By Barnaby "Bottom-Line" Coyne
Somewhere between the free sign-up and the surprise charge, eHarmony crossed a legal line. Australia's federal court has ruled that the US-based dating website engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct, running what regulators called "subscription traps" that cost thousands of customers hundreds of dollars apiece.
The case, brought by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission back in 2023, centered on two things: eHarmony's advertising that dating on its platform was free, and the way it disclosed subscription costs and renewal terms once a customer signed up for a premium plan. The watchdog said it had received hundreds of complaints before it sued.
The mechanics of a subscription trap are familiar to anyone who has tried to cancel a gym membership or a streaming service: an easy sign-up, a free taste, and then fine print on pricing and auto-renewal that's harder to find than the offer that lured you in. When a court calls that deceptive rather than just annoying, it means the company's own marketing claims didn't match what customers were actually charged.
What penalty eHarmony will face has not yet been determined by the court, and the company's response to the ruling was not detailed in reporting. Those numbers — the fine, the refunds, if any — are the ones worth watching next.
For now, the ruling stands as a warning to any subscription business banking on customers not reading the terms: regulators are reading them instead.
Somebody's paying for this. Let's find out who.
— Compiled from reporting by The Guardian.
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