Santa Barbara County prosecutors say they’ve reached a settlement with one of the biggest online dating companies in the nation over allegations customers didn’t receive fair notice they were signing up for automatically renewing subscriptions.
County prosecutors teamed up with DA’s in four other counties, and the City of Santa Monica to go after the Match Group, Incorporated with a consumer protection lawsuit. The company owns popular dating sites like Match.com, OKCupid, Tinder, and Plenty of Fish.
Prosecutors contended that the signup process for the sites failed to clearly warn consumers that they were signing up for a service which would charge their credit cards indefinitely. They also say the cancellation process was long, and time consuming.
Match denied the allegations. But, the company will pay $2 million dollars as part of a settlement. It also agreed to make the signup for the paid portions of the dating services clearer, and has already moved to simplify the cancellation process.
