Whoo hoo! I finally canceled AOL!

Ahh…feels good to have cut those apron strings.

In 1997, when I bought my first computer, the whole online experience was overwhelming to me. I didn’t know my RAM from my CDROM, my modem from my mail. So, AOL was a great choice (at the time)–I learned the basics of online crap, started IMing, etc. It was a good training ground.

Then it started to crash. All. The. Time. Then the busy signals. Then the shitty browser. Then the spam–the tons and TONS of spam. Then the various encounters with AOL Techs. I stayed with them through it all. This summer, DeathLlama and I vowed to shed the newbie skin and lose the company we didn’t like anyway. And ta-dah! I just canceled. I feel all grown up now. :wink:

The conversation was amusing. (But I had to sit through about 3-4 minutes of being on hold after selecting “Cancel” from the phone tree, the whole time being barraged by various AOL commercials) A run-down of how it went:

**Cheery AOL GUY: ** What made you decide to cancel?

Me: The browser is terrible, I can’t configure the email to be prescanned by antivirus software, and kicking up the price to $14.95/mo (for provide your own access) was the last straw. It isn’t worth it. It’s been five years; it’s just time.

CAG: So you were using it mostly for mail.

**M: ** Yes. And now I have a different service for that as well that Norton AV can scan.

CAG: Well, I can give you three free months of AOL.

M: No. The price then just goes back to $15 a month. [and the browser STILL sucks]

CAG: Well, it might offset the other company…

M: The other company gives us 50megs of web space as opposed to AOL’s two.

CAG: I see we just billed your account yesterday. If you want, I could refund that billing and start your 3 free months then. You could enjoy AOL until the end of October, when you could contact us with your final decision…

M: No, I’d just like to cancel my account.

CAG (somewhat resigned, not so cheery anymore): Okay. Here’s your cancellation confirmation number. Should you change your mind, you could blah blah blah.

Oof! Stubborn protocol they’ve got there.

But ahhhh…I am AOL-free!

Hey, I can relate.

Back in November, when I got laid off, I decided to cancel AOL on the Mac upstairs that my kids used when they were here. When I called to cancel, I got the same hold time with commercials, and when the CS guy comes on it went like this,

AOL: What made you decide to cancel?

Me: I got laid off and sold the computer to pay some bills, so I don’t need an Internet provider.

AOL: I’m sorry here that, did you know that you can search for a new job by using AOL?

Me: I don’t have a computer, I sold it.

AOL: Did you know that AOL offers many other services, that can help you when you want to buy a new car or travel, or just surf the Internet.

Me: I don’t have a computer, how am I going to surf the internet using AOL, if I don’t have a computer? I sold it.

AOL: Well, I can offer you three free months until you make your final decision, and at that time if you still feel you want to cancel, you can.

Me: This is my final decision, I don’t have a computer, I sold it.

AOL: Okay. Here’s your cancellation confirmation number. Should you change your mind, you can just sign on using your user name and just click the appropriate box, if you shou…

Me: click
They have the same standard script for people trying to cancel. I think if I did take the three months, and called back, I would probably go through the same thing.
They keep sending me discs saying they want me back, but we have cable hook up now[sub](and a new job)[/sub], and why would I want go back to a dial up.

[famous AOL voice-guy]
You’ve got brains!!
[/famous AOL voice-guy]

Good on ya.
Gratuitous anti-AOL rant to follow:
Wretched “No wonder its number one!!” propaganda machine that it is. Its only number one because they inundate anyone who could possibly ever even consider finding an ISP with millions of free trial cds. Heres an idea-- stop printing billions of friggin trial cds and use the money you save to lower user cost and improve service. That is all…

Ruffian cancels and AOL-Time-Warner stock is down 22% percent today. Coincidence? I think not.

I cancelled AOL once, they kept charging my card…heard it happens to others, so keep a watch.

Me, too.

Ruffian: Hi, my name’s Ruffian and I used to be an AOL user.

All: Hi, Ruffian!

I just cancelled too, and I was a member since 1993. I wonder if that’s a record.

I only keep AOL, for the entertainment I get from shouting at the happless employee’s down the line.

egg

note to self

Call AOL and pretend to cancel for 3 free months of service.

Baraqiyal, that might be ! I’ve been a member since 1994 or so, and I’m cutting the apron strings in the next few weeks. ( I have to actually plan this carefully, I use my AOL name for business and so have to build the Grandmother of all e-mails, to do an appropriate notify for the new name ).

I too have heard stories about people’s credit cards being charged for months after cancelling AOL. Fortunately, I’ve been a member long enough, and have had enough in-depth dealings with AOL that I have a direct number in Herndon, Virginia where AOL’s offices are. I won’t call an 800 #, I will call Virginia, get the name and extension of the person I am talking to.

These are the same people a few years ago who went and dug around in their desks, to find me a CD of AOL 5.0 when I couldn’t lay my hands on one to save my life. ( AOL 6.0 had been out for a while, but I needed to not upgrade ). The people down there actually found me a CD, and mailed it to me. Not for nothing, but that was far and above what was required of them, and it made an impression.

Like any virtual monopoly, they’re arrogantly awful to deal with. All of the complaints listed in the O.P. are true, and yet they have served my needs fairly well for almost a decade.

And, of course, being on the Internet has changed my life, so I gotta thank em for that.

So go and cancel I shall, one day soon. But first, I will call my credit card and inform them that the service has been cancelled as of that day, and any further attempt by AOL as a vendor to collect should be blocked as fraud. Amex loves that kind of thing, and will be glad to honor my request.

And yes, I DO love AOL, I simply cannot afford both that and a local ISP. I’ve already downloaded AIM. :wink:

Cartooniverse

Heh, we had Prodigy or CompuServe in various forms since 1991. But we went through a time in (1996?) where we just could NOT afford to have internet access. We closed our account, but saw that we’d get a free month with AOL.

We knew AOL sucked donkey balls (I had seen my friends have it), but dammit, it was free. So we signed on for the free month, so we could continue to have internet access. After the first month, we thought, “ah, forget it,” and called to cancel.

As soon as you said the words, “cancel my account,” they authorised another free month, with unlimited hours! (This was back when you’d get 40 free hours for a month). So okay. Heh, we continued this for about 6 months. End of the month arrives, call AOL to cancel, get another free month. Hey, if they were so quick to give you a free month, who are you to argue?

By that time, we could finally afford to pay for access, so we really did cancel. To me, AOL is tolerable for free service (honestly, I bet we could’ve gone on for months and months without a problem), but as soon as we could afford to pay for service, we switched in a second. I hated AOL and was so glad to be rid of it.

I signed up with it a long, long time ago. 1995, 1996 or so. Connected once, but had trouble reconnecting. Decided it wasn’t worth the effort, and let the free trial period thing slide on by. Then I decided to get back on and cancel, but couldn’t for some reason (I seem to recall that I wasn’t able to access my account). Now, this was back when I was truly, truly naive, and it never occurred to me that they’d resume billing - don’t ask me why it didn’t.

So I was billed, over and over again. Called AOL, they wouldn’t stop the billing. Called credit card people, they said - send em to us, we’ll kick their collective asses. This went on for a while - oh, about 18 months! - but I’ve been clean for a long time!

I had AOL for two years before college. My college offers free internet service (with a lan) so I called to cancel, they kept saying I can keep it in college, but I only use it to connect to the internet, I don’t even use it for mail. I did take their free month though as I had about three weeks left until college started. I did the same thing the second year when I used it for the summer. It’s still annoying and way to expensive. I had it tied to my bank account and had to go to the bank to tell them not to let AOL draw out anymore money as they were more than happy to keep billing me after I canceled. I’m now with earthlink, which is still pretty expensive, hard to log on with and such but it’s only for three months during the summer in which I can then go back to my much faster, non-dialup connections in college.

Drat! You mean you cancelled your AOL account? I thought you’d managed to cancel, like, the whole company.

Does anyone know how to do that? Now, that would be impressive. :slight_smile:

I canceled it about 2 weeks ago. I was on since… 1994!!!

I even beta tested many of the new versions of AOL, starting with 2.0 and up. People always hack on AOL, but I honestly thought everything was fine until about 6 months ago. Everything started to not work.

I am glad to be free of them.