Shutterstock

Shutterstock advertises a "free trial" but if you do not remember to cancel in time, this trial results in your subscription to an annual membership, the terms for which are not made clear when signing up for the trial. An annual membership means that they charge you over $30 per month without any notice or receipt of purchase and automatically include an auto renew feature. When you finally realize that you need to cancel this subscription, they want you to pay $100 to cancel. You cannot even go back to get your money's worth because the 10 photos per month that are part of the annual plan do not roll over. While their customer service agent lowered my cancellation fee from $100 to $20, she was unable to stop the charge that was currently pending nor was she able to refund the payments for the months where I did not use any product or service. I will also note that this is a repeated problem with this business, as evinced by the numerous reviews left with the Revdex.com about this exact same problem.

I signed up for Shutterstock In March 2020, for what I believed to be one month, for about $30 (I was using the photos to create a cozy online classroom for my students). A few months later I realized I was being charged monthly, in an ongoing fashion. I tried several times to cancel my subscription online, but couldn’t find the right password and the reset consistently did not work. When I asked them to send me a password reset I could never find the email, though I checked spam, trash, etc. in my email. I have also called them twice in July, but without an account number there was no way to taLk to anyone.

They fraudulently charged my credit card $199. They claim it is a valid account but the email they gave me is not mine. They refuse to refund my money.

I signed up for a free trial in April for a project, but then forgot to cancel the membership because Shutterstock never sent me any emailed receipts as it billed me monthly that would have reminded me I signed up for it and was now being charged outside of the free trial period. I tried to cancel but the “24-7 support” it says it offers on its website doesn’t actually exist. No one is there to chat, the email option doesn’t actually send, and the phone line drops your call. This is totally predatory and exploitative business practice. Other reviews have also mentioned an exorbitant cancellation fee, though I can’t even reach them to see what that fee would be. I don’t understand how they can have an A+ Revdex.com rating with all these complaints. Is this a change to their business operations and the rating here simply doesn’t reflect it yet? In any case, I am already out $100 with no end in sight and I haven’t even used their product!

If you try to buy a $29 package of images, they try to trick you into choosing the "auto-renew" option. The check box for this option is pre-checked so you are screwed if you don't notice and uncheck the box. Deceptive practice for sure.

I have sent three emails to Shutterstock since June *, 2020 asking them to remove my information and photos from their system and to delete my account. Their stated and printed (on website) policy is to respond to such requests within thirty days. To date, they have not responded and my account is still active. I have also reached out to the NY Attorney General office to file a complaint as well.

The free trial is a total scam. I signed up on June *** and then they billed me 4 days early on July *. It won’t even give me an option to cancel online and no on replies back to DMs on twitter, emails, and you’re constantly on hold for hours when you call. I just want my refund and account canceled.

I asked them twice now how to cancel my plan and they are telling me there will be a $200 charge to balance out the “savings” I have had. I used 2 images from their service a year ago for my mother’s funeral. I have not used it since.

Poor customer service, I called three times for a resolution, to which none was given. Following the download of the photo, I attempted to use it for my website and it was of poor quality, both washed out and extremely yellow in color. The really sad thing about it all is I could find these photos online for free, but I was trying to do the right thing and pay the artist $99. Shutterstock could have at least offered a resolution so that I was happy with a photo I was paying $99 for.

I signed up for Shudderstock under a free trial. It was stated that after the free trial I would be charged 29.99 per month. Im positive that I was told that I could cancel at any time. I signed up for this to help with a college class on image editing. At the end of the class I forgot to cancel my subscription. When I remembered and tried, I found that I could not do it online. I have tried to call half a dozen times and each time after a few minutes the line goes silent (void of hold music) and then a few minutes after that the line is disconnected. The chat option they have on their webpage never seems to be available and supposedly the customer service is available 24/7 But I think that is a lie. Additonally, I see that I am subscribed to an annual plan and that I they may charge me a fee to cancel early. This business employee deceptive and predatory business practices and needs to be dealt with. I have sent them an email but I dont think they will respond given the complete lack of customer service and other complaints made to the Revdex.com.

I have tried to cancel my subscription due to covid 19. I got unemployed and I dont use this anymore for work. I dont have enough money to pay my rent or student loan anymore. I have contacted them few times. They are so rude an d they asked to pay a huge amount of cancellation fee. I am getting charge $56 USD every month for nothing. When that can pay for my food at this pandemic. :( How people can be so scammy and unfair, while so many other companies are helping people during this time.

I am hoping someone here help me to cancel my subscription with them without paying cancellation fee! As I was their customers for 2 years already!!!!

I need a refund for the month of June!!!

Hello, I signed up for a free trial membership of Shutterstock back in February. They started charging me 29.99 per month since March. I reached out to them in April upon seeing the monthly charges - Called by phone and was advised that the only way to request a cancellation is by email. I was directed to send my request to a particular email address "***" for a complete cancellation, which I did. After this circutous process, I see no confirmation of cancellation from Shutterstock and have been charged the monthly fee for May as well. I tried to access my account and there isn't an option in my settings to cancel or disable. I tried to use the chat option and call the number again. Both options were futile - I couldn't reach anybody by chat and when I call the number, I'm not able to speak to anybody because they keep playing one telemarketing ad after another. I don't want to be charged anymore and need a full refund from this fraudulent company. Also, I tried to remove my credit card information from my account and I'm now "allowed" to do so. I've never seen such a thing!

I wanted to purchase one image on the website. They told me I had to buy a one month plan. I purchased the one month plan so that I could buy one image. Now I am getting monthly charges saying I am locked into an annual plan and am not able to get out of it. I tried contacting their office and it keeps saying it is closed. There is no button to even delete my account on the website, nor can I remove the credit card from their website.

The free trial is ultimately a scam. They tell you the date the plan will be renewed, but they take the money from your card 4 days before that date , there is no way to cancel on line and no one answering the phone .. all I want to do is cancel my account before 1 month is over

I registered with Shutterstock for a free monthly trial Standard License on February *, 2020. The next day I realized in order to use their images on t-shirt I would need to change my account to a "365-day Enhanced License Subscription with 1 download.” I called to confirm this and then I logged in and paid $99 to cover the enhanced license and convert my account to the new terms.

I was told by a telephone representative that the Enhanced license (and my full payment) would replace the Standard License. At no time in writing or on the phone did was there any notification that I was signing up for an Annual Standard license plan.

After paying $99 on Feb for the full year of the enhanced plan, I downloaded the one image I paid for and I have never used the service again. I do not want any

Due to the pandemic, I did not see the charges on my card until this week. I was charged $29 on March and April *.

I wrote to them on May and explained the fact that I had two different subscriptions on my account when their should have only been one. I requested that the charges be refunded and no further charges be made to my account. I explained that I did not sign up for an Annual plan and I received no contract or details from them when I created my log in.

Despite repeated claims on their website that you can "cancel at any time," they stated that these “monthly” charges are actually an annual plan that can only be canceled in the weeks leading up to the Annual renewal (so February 2021). To cancel at any other time, they want to charge an additional $20 for each month since they started charging my card—so they want an additional $40 and they will not refund the $58 erroneously charged up to this point.

Their website makes it impossible to shut off the recurring charges and attempting to call result in long wait times on the phone. When they respond to questions via email, they do not address the circumstances of my complaint and just provide boiler plate asking me to authorize more charges.

Note that I did not download any of the “10 images a month” included in the plan they claim I signed up for. I had no idea this account with these charges had been activated. They did not send invoices or receipts for charges on either March or April *.

There are numerous complaints about this company and their lack of documentation about plans and poor wording on their website. It appears their intent is to deceive customers into creating an account and using a free monthly trial, but they begin billing 25 days after the “one month trial” and then they call it an annual plan with no option to cancel until the following year without fees.

I signed up for a discounted trial at $20 a month on Jan 2020, I emailed customer service to cancel my plan on the 20th of Jan and thought that was that. They did not mention anything about a cancelation fee! I find out that not only was my plan not canceled, but I had been charged $29 for the past three months and I found out yesterday I was charged $171 (April ***)! They claimed I signed up for a new plan, I did no such thing! I hadn't visited that account in month's! This company only makes money off of scamming people into signing up for trials, hoping they will forget, and when they find out, they cannot cancel it. There is no way to cancel your plan from your account, so you have to email them to do so which is absolutely ridiculous. Not only was I charged $171 for a subscription I did not sign up for and do not use, but they also will not give me a refund AND they want to charge me a $50 cancelation fee on top of the $171 they stole from my bank account. The world is plagued with COVID-19 and I'm worried about paying my rent and buying food, not worried about Shutterstock a company who's sole business model is built on scamming people in to trial subscriptions that increase in price and can never be canceled.

I signed up because of the free trial. It was not stated that I am signing up for a 1 year membership. I wanted to see how their services and if their collection is better than the others. Clearly it's not. Others that offers the same service don't even ask for credit card when you sign up. I should have known better. Didn't realized that I was charge for a few months now. it was never clear. And now they want to charge me a lot of money if I cancel the membership. And with less to offer, they clearly lacking on services. Other site let you use the unused download the next month. The site don't.

As per the previous complaint. We signed up to the 10 downloads a month annual contract with first month free and freedom to cancel the full contract without any costs in the first month. Our month expires tomorrow, Sunday, but it appears that there is no way of contacting Shutterstock over the weekend. Surely if you have policies that expire over the weekend, you need to enable customers to do just that. I cannot enable direct contact, cannot call and my emails to Shutterstock are cancelled without sending as soon as you say, Cancel the plan.

I have signed up to the 10 image trial period and suddenly without my permission I noticed an amount of 99 dollars here deducted from my bank account to shutterstock, and after days of back and forth emails they refuse to return the money saying that "Contributors have been paid" which is such scam because all the images I have downloaded were during the trial period which do not exceed 8 images, this is absolutely disgraceful and unethical, adding insult to injury there are no options to cancel this subscription yourself.

I registered with Shutterstock for a free trial in December 2019. At no time was it made obvious that it would lead to a year long contract or what the rates and terms for that contact would be. I also was not provided explicit information on the process and implications of the free trial.

This was done using my author pen name PJ Mayhem with an emaill address being: *** as the membership was for my writing project. However I have provided my legal identity being Margaret M and my email address in this name, as the debit amounts were charged to a bank account in that name.

At no time was it made obvious in undertaking the free trial that it would lead to a year long contract or what the rates and terms for that contact would be. I also was not provided explicit information on the process and implications of the free trial.

I have attempted to contact them via email and online chat multiple times to resolve the above and cancel the contract but none of my communications have been resolved or responded to.

While the email for my account is valid, I have a username which I did not select and was not ever provided this by Shutterstock – the only way I came across it was by logging into my account.

Further the only files that I now have access to download are EPS files not JPG - as I do not use design software, I cannot even take advantage of having the plan. The format of files was not made clear at any point either and I note that during the trial I could access JPG files.

Their services and the way they go about things is very questionable and even if not technically illegal, the omission and lack of response to enquiries crosses ethical and allowable consumer care for service protocols.

I also note that Shutterstock do not provide a direct email address and the mechanism to contact them via their website does not provide an acknowledgement of receipt, therefore it is impossible to provide evidence and, unless recorded separately dates of contact them (hence the dates provided in this complaint are approximate).