When paying my bills for this month, I noticed a post on my credit card bill that I did not recognise. It seemed to be an automatic renewal of a subscription for anti-virus software that I had on my old laptop, which I got rid of (scrapped) last spring. I never moved that over to my new laptop since my IT guru (also known as my brother) assured me that the protection I needed was included in Windows. And I knew I had cancelled that subscription, because I had just recently been receiving emails from Norton, first to remind me that it was about to expire, and then that it had expired. - So what on earth was this about??
Logging into my account, I found to my surprise that besides the expired subscription, I seemed to have another one, which had been auto-renewed without any emails to notify me about that. I can only assume that this one must somehow have been included in the purchase of my new laptop, even though I never downloaded and used it. In spite of that, it had now been auto-renewed for another year - at a cost of around $45 (£36).
I probably spent at least another hour that evening just trying to figure out how to cancel that subscription as well. After having (hopefully) managed that part, I gave up for the evening.
Today I resumed my quest, to see if I might even manage to get a refund of the payment already made. I found some info to indicate that this might be possible, as it was less than 60 days time since the payment was made. However, I found their whole website totally confusing. I was looking for a way to get in touch with their support, but all links seemed to just have me going round in circles. They kept referring to their "chat", but there seemed to be no links actually leading there. I still can't retrace how or where, but after about two hours of increasingly desperate searching, I suddenly happened to find it after all...
Below is a summary of what followed - I copied it all to a text document before I closed, partly for documentation, but also because in the midst of my frustration I found the chat itself rather fascinating. (I'm still not convinced that person No 2 was a real human either. Just in case she was, though, I'm omitting that name below, and just calling her "A---". )
The whole chat lasted about 25 minutes from start to end.
N: You are now connected with Norton Support. Hello! My name is Kate and I am a virtual assistant for Norton. In a few words, please tell me how I can assist you
Me: I just detected that I had an automatic renewal of a subscription that I did not know that I had, and that I have never used. I have ended it but I want a refund
Kate: I was able to locate your account. I need to authenticate you using a verification code. --- I've emailed you the 6 digit PIN. --- You've been successfully authenticated.
As a virtual assistant I am only able to offer limited assistance. One of our agents will be able to assist you with your refund request. Please wait while I connect you with an agent to assist you with your refund request. Your estimated wait time is less than 5 minutes. ---
We are connecting you with a human agent
A--- just joined the conversation
You are now connected with A---
A: Welcome to Customer Support for Norton and LifeLock products . My name is A---. I would like to apologize for the long wait time you had to experience. We are receiving a high number of chats at the moment and we are working on reducing the queue time as soon as possible.
Me: I recently found I had been billed for a renewal of a subscription I did not know that I had, and have never used. I have ended it but I want a refund.
A: Hello, Thank you so much for your patience. How are you doing today?
Please be rest assured I will surely help you with the cancellation and refund. [silence]
Me: Yes?
A: Please take note of case number xxxxxxxx for future reference. You can contact us back with this same number if this chat session is disconnected. [silence]
Me: What info do you need from me?
A: Please allow me a minute to check with the details. As I can check that you have a subscription of Norton Utilities Ultimate under your Norton account which got auto renewed on Mar 16, 2024 due to which you were charged SEK 499.00 to your account. Am I correct?
Me: Yes. I have no idea what that is about. I don't have Norton installed on any device.
A: [Enters into a very long description of 'Norton Utilities Ultimate' and the 'Norton Automatic Renewal Service'] "Norton would have sent a notification to the registered email address between 50 to 65 days before your subscription expired and also before any payment was billed...." ...(They did not!)... "I would like to inform you that we do not had such intension to charge you and this is the reason we offer 60 days refund policy to our customers. as you are a valuable customer to Norton and you have contacted me regarding your concern, if you like I can also offer you a 20% refund of the automatic renewal price, and you can continue to use your Norton Product for the next year. Is this something you might be interested in?"
ME: I don't want this subscription.
A: I totally respect your decision and there is nothing more than your satisfaction. I do not waste any more of your time. I will go ahead and process 100% refund back to your account. As well as I will check that such issue will never repeat again and make sure that the Automatic Renewal service is disable from your subscription. --- Please allow me a minute to process the refund and share the details.--- As requested I have started the refund process --- Please allow 5-7 working (business) days to process and it will show up in your next billing cycle (within 10 working days depending on your bank). Please, take a note of your refund confirmation number xxxxxx. You will also receive an email confirming the refund and another email confirming your Automatic Renewal cancellation.
Thank you for all your time and patience and I do apologize for the time taken, you are awesome and was very supportive throughout the chat. This is very rare to get such a calm and wonderful customer like you. Apart from that Is there anything I can assist you with?
ME: I would like to close my Norton account permanently after this has been resolved and I have got my refund
A: Please do not worry as I have already cancelled your subscription so you not be charged ever again and if you wish I can delete your billing information so that you will never face any issue ever again.
ME: Yes please.
A: Please allow me a moment. --- I have successfully deleted the billing info and I assure you that you will not be charged in the future.
ME: Thank you
A: I am really glad to help such a wonderful customer like you. You were also very supportive and cooperative throughout the chat. You will receive a Customer Satisfaction Survey by email within the next few days. You are welcome to express your overall opinion of Norton Service and Support in the survey. Your feedback is much appreciated and helps us improve our customer service.
ME: OK. Bye!
A: It was a pleasure to assist you. I will pray to keep you and your family safe. Thank you for contacting Norton LifeLock support and have a great time! Good Bye and Cheers for the day.
PS. I did also receive email confirmation of the refund. Remains to be seen when it also turns up in my bank account. (When it has, I may investigate further how to close the whole account altogether...)
PPS. It's certainly a first for me to have a customer service chat ended by prayer! ;-)
Now that dud sound like a very strange conversation!
ReplyDeleteJayCee, it did feel very strange - like dealing with some sort of hybrid between AI and a real person... Throughout the whole chat I felt I had no idea what to expect next!
DeleteOh my goodness, I have to admire your perseverence Monica. I'm not sure I would have managed to last that long!
ReplyDeleteCarol, I was tempted to just give up but it annoys me when companies get away with making things automatised but at the same time so difficult to understand, and almost impossible to get in touch with them, that customers just keep paying for services they aren't even using because they have somehow been tricked to "agree" to do so without knowing when or how. And this certainly doesn't get any easier as we get older...
Deletethey are simply telling you what you want to here. I parted ways with Norton 2 years ago, I think they are a dangerous company. almost all web sites are like this now. even Amazon website gives the runaround and that is to keep us from talking to a person. I hope the refund hits your account, fingers crossed.
ReplyDeleteSandra, your comment went to spam for no apparent reason, just retrieved it. It's tricky when new devices come with a free trial period of something and then even if you don't use it they auto-charge you when the free period is over... Trying to remember I think Norton may have been pre-installed on my new laptop, but I uninstalled it, because it somehow clashed with the protection already included in Win11. Something like that...
DeleteI have had occasion to speak to Norton twice and I have to say that both times they were cooperative and friendly. As far as I recall I didn’t even have to be screened by a robot first!
ReplyDeleteDavid, it was a text chat (not phone) and once I found it and figured out how to get in there I can't accuse them of not being "friendly"... Still don't know how I got to be billed for something I never used, though - and trying to get my head round the whole situation and what do to to get out of it took me hours.
DeleteGoodness, praying for you and your family from a chat-bot! Amazing. So glad that your needs of refund and cancellation were finally met. But it's always so awfully hard to go through all that process before you can resolve issues. I recently was mis-charged in much the same way by our local newspaper, and I wrote a scathing letter to the editor. Of course it wasn't published, but it hit home and this week I was credited the amount they'd taken from my bank without my permission. Funny that "A" determined that you would like appreciative comments! A bit over the top!
ReplyDeleteBarbara, your comment went to spam for unknown reason, just retrieved it... I agree I felt the "appreciative comments" to be a bit over the top, as I tried keep my own input short and focused! (lol)
DeleteMy guess is that "A" is indeed a real person. His or her first language is clearly not English, but he/she is making use of pre-made text blocks (very likely as per instruction), probably working from some Norton-paid call center somewhere in Asia where wages are low but people in general have a reasonable command of English.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, the chatbot reacted well in connecting you to a human being almost straight away instead of insisting you make the rounds with its assistance :-)
Meike, when rereading the chat afterwards I came to the same conclusion (human with English not as first language mixing formal standard text blocks with their own) While online it felt a bit surreal... Also not knowing if I was expected to explain more myself or not!
DeleteThis is unlike any robotic customer service that I have ever heard of!!! Kind of funny, but very unusual!
ReplyDeleteGinny, Meike's explanation in her comment above probably comes closest. I've still never had any conversation quite like it with a personal customer service either, though!
DeleteIt is almost as if Norton - meant to be a security service - is morphing into a form of scamming. I have discovered similar with a security business - pop-ups occurring very regularly causing great annoyance. Getting through to actual people at these companies - and others is becoming a widespread frustration.
ReplyDeleteYP I agree. I had Norton on a previous laptop, but sometimes it seemed a bit "overprotective"... (Causing more worries than probably necessary.) I also think too many companies practice annual auto-payments these days, making those dates easy to miss, and the subscriptions difficult to get out of.
DeleteThat sounds so creepy to me. I really miss real people. And you know what else I miss? Silence on the phone. Now, there must be loud TERRIBLE music blaring in your ear as you wait. Years ago, there would just be silence and then, someone would pick up. I really miss that.
ReplyDeleteKay, I prefer silence to "waiting music" too.
DeleteAdding here - primarily for my own memory - that the money did get paid back to my credit card on the next banking day (i.e. Monday the 29th).
ReplyDelete