Complaint Review: TWX Magazines Magazeoutlet USNEWSDIGIT NSS Magazine Outlet - Internet

Thank you thank you thank you. I hate when stuff like this happens (I was also briefly a user of Freecreditreport.com only to find out they were charging me for monthly credit monitoring). With TWX I called the second number people provided here and waited to talk to a human for about 4 minutes. Then, I said I wanted to cancel all three magazines, I remembered two and the operator told me the third, she offered me gifts and subscriptions far into 2010, I declined and just asked her to cancel any pending charges and make sure the cancellation was complete (not just one of several, like it sounds like they willingly do). I am so grateful for the guidance provided here. 

A $2.01 charge showed up on my debit check card, and I could not figure out who TWX Magazine was. I did remember getting some good deals on magazine subscriptions awhile back, and figured this was one that did not get processed at the time. I probably just blew it off thinking I would not get the subscription, and was pretty upset that charge showed up w/no notification..granted, it is my bad that my bank account runs negative from an unexpected 2.00 charge. Anyhow, I came online to get contact info for the company, since the bank did not have it yet. I was very afraid when I read the reports on this site. As of right now, my situation turned out well. I wrote down all the ph#'s I found on the site, but called 877 294 1093, and got a live rep within a couple of minutes. She advised the charge was a test to see if the card was still good, and would fall off 'pending' within the next 24hrs. When I found out what the magazine was, I told her to cancel, as I did not like it. She did try to push a little for me to keep the next subscription at $1.00, but I really dislike the mag. She told me it was cancelled, and I would not be charged anymore. The next phone call I made (to same#) was because I forgot to ask on the first one..if I had any other subscriptons. I had 3 more which were due to charge for renewal Nov 3. I cancelled all but one, and will review things again closer to renewal time to see if I want it..she could not give me a price for the subscription. This rep was not quite as pleasant as the first one..she actually seemed annoyed at handling my call.

I just picked up the phone called 800-927-9578 and just hit 0 a few times...I got to a person who canceled my subscription in about 30 seconds....I canceled before I got billed actual price because TWX tested my CC to make sure it was still active...I caught this on my CC statement online...I called to verify what this was all about and in less than one minute it was all taken care of.... One suggestion is make sure you get som type of confirmation # from the Rep. Not sure what the # means but its something to have as proof you called...maybe ....

Don't be fooled, this is an absolute scam/ripoff, why? The practices used rely on large numbers of people, the more the better. There will be a large percentage that will "NOT" read the disclaimers or terms of agreement as they are long and tedious. These types of disclaimers that are attached to products or services are tedious to read and very specific in much detail. In the end, many "businesses" find it much more profitable to "automatically" sign consumers up to a "renewal", etc upon a purchase, knowing full well that there will be a % of consumers that do not cancel in time or foget the renewal etc. Some companies will even go so far as to refuse a refund if you forget to cancel. They could simply offer a product at introductory price with no renewal clause, and send a letter asking if you would like to get a regular subscription, but they know most people don't usually renew. Buyer beware on the internet especially for these types of purchases and "digital" purchases. Good luck to all consumers trying to avoid the traps and pitfalls of unscrupulous sellers.

I had this happen to me and I just called 18007733142 and got cancellations on all magazines they had me signed up for (I had multiple subscriptions apparently, NONE of which I was aware of) as well as full refunds on the two I had actually gotten charged for. This is a pretty shady way for the company to run things, but if it's happened to you, you had to have done something like checked a box for "3 months free for a magazine" after ordering something online and just forgot about it or failed to read the fine print. Admit this to yourself, be pleasant when calling (no matter how persistent the salesperson may be), and say NO to all other offers! Do this and you should absolutely get any subscriptions canceled and fully refunded in 15 minutes or less. It's that easy.

Well, first off, I'm just another customer, so I have no special motivation to say good words about this company accept for a sense of fairness. The company does use aggressive sales techniques. The do not provide any contact information on the card statement and don't have a web site. If you get a live person on the phone, the do try to upsell you and use tricks like "72 business hours" which is actually 9 busness days etc. But to be fair, they do give you great price for the first year. And once you get the phone and after hitting 0 multiple times get a live person on the phone, it's not that hard to get money refunded. So I spent total about 20 minutes on subscribing, googling the customer services number, listening the the representative and filing this comment. What I got for 20 minutes of my time is a few good magazines for next to nothing. In my case it seems to be a pretty fair deal, so I'm resonably satisfied. In my mind, if you expect better service, you should expect to pay more. For a dirt cheap price this company does provide good quality products (the magazines are fine, no catches there) and some working customer service. So I would not call it a scam or ripoff. Thanks, Ruslan

I signed up for 1 year of 4 magazines for 1 or 2 dollars each. I do not recall getting an email from them, but when the charges appeared on my credit card, all I did was call the phone number that they gave me in their email notification that I was going to receive the almost free magazines. They say they will refund the money except for $2.25 to 2.50 per magazine (on the automated line). This line of course did not explain why all the money was not refunded. This is where Ripoff comes in. I was looking for another phone number and found several options here. THank you for that! I called the automatic number and pressed 0 until I was transferred to a live person, who said she would take the information and request her supervisor to refund the remaining difference for all that I cancelled. Of course I am waiting to see what happens. If it is not satisfactory then I will file a complaint here. I think that their offer was great. I just have to write down in my "reminder calendar" to cancel in the future. I do think they should put in the information about how to contact a real person on their automated line, and they are at fault for this. And they should explain why the refund will not be the same as the amount appearing on the charge account. If kids are selling these, the magazine company must give them a flyer to pass out whenever someone buys a magazine from them, as to who to contact to cancel or change information. odw MD

I didn't even have to yell. Just call the numbers above and press "0" over and over again until it a customer service person picks up. I told them that I needed to cancel 4 subscriptions and they did it with no hassle.

Whoa, folks get pretty worked up about this stuff! I too found charges to my credit card from TWX*xxxxxx* and was worried I somehow got scammed, or just ripped off. I accepted some free trial magazine subscriptions (I normally never sign up for trials because I hate cancelling) because it said they would send a renewal notice before charging my account. That didn't happen, and I found this site with helpful info on the situation. Got to magcustomerservice.com Enter your Subscription ID (that xxxxxx between the ** on your statement) Click OK and enter your last name/zip This will bring up your subscriptions, which you can verify and see the terms of your offer Call the customer service line and cancel at 877-294-1093. I called and they were very pleasant, timely, and helpful. There was no going through automated system, got to a representative right away, who did offer a discount, but was happy to cancel when I declined.

It's not our fault if you don't read what's given to you. But we do fix it. You want a refund, we give you a refund. You want a full refund, even if you don't deserve it, we give it to you. You get overdraft fees because of the charge, we pay them, and guess what you still keep the magazines. Our reps are nice and polite, at least they are where I'm located. You call to cancel the subscription, we will of course offer you discounts so you will want to keep it. A lot of companies do that, we don't want you to cancel because the company is making money if you keep the subscriptions active. But, you say cancel, we cancel. Just listen to what we are saying. And know what you are agreeing to. And to the poster, it is the consumer's fault, but we will fix it. As fast as we can though. It takes time to issue a credit. It takes time for you to stop receiving the magazines. But of course there will always be people in this world who don't take responsibilty for their actions. At least this company does. This isn't going to satisfy anyone, I know that, but technically it is the consumer's fault.

Probly to late for all those who have been screwed over by these guys, but you can always tell when your getting ripped off when the customer service guys come on here and tell you its your fault. Rather then try to make it right with the customer. Their never nice, never polite, never contrite, just tell you its your fault. Real companies will try to make it right and wont tell you your an idiot for not reading the fine print. jonny x

I just wanted to say a few things about this. I work for the company, which is called Synapes Group Inc., not TWX. 1) TWX is a reference code that we use when we charge accounts so that when a customer calls we can search for that charge. 2) I have seen many of the offers myself, whether it be a offer that was in your credit card statement or on the internet, and it does say there, for those of you who don't read everything you get, that by excepting the offer you are excepting the automatic renewals. Go to magazineout.com to see for yourself. 3) There are other offers out there, phone offers after you make a purchase from and informercial or a catalog company such as JC Penney. The people who say the offers to the customer are not employees of Synapse, they are employees of the company's you called to place an order with. If the terms were not stated when you ordered or were wrongly stated, I'm sorry, then you were ordering under false pretenses and you have every right to call pissed off and cancel the subscriptions. 4) If you do find some charge on your account from us, and want to call to cancel it or to find out what it was for, I have some advice for you: yelling and being forceful isn't going to help. Just know that we are "required" to give our customers good service, but you'll get even better service, and maybe even a pleasent reply, if you are nice about it. The person on the other end of the line didn't charge your account, but we can fix it, remember that. If you are rude, we are not going to want to help you. We hear people all day that say they didn't authorize the charges, when if they only read what was presented to them, they wouldn't have gotten charged in the first place. We even send out notices before we charge you, reminding you that it's coming and if you don't want it to call us. 5) Our call centers aren't open 24 hours. So if you call after 9 pm est then you won't get a live person. call anytime between 9 am and 9 pm est and press 0 twice to get out of the automated system and it works. You have have to wait on hold because we have other calls but if you wait long enough WE WILL ANSWER. 6) I know it's coming so I'll say it now, we don't only take calls about cancellation. We also take orders and change addresses and answer questions. Only a percentage of our calls are cancellations. 7) NOTHING IN LIFE IS FREE! Of course we are going to offer a free term, to see if you like the magazines. If you accept it's your responsibility to cancel if you don't want to get charged. I know that there are going to be people that post after this that says it's a load of crap but it's not.

I was caught in this scheme also. I followed the instructions of one of the solutions using gibberish and it worked. I asked the 'real person' how to get to them quicker and she said, 'just keep pressing zero and you will get to a real person'. I did and it worked. Also being nice really helps! I said I tried canceling through the automated system and it must not have worked because I was billed for the magazines. The representative cancelled them and within 3 days my Credit Card charges were refunded! You can make the system work. Also, the law firm below is filing a class action suit: A law firm has filed a class action against Synapse Group, Inc. alleging deceptive practices regarding magazine subscriptions in a related matter. Please contact our firm if you wish to assist in the investigation. Very truly yours, Michael

I recently was offered three free months for three magazines. After which the subscriptions would continue if I decided not to cancel. The day after I agreed to the offer a pre-authorization charge was posted to my bank account. This resulted in another item being returned do to insufficient funds. I called the company, which told me that the pre-authorization should be lifted within 24 hours. They lied. It is now at 48 hours and the pre-authorization still exist. I called back to cancel the subscription to all three of the magazines. I was not offered a confirmation number for the cancellation, but after requesting one, one was provided. If other charges surface I will seek legal action. With all of this said, please do not order any publications through TWX Magazines.

Thanks to the guy that provided the solution, it worked!

BTW: Thank you to the poster who gave the advice on bypassing the annoying automated happy voice. It did get me past, but unfortunately, not to a human. Instead I got a message that my call was being forwarded to a representative. This message repeated for 15 minutes, then hung up on me. Dannie

I was also caught in this snare and only avoided an overdraft due to overdraft protection. Contrary to the insinuation of the "employee", I was not trying to get "something for nothing". I expect those to have a catch. What I was doing was supporting local school and scout activities by buying subscriptions from children in my neighborhood and those of co-workers. I try to buy one item from each child selling. It is sad that due to unethical companies that exploit innocent children and their unsuspecting and well-meaning customers, I will no longer be willing to help fund cummunity activities in this way. "Employee" seems to be unable or unwilling to differentiate between illegal and unethical. I don't debate the legality of what this company is doing. I do say it is highly unethical for a company to attempt to trick people into eternal open-ended contracts, where years after they make a purchase they can be surprised by unexpected, seemingly unauthorized charges to their bank cards. The irony is that both magazines I cancelled this week are magazines I enjoy. I have subscribed to Reader's Digest all my adult life, and read it since I was a teen. Since I have a daughter living in the Caribbean, Caribbean Travel was of great interest to me. Had I been properly notified that my two-year subscriptions were due for renewal, I would have happily continued my subscriptions and updated my address, since I am a traveling nurse and it changes frequently. Instead, I shall have to do without. What I have done is cancel both subscriptions, and I am contacting the actual publishers of the magazines to inform them that I have cancelled and WHY I have cancelled. I am sorry that two good magazines have allowed their good names to be sullied by association with TWX, but until they terminate that association, I cannot in good conscience support them with my patronage. I advise all who have been deceived into renewals without their active consent to do the same. While it is true I would not "buy a house without reading every word of the contract", I do not expect to have to exercise the same caution when I am merely attempting to help local children and community groups. How sad that that is no longer the case. Dannie Californian in NC

I had the same problem and I accidently hit upon the following solution. It really works!!! Call 800-927-9578 (should also work with 800-773-3142 and 888-321-6247) and respond with any rubbish answer (or some sound) to all the automated voice questions. The automated voice says 'I don't understand' a couple of times and then re-directs to a human customer service representative.

ALL internet offers from our company have a box that YOU MUST check, saying that you READ AND AGREE to the TERMS OF SERVICE in order to recieve the magazines. I don't understand how anyone can check that box and not have read it! When you buy a house, car, or anything. Do you not read the terms of the agreement? Most internet offers already have your credit card information from purchasing something on their site. Knowing this, you just agree to any offers that appear? All YOU see if FREE, you're wrong, the offer says RISK FREE! If you don't know, Risk Free is if you're not satisfied with your PURCHASE, you get your money back. If you're not sure, don't agree, that's all there is to it! I would like to see this website that you say "lures unsuspecting readers", and where there is no place where it says NO THANKS to the offer, and where it has no place to read terms and conditions of the offer. Please respond with this website and prove where it says the magazines are not on automatic renewal.

I also tried this number: 1-800-773-3142. This number gets you to an automated menu. (The same menu as the number above and as 888-321-6247) Through this menu I was able to get my subscription cancelled. When the voice asks if you want to cancel a subscription, say "yes" and it will try to look up your account information. It asks for your home phone number, but if that's a cell phone it can't look up the information. Stick with it until it asks you for your last name. (Before that point it will ask to look up your info by credit card but I wasn't about to give them that info again.) Once it finds your account info...and it will...tell it what magazine to cancel. The system will then offer to refund your money and keep your subscription for like $5.97. After you say "no" it will offer you another offer and so on for about 3-4 offers until finally you get to the point where it just cancels your subscription. It will give you a confirmation number at this point. It says it will take up to 1 to 2 business days but sometimes as much as 2 business cycles to refund your money. Once you get your confirmation number stay on the line and say "cancel magazine" and it will start over and you can cancel another subscription (if you have more than one). I tried getting through to a human being by saying "customer service" but that didn't work. The line would just ring, then I'd hear someone pick up but it would still be ringing. After 2 minutes, the line would get disconnected, even though the operator could hear me and I could hear her.

I had the same problem with this company, and was pretty irritated because it resulted in an overdraft charge to my bank account. However, I called one of the magazine companies with whom TWX started my unwanted subscription with and got their company phone number. Then once you call TWX, do not mess around with the automated voice service. Just say no to everything they ask, which will allow you to speak to a real person. It takes a while to get thru, as they are probably hoping you will hang up. But finally when I got thru and complained, they completely refunded me for all the magazines.