Helpdesk: Saga of an unwanted magazine subscription hard to digest

In January, I received a letter from Readers Digest welcoming me as a new subscriber to the magazine. However, as far as I am aware, I have never filled in any application form to become a subscriber and I do not want to receive the magazine.

I sent them a letter asking them to delete the details from my record and to stop the subscription. However, a few weeks later, I received another letter and magazine – again, I wrote to them and asked for this to be stopped.

But the same thing happened again last week and I was sent another copy.

Having already contacted them a number of times with no success, I am not sure how I can get this to be stopped.

JC, Dalgety Bay

A: A spokeswoman for Readers Digest said: “We are sorry to learn that this reader has been receiving magazines he did not expect. Our records show we sent an offer for a year’s subscription at £21.99 in the post to him in early January, and that we received a firm order for the subscription, so the January issue of the magazine was sent out to him.

“The February issue of the magazine was sent shortly after and we then received a cancellation request into our office at the Isle of Man. The subscription was cancelled on 2 February, but this was too late to prevent despatch of the March issue. An acknowledgement of cancellation was sent to the reader explaining that, whilst the subscription had been cancelled, he would still receive the March issue and he should keep this issue, and the January & February issues with our compliments.

“No payment was due and the bill for £21.99 was cancelled from his account. We are sorry if this letter did not arrive and the reader was unaware that his request to cancel had been acted upon.

“I hope this helps to clarify the situation.”