not forced to upgrade your license from legacy status / accept the offer and you were given $100 account credit as a loyalty credit for converting. At this juncture, I feel it best to restore things to the way they were, so I have restored your legacy license as it were and reverted the credit as I'm certainly not going to entertain "as compensation I want to have my account credit to PayPal."



To others, I do want to make it clear that invoices are only paid automatically if there is an account credit or a credit card on file. Beyond those circumstances, we don't have the ability to process automatic payments as do not retain credit card data unless you specifically ask us to. I'm sorry for any confusion.

 

[AdamD]

Interestingly, cancelling the renewal, does indeed immediately cancel the license
Even if the renewal isn't due for months, it cancels the license and stops you from downloading anything.

 

[Anonymous]

I am starting to wonder if I can remove my personal details from their system.

 

[AdamD]

No idea to be honest, I did have the free $100 of credit after converting my license, but due to the auto renewals which I didn't know about, it's down to $5
lol
I was going to wait till 4.1, before giving IPB a try, I guess I won't bother now.

 

[Danielx64]

No idea to be honest, I did have the free $100 of credit after converting my license, but due to the auto renewals which I didn't know about, it's down to $5
lol
I was going to wait till 4.1, before giving IPB a try, I guess I won't bother now.

I dont think I would even bother now

 

[AdamD]

Yea I won't
It's funny though, I DO have the option to download the 3.X series, but not the 4.X
Can't renew the license either, it lists all the old legacy products instead of the suite
Yea, I think I'll stick with XF if I open a forum again.

 

[s.molinari]

I can't imagine it would be hard to reprogram the license system to offer downloads that were available up to the license renewal expiration date.

And the fact they think reminding customers they are about to be automatically charged again is a problem, because a few customers went and paid again sounds like a lame reason to not do it. It sounds more like the process is done wrong. Like, it sounds like they were sending the invoice before the renewal, which is not a reminder really.

I would think the process should be.

1. Remind the customer of an upcoming renewal. Maybe even twice. A month before and a week before.
2. Carry out renewal and charge the customer, on the day of the renewal expiration (not a week before!).
3. Send invoice in an email saying thank you for being such a great and loyal customer.

How can that cause confusion?

And if, on the far chance, the customer went in to pay again, then they'd see, they'd be renewing for another 6 month period 6 months in the future. I think pretty much all customers would stop right there and not renew, right?

Scott

 

[doubt]

And if, on the far chance, the customer went in to pay again, then they'd see, they'd be renewing for another 6 month period 6 months in the future.

With VB up to 4 you could do just that. On the arrival of 4 that system's died because there were no more renewals.

 

[cheated_ips_cust]

So, to clarify - you upgraded your legacy account. They gave you a $100 credit towards the upgrade to IPS 4 and future renewals. You have used those credits and then you get billed. You then are upset because you were not notified that you were being billed when the credits expired to pay for your license on an auto-renewal that you were not aware that you were a part of.
They revert you back to your legacy license and revoke your IPS 4 access but allow you to have lifetime up to what version you were originally on.

The only question is - if they charged your credit card for a renewal - and you didn't get to use IPS4 for that renewal period - did they refund you the renewal they charged you?

They converted me without my knowledge back to legacy (after the post from IPSLindy) and my account is 0$ (yesterday it was 75$). They didn't refund me anything.

 

[cheated_ips_cust]

it was the 100$ offer what i get after i agreed the deal. I see it differently, they give me the account credit as a gift after I've agreed the conversion.
You can not revert gifts back. In the Mail from January there is no word about auto renewal and they say also:

There is, however, no expiration and you may use it how and when you’d like.

With the exception that the gift can only used on IPS products (and services).

 

[s.molinari]

I agree partially with Perry. It seems cheated_ips_customer's concern with the credit (which IS a gift by the way) is a bit off, because it seems she/he thinks he/she should be able to get cash back from the credit. That isn't correct, if the assumption is true. The other thing I think I caught at the beginning was, cheated_ips_customer downloaded the latest version, thus not allowing them to revert the prior (and unfortunately incorrect) action they took. If cheated_ips_customer had a problem with the action to begin with, he/she shouldn't have downloaded the software. The fact he/she downloaded means, there shouldn't really have been any complaining at all. The downloading is an agreement to the action taken.

And I said I agree partially, because the fact IPS set the licenses up to automatically renew, without the customer's knowledge was incorrect. cheated_ips_customer does have an argument there. And the policy of stopping all license downloads once a license becomes inactive is also not quite correct either. Let's say it is customer unfriendly, and actually sort of dumb, since IPS's main competition allows it (even vBulletin). In fact, charging for a privilege seems more like a membership type of deal and not a license plan. Maybe, if IPS wants to keep that methodology (which I personally wouldn't suggest), they can change the name of the deal from "license and support renewal" to "IPS membership renewal"? And, because that sounds so odd or off, we can see why the stoppage of the downloads is also off.

In the end, there is always two sides of the story to learn from.

Scott

 

[cheated_ips_cust]

Hello,

My main problem is simply that 7 days before it expires, the license was auto renewed without my knowledge. I agreed the convert in condition that i get the 100$ as account credit, but i never agree an auto renewal. In the mail there was no word about that. This is reason why I complained.

I never said and never agreed that I want to be converted back. You're right scott, with the download i agreed the converted license, but not the renewal until 29 March, because i download before on 29 September.

If it is legally okay, that old license holders don't get IP.Board 4, is another question. The other solution could be: They offer only the plugin to download and Core only if an active license from IP.Gallery or IP.Downloads etc. But then I would not have agreed a convert.

and i write "as compensation I want to have my account credit to PayPal." only, because
i'm mad of course, that no one does help me in the ticket system with my problem and of the thinking: "They only think the own advantage".