Subscriptions are pushed through the Duma – Newspaper Kommersant No. 41 (7486) dated 03/13/2023

Before the end of the spring session, a bill will be submitted to the State Duma, according to which Internet services (online cinemas, music streaming, etc.) will have to notify users of the planned debiting of funds for a subscription using push notifications or emails. The new rules were developed for a year, and initially it was assumed that notifications would have to include the ability to instantly unsubscribe. Due to industry fears that the mechanism would lead to an outflow of subscribers, the bill was softened, but even its new version does not suit market participants.

Sources of Kommersant in the IT market said that on March 9, a meeting was held at ANO Tsifrovaya ekonomika on a bill on regulating notifications about paid subscriptions to Internet services (online cinemas, music streaming, etc.), which is being developed by a deputy “United Russia” Anton Nemkin. The meeting was attended by representatives of Yandex, VTB, Sberbank, the Center for Strategic Research and the deputy himself. According to two Kommersant sources, as a result, it was decided to submit the bill to the State Duma before the end of the spring session. This information was confirmed by Kommersant and Mr. Nemkin himself.

The development of a document on the regulation of notifications about paid subscriptions began in 2022. Then Vedomosti wrote that it was planned to amend the law on consumer protection, obliging Internet service operators to send a notification to customers about the planned deduction of monthly subscription payments a day in advance. The notification should have included a button to unsubscribe.

Now the bill suggests that in the notification that service operators are required to send to subscribers, instead of the opt-out button, there will be a link to the user agreement and other information about the subscription, says a Kommersant source familiar with the new version of the document: “The change was fundamental for Internet service operators “.

Another interlocutor of Kommersant notes that the discussion of the document dragged on for a year, because he met with “serious opposition from business.” Service operators, he explains, feared that the opt-out button would deprive the company of “sleeping subscribers” – customers who, for example, signed up for a month-long trial subscription and forgot to cancel it. Rostelecom (Wink), Yandex, MegaFon (owns the Start online cinema) and MTS (Kion) declined to comment. Sberbank and VTB did not answer “Kommersant”.

“We have carefully considered the position of business and seriously revised the draft law to take into account the interests of both users and Internet companies,” says Mr. Nemkin. Some services, he admits, continue to insist on their right not to warn people about future subscription payments: “We don’t agree with them on that.”

Many companies already notify users about the end of the subscription and the future debiting of funds for it, but a fifth of consumers do not receive such messages, Oleg Pavlov, head of the Public Consumer Initiative, who participated in the discussion of the project, told Kommersant. In addition, Mr. Pavlov added, many users have difficulty tracking paid subscriptions, canceling them after the trial period: “Also, the stated subscription conditions often do not correspond to reality, for example, some content is missing or you have to pay extra for another part.”

A Kommersant source in a large IT company explains that, according to statistics, on average, users of audiovisual services use a subscription for about five months, which, in his opinion, “suggests that there is no problem unsubscribing.”

A monthly reminder to renew a subscription, he says, will increase the number of user abandonment by 15-20%.

“In this form, the bill can harm conscientious market participants, as well as worsen the user experience for millions of citizens,” fears another Kommersant interlocutor in the IT market. Another Kommersant source notes that even the new version of the bill is considered “excessive regulation” in the industry.

Nikita Korolev, Yulia Yurasova