Giles Coren’s anger at Amazon Prime membership is shared

"I can’t believe you’ve been screwing me for £79 a year"

Giles Coren took to Twitter to rant against Amazon after discovering that his free Prime trial in 2012 had led to a £79 annual charge (Rex)

Amazon has been accused of “tricking” people into paying £79 for its Amazon Prime service – by customers who signed up for a free trial.

The online retail giant enticed many shoppers to sign up for 30 days of free Prime before Christmas with the offer of next-day delivery. Prime membership guarantees free one-day delivery on millions of items as well as a number of other perks, such as unlimited photo storage and access to an instant video streaming service.

The free trial offer has been around for several years, catching out some people who forget to cancel their subscription before 30 days are up. But restaurant critic Giles Coren today brought the issue into focus after expressing his frustration in combative terms on Twitter.

“You bastards Amazon. I can’t believe you’ve been screwing me for £79 a year for Prime! I had no idea,” he wrote after discovering that his free trial in 2012 had led to the annual charge.

The obvious advice is to check their bank statements more regularly to spot such rogue payments. But the number of people who contacted Coren with similar complaints suggest many were confused by the original offer. “I got caught too, confusing set of buttons when buying. When clicked back to check the page wording it didn’t appear,” wrote one. Another said: “I’ve just checked and yep £79 lighter and didn’t even know. I can’t even remember signing up!”

Amazon said: “Customers who sign up to a free trial of Prime receive an email informing them of the duration of the free trial and how to avoid continuing to paid Prime Membership.

“Customers who become full Prime members can cancel their membership at any time and we will refund the full membership if the customer has not made any eligible purchases or used any Prime benefits.

“So as long as you haven’t used the free delivery, downloaded or streamed any videos through the service, or borrowed a Kindle book, you can simply cancel the membership and reclaim the subscription.”