Here’s a con that’s entirely legal: Companies can sign you up for a membership in one click, then bury the cancel button so deep you give up and keep paying. Whole business models are built on it.
For one brief, shining moment, Washington was going to end it. In 2024, the Federal Trade Commission passed a “click to cancel” rule, which mandated that canceling had to be as easy as signing up. Then, days before it took effect in 2025, a federal appeals court threw it out on a technicality. Gone.
So no national rule is riding to your rescue, at least not soon. But here’s the part the subscription industry would rather you miss: The idea is clawing its way back anyway, one state and one city at a time. And you’ve got more leverage than you think.
1. First, find out what you’re actually bleeding
You can’t cancel what you’ve forgotten you’re paying for — and forgetting is the whole plan. Four in five American adults carry at least one subscription, and the average person burns more than $200 a year on ones they don’t use.
Pull up your last two or three bank and card statements and read every recurring charge out loud. The $6.99 here, the $14.99 there, the “free trial” you forgot back in March. Circle everything you wouldn’t miss.
I’ll be honest, though: I love the pull-your-statements method, but I know how many people start it and quit halfway through. If that’s you, this is exactly the kind of chore worth handing off.
One popular tool is Rocket Money. It connects securely to your accounts and puts every subscription on one screen — so instead of digging through a year of statements, you see the whole leak at a glance and cancel what you don’t want in a few taps.
It’ll even negotiate your cable, internet, and phone bills and flag fee hikes before they hit. Members have canceled over $880 million in subscriptions so far. If the manual route isn’t going to happen, at least take a look at Rocket Money.
2. Know the law may already be on your side
This is the leverage most people don’t realize they’re holding. The federal rule died, but a growing patchwork of states — more than half of them now — has passed its own version, although some aren’t as strong as others.
Look up your own state’s automatic renewal law. If a company makes you jump through a hoop that law forbids, you’re not powerless — you’re holding evidence.
Here’s a list of states with the most robust click-to-cancel laws. Know, however, that this is a moving target. These laws are changing rapidly.
States with true “click to cancel” laws (they specifically require you to be able to cancel as easily as you signed up, or cancel online if you signed up online), per recent legal roundups, include:
- California — AB 2863, effective July 1, 2025; widely considered the strongest
- Colorado — one-step online cancel, penalties up to $20,000 per violation
- Massachusetts — same-channel online cancellation, effective Sept. 2, 2025
- Minnesota — easy online cancel, effective 2025
- New York — state law plus NYC’s municipal rule (Oct. 1, 2026)
- Virginia — cancel-as-easy-as-signup, effective July 1, 2026
- Delaware, Idaho, Illinois, Tennessee, Utah — online/easy-cancel provisions
- Georgia — online cancel, but with a draft-email quirk
3. Cancel the same way you signed up — and say so
Where these laws exist, the rule is refreshingly simple: If you subscribed with a click, they can’t shove you onto a phone call, a retention specialist, or a mailed letter to get out.
So when a company funnels you toward a call-to-cancel maze, push back in writing and name the law: “Under my state’s automatic renewal law, you’re required to offer online cancellation.” It’s amazing how fast the maze clears once they realize you know the rules.
Quick heads-up — companies spend billions figuring out how to separate you from your money. I’ve spent my career exposing those tricks. Sign up for the free Money Talks Newsletter and keep more of what you earn. 10 seconds, no spam, ever.
4. Kill free trials before they flip
The free trial is the trap’s favorite bait. You mean to cancel. You forget. It converts to $19.99 a month — and it’s still charging you a year later.
The newer state laws attack this head-on, requiring companies to get your clear say-so before that first real charge. But don’t count on it. The moment you start any trial, set a phone reminder for two days before it ends. That one habit will save you more than any budgeting app.
5. Don’t let the junk fees slide either
Subscriptions are only half the game. The other half is the convenience fee, the service fee, the mystery line that appears at checkout once they’ve got your card in hand.
Massachusetts now bans a lot of that surprise pricing outright, and other states are following. If a fee turns up that was never disclosed, challenge it — at the register, in an email, or through your card issuer. Half the time it evaporates the second someone pushes back.
6. Keep your card company on speed dial
Your last line of defense is the one that made the charge in the first place. If a company flat-out refuses to cancel or keeps billing you after you’ve quit, dispute the charge with your card issuer.
Save your proof — cancellation screenshots, emails, dates. And for anything that smells like a trap going in, consider a virtual or single-use card number, so you can shut off the tap yourself if they won’t.
The bottom line
The subscription economy is betting on your inertia. Every hoop, every buried button, every “are you sure?” screen exists to wear you down until you quit trying.
I’ve spent my career catching companies with their hand in your pocket, and this is one of the slickest games going. But the tide is turning. Washington fumbled it; states and cities are picking up the ball. You don’t have to wait for a law to catch up, though — read your statements, know your rights, and cancel without guilt. It’s your money. Act like it.
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