Judge Rules SiriusXM Must Make It Easier to Cancel Subscriptions

A New York state judge ruled Thursday (Nov. 21) that SiriusXM must change its subscription cancellation policies and pay unspecified damages.

Justice Lyle Frank found that the company’s policies violate the federal Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act, Reuters reported Friday (Nov. 22).

New York Attorney General Letitia James brought the suit, alleging that SiriusXM makes it too hard for customers to cancel subscriptions, according to the report.

When ruling on the case, Frank said the company made it “clearly not as easy” to cancel a subscription as it is to sign up for one, per the report.

The judge said SiriusXM required subscribers who were looking to cancel to talk with live agents trained to dissuade them from doing so and to hear offers of other services, according to the report.

James said in a Thursday post on X that the court found that SiriusXM “illegally forced people to go through a long and burdensome process to simply cancel their subscriptions.”

“We sued SiriusXM to protect people’s wallets, and now, SiriusXM must simplify its cancellation process and stop taking advantage of New Yorkers,” James said in the post.

Reached by PYMNTS, SiriusXM said in an emailed statement that the court dismissed almost all the charges against the company and found that its policies “were neither misleading nor deceptive.”

“Most importantly, the court ruled that SiriusXM had shown through ‘a plethora of material … that they have taken repeated steps to avoid creating such an atmosphere’ of fraud or deceit,” the company said. “While the court found some technical violations of a federal statute, it did not find that SiriusXM ever deceived anyone or committed any fraud. SiriusXM intends to appeal the court’s ruling as to those technical violations.”

When filing the lawsuit in December, the New York attorney general said SiriusXM maintains a “deliberately long and burdensome” subscription cancellation process, forcing subscribers to contact an agent and deliberately drawing out those interactions.

“Having to endure a lengthy and frustrating process to cancel a subscription is a stressful burden no one looks forward to, and when companies make it hard to cancel subscriptions, it’s illegal,” James said in a press release at the time.

Reached by PYMNTS at the time the lawsuit was filed, a SiriusXM spokesperson said: “Like a number of consumer businesses, we offer a variety of options for customers to sign up for or cancel their SiriusXM subscription and, upon receiving and reviewing the complaint, we intend to vigorously defend against these baseless allegations that grossly mischaracterize SiriusXM’s practices.”