Abuse? I record all calls I make to customer service entities, with the opening, “Hi, I’m recording this call.” So yeah, in the four or five times I’ve had to do this, no one was dumb enough to take me to court, and if they did they’d lose. I make sure that I don’t use a service without paying for it, I make it clear what’s going happen and tell them to stop the service and that I’m going to stop payment. If they can’t manage that, by all means, talk to my attorney.
If you don’t consent to being recorded, they are required to serve you in an unrecorded line. And if they cannot, then you have been denied service. And if you’re denied service, you cannot cancel. So run the chargeback.
Um, no. That's not accurate at all. Maybe it's different outside the US, but many states are "single-party consent" states, meaning you don't need permission to record them and vice-versa. The biggest reason that many companies disclose the fact that they're recording the call is that you might be calling from a location that requires consent from all parties; they want to cover their butts.
I was mostly referring to here in California, but it would also apply to: Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Washington.
In your earlier comment you said you cancel charges rather than dealing with "customer service".
It's only reasonable to interpret that as you not calling at all. And in that case it would be abuse to file a chargeback.
It seems like that's not what you actually meant, and you do call first? Great! But you shouldn't be confused that people misunderstood your earlier comment.
You're talking about a situation where you have demonstrably tried to cancel. The rest of us were talking about a situation where someone cancels payment but not the contract. Both legally and ethically speaking, those are entirely different scenarios.
