Automatic renewal not so automatic with MS

Xbox sent me an email on 12/3/13 saying that they would charge me $59.99 on 1/3/14 to renew my live membership. On 1/2/14 they sent me this :

Dear xxxxxxxxxxx

This mail is confirmation that you have successfully renewed your subscription to Gold – 12 Month. This renewal goes into effect on Friday, January 03, 2014. Please retain a copy of this for your records. Here is a description of
the service:

Then at the beginning of February I start getting emails saying that my card is expired and to update my info to avoid any interruption of services. I called support and got nowhere. Does anybody else read this to infer anything besides my payment for services
was completed in January? This is stupid. Happened last year as well. Customer support keeps telling me that the payment didn't go through and that this email does not in fact state that the payment went through. I am sick and tired of word games with MS.
If my payment was rejected for any reason, just say that. No instead they send me a confirmation of renewal and then tell me that it does not say the payment went through. Worst communication ever. Nice job MS.

:)

 

Turn Off Automatic Renewal?

Hello! I'm trying to turn off my automatic renewal. I've gone to the help, and it tells me to go to 'My Account' and it would say 'Automatic Renewal' and hit 'Change.' However, I don't see the 'Automatic Renewal' link anywhere, and I'm not quite sure where
to look.

 

Automatic renewal

It say next to automatic renewal you press change, but it doesn't say where the automatic renewal option is!

 

actually if you are getting a email saying your payment did not go thru then it didn't go thru

also you can check commerce.microsoft.com

the email saying you renewed in jan is the initial automated autorenewal email that will be the first email and as long as the creditcard doesn't declines it. however if declined ms will try for the next 21days or 3 times

if it is unsuccessful you can receive a suspension for payment options

if your payment went thru and showing on your creditcard or commerce.microsoft.com then ms will see it but they haven't

you will have to discuss it with xbox support

you will continue to receive that email that its has been unsuccessful 3 x if it is declined until you are updated or suspended for payment option in which case you will need to add a new payment option

 

basically you get that first email regardless if your payment went thru or not

it means ms tried to charge your card they are telling you that they are charging you for the renewal

however declination of charges may not be instant (1-2 days sometimes) hence why the delay

also why ms will try for the next 21days to give you time to clear any blockage like over credit limit block

 

Keep in mind, also, that every account has a billing date specific to that account, related to the date of the month you created it. If you created your account on July 15th, for example, and your 12-Month Gold membership renewed on January 2nd, you would
get an email on January 2nd stating that your Gold had successfully renewed. At this time, Xbox has started the new cycle, and generated a $59.99 (plus tax) charge against the credit card you designated previously. But it will not process this charge until
January 15th, the account's billing date.

You may need to contact Xbox Customer Support to inquire about your account's billing date, so you can mark it down and always plan around it when you have automatic renewals. Also note, the billing date only applies to automatic payments. Any time you go
into the marketplace and Confirm Purchase, you will be charged immediately.

 

It gets worse than this they even take from a credit card which has an expired date! usually the account number stays the same and this is what the claim is made against even when its EXPIRED !!!

Be warned

 

That's actually pretty normal for a lot of services, Welsh. When you have a subscription attached to a credit card, and that credit card expires, the subscription payments will still be honored by the bank or credit card company, but they won't allow further
purchases or new subscriptions to be set up until the credit card details are updated. This is a courtesy many businesses offer so you don't have to worry about frantically calling up everyone you do business with to update them all. It means you can update
various companies one at a time, as you need them.

 

I seem to be having a similar problem to this. For my subscription, I use my bank card and it seems to have over drawn my bank account (poor college student) and I get this same billing error message when I get on the xbox. The weird thing is, though,
that my account says the subscription has been renewed.