[2] Compiled from: Shandong High Court
 
Case review
Xiaojia checked her phone wallet and found multiple APPs were on "auto-renewal." Some of these APPs had long been unused or even uninstalled... All of this stemmed from Xiaojia forgetting to disable "auto-renewal" when she first activated her membership.

 
 

Xiaojia said she planned to go on a shopping spree during "Double Eleven," so she started tallying up her WeChat and Alipay bills to plan her expenses. She discovered that there were multiple "auto-renewal" deductions in her WeChat and Alipay accounts.
 
There are many citizens with similar experiences to Xiaojia. "I only opened a one-month membership, but the next month I was charged. It wasn't until I called customer service that I found out it was auto-renewal," said Sun, a Jinan resident. Although the monthly membership was only about ten yuan, she had no memory of agreeing to enable auto-renewal.
 
Intending to try out a short-term membership, they didn't expect the "auto-renewal" option to be default-checked in the APP service agreement. If users aren't careful, even after uninstalling the APP, the "auto-renewal" won't be turned off. "Being auto-renewed" has caused many people to fall into a consumption trap.

 
 

A netizen revealed that by chance, while settling payment bills, they discovered various "auto-renewal" deductions, including video memberships, cloud storage memberships, photo editing software memberships, music software memberships, forum memberships, and so on. Although some APPs had long been abandoned, users' wallets were still "leaking." Such examples are by no means isolated. Being charged "unjustified money" inevitably makes consumers feel cheated.
 
 
Article 496 of the Civil Code 
A standard-form clause is a clause that is prepared in advance by a party for repeated use and is not negotiated with the other party at the time of concluding the contract.
 
When a contract is concluded using standard-form clauses, the party providing the standard-form clauses shall determine the rights and obligations between the parties in accordance with the principle of fairness and shall take reasonable measures to draw the other party's attention to clauses that exempt or reduce the provider's liability or involve other significant interests of the other party, and shall explain such clauses upon the other party's request. If the party providing the standard-form clauses fails to fulfill the obligation to draw attention or provide explanation, causing the other party to fail to notice or understand clauses that significantly affect its interests, the other party may assert that such clauses are not part of the contract.
 
 
Article 19 of the E-Commerce Law　
E-commerce operators who bundle products or services must remind consumers in a prominent manner and must not set bundled products or services as a default consent option.

 
 

 
[1] The author's perspective
Nowadays, people's daily lives still rely heavily on mobile apps, especially video and food delivery apps that are closely tied to daily life. App operators are well aware of users' psychology and have long introduced various membership packages, with common ones being auto-renewal and monthly or yearly subscriptions. Auto-renewal often attracts a large number of consumers with a lower first-month fee compared to a single-month purchase, but the problem lies in the inconspicuous line "will auto-renew next month" on the page. Some apps even require checking this option to proceed, and worse, they do not provide a menu to disable "auto-renewal." Since the monthly renewal fee is small, ranging from a few yuan to over a dozen yuan, it is difficult for ordinary consumers to notice, and sometimes even after deleting the app, the charges continue. Once consumers overlook this, it leads to an unnoticed, long-term loss of money over months and years. Clearly, this is unreasonable.
 
For app operators, they believe that by using standard terms and having consumers check the box to agree when signing up, they can absolve themselves of all responsibility, but this is not the case. In reality, the small and inconspicuous font of "auto-renewal," along with unclear markings, may infringe on consumers' right to know; if users cannot proceed without agreeing to "auto-renewal," it is even a form of "forced buying and selling." According to the aforementioned legal provisions, app operators should remind consumers of bundled products or services in a prominent manner, and it is evident that many app operators fail to do this, only seeking loopholes to make money.
 
As consumers, when using apps and signing up for services, we should carefully read the terms of the agreement. After all, the agreement is drafted by the app operator, and as individuals, we are often the weaker party, so we must be cautious in reaching agreements to avoid causing long-term losses to ourselves.