Cutting the Adobe cord — how to end your annual subscription for free

Are you ready to move away from Adobe but tied in to a 12-month contract? Don’t want to pay a large fee just to stop paying them? Read on to find out how you can end your subscription today — at no cost at all.

I’ve used Adobe software for decades.

In the early days it was a pirated copy of Photoshop that was passed around — probably on floppies (Google it).

Adobe, and other similar companies, knew people did this and were generally ok with the situation even if that couldn’t be their official line.

Back in the day the software cost a fortune and for those wanting to learn how to use it without the benefit of a huge existing income, a college with up-to-date resources, or an employee to pay for it, piracy was the only option.

At some point the software becomes a valuable part of your income and you pay for it (either for moral and/or legal reasons — and maybe because of the headache of using pirated software).

Or maybe it doesn’t become a valuable part of your business in which case you either use something else, or you continue to use a pirated copy. Adobe are no worse off as you would never have bought it anyway.

To be clear on this point, and hopefully to head-off unnecessary comments, if you make money from software you should pay for it.

Then came the subscription model. Suddenly Adobe software was more financially accessible to more people. From photography-only options to the full suite — none of them cost too much.

At least, not for a year. But year after year after year of subscriptions and the cost soon adds up. And you never actually own anything.

Then we have the debacle of the recent ‘price rise’ where the cost of the basic photography package doubled overnight — which Adobe later back-pedaled on trying to claim it was just a test (tell that to the people who paid twice what others paid).

Add to that their demand users stop using older versions of their software — which some people may need due to older equipment — or face legal action, and it’s fair to say relations between Adobe and many customers are strained.

There was a time when alternatives to many Adobe products were very limited. Photoshop in particular was a problem. It’s always been a superb product and good alternatives were, at best, just that — good. And many were very poor — especially for someone used to Photoshop.

But the reality is most people don’t use anything like the full-features of Photoshop. All most of us need are the ‘basics’ done well. And those alternatives now exist.

Which gets me to the point of this article (About time, I hear you say).

I randomly saw a YouTube video by Joseph Cristina, a professional creative who uses Adobe software extensively. He, too, is fed up.

He’s cancelled his Creative Cloud subscription and started testing other products in a quest to find pro-level alternatives. He is documenting this in a playlist on his channel — ‘Life After Adobe — Cutting the Adobe Cord’.

He’s very frank about the fact that, as he makes his living using this software, if he can’t find usable alternatives he will go back. That’s understandable. But so too is his desire to ‘cut the adobe cord’.

I pay for two full Creative Cloud accounts. One of which no longer gets much use so — partly inspired by Joesph — I decided to cancel one of them to start with, and look at alternatives before cancelling the other.

But when I tried to cancel, I was hit with a cancellation fee which I wasn’t too keen on paying (the fee is 50% of your remaining annual contract).

Like most subscription-based offers, Adobe throw various deals at you when you try to cancel. Sometimes they offer you 60 days free but the option I was given was ‘save 40% on the current price’ (which is actually the current offer to new subscribers).

Although I wanted to cancel, I didn’t want to pay the cancellation fee. As this contract ends in January, I figured the 40% off was a good compromise. I would pay 40% less until January which, while that came to just a bit more than the cancellation fee, at least I’d have the option to make some use of it until then rather than paying a fee with nothing to show for it.

Of course, life is never that simple.

When I took up the offer to ‘save 40%’, it actually cancelled my current contract and started a new 12-month contract. So now I was tied in until next July.

I didn’t see anything on the offer page that made this clear. Maybe it was linked to in small print, but that isn’t good enough. If the good parts of the offer are in large bold type, so should the fundamental detail that you are starting a new contract.

I spoke to live chat. It was like speaking to a robot (and actually when you first connect you do — simply type ‘speak to a human’ or similar to get a person).

All they could do was repeat ad-nauseam that by taking up the offer I was starting a new contract. I knew this (now). That wasn’t my point. My point was it wasn’t made clear and I wanted my contract date to go back to January.

It was late and I was ready to go to sleep so I ended asking them to do the right thing and put it back to January.

The next day I checked and, not surprisingly, it was still set to expire July 2020 and there was no contact from Adobe.

I spoke to another person. This guy was a gem. For a front-line support worker he sure thought he knew enough about contract law.

Apparently, once you sign a contract, it’s impossible to change the price without a new contract which must be another 12 months. That’s how the law works. Apparently.

This is where I managed to get out of the contract without paying a cancellation fee, but before I explain that, a slight diversion about this chat session.

Remember, at this point I already had the option to cancel for free, so there was nothing in this for me. My wife says I just like arguing, but I wanted Adobe to change their offer page so it was clear to others. Not everyone would have gone to the trouble I did to fix this and would be stuck with an extended contract.

This conversation lasted about an hour.

I know. I shouldn’t waste my time. But as I kept saying — the page did not make it clear it was cancelling my contract and starting a new 12-month one, and it should have.

He actually said they make the 40% discount offer and it is up to me as the consumer to use that information to make a decision on whether to take it.

Yes, obviously, but to make an informed decision I need to know the ‘small print’.

EU law on small print is very clear. You can’t hide important details — which this is — in small print when the good parts of the offer are large. Although to be fair, he never even said the new contract was explained anywhere, not even in small print. He just said that’s how it works and I was expected to know that.

All I wanted at this stage was for him to say ‘Thanks for pointing that out, I’ll pass it on and we’ll check it out and amend it if it isn’t clear” (maybe it did say it and I just missed it in my ‘excitement’ to save 40%).

But it took an hour for him to agree to do that and I doubt he even meant it. Despite me saying throughout the conversation that I was bored, and he must be bored, and I that had nothing to gain personally etc — the conversation just kept going on.

At one point I asked for a complaints email address

‘There isn’t one’ apparently.

If anyone knows of one — and there must be one — please post it in a comment.

This guy tried everything to deflect from my basic point. When I asked if he understood the frustration of a growing number of long-term users, he simply said it was a choice to use their software and the software is very good. Yes. True. But can you answer my question please?

His attitude, combined with everything else, has solidified my resolve to find alternatives to all Adobe packages I use. Well done to that guy.

Ok… to get to the point — he did tell me something that the person the night before didn’t do. Why the first person didn’t tell me I don’t know. Maybe they didn’t know, or maybe they didn’t want me to know.

It’s also obvious when you think about it.

They cancelled my old contract and started a new one without telling me beforehand. That’s what annoyed me so much.

But it’s also what has allowed me to walk away without a cancellation fee.

You can cancel new contracts within 14 days without any penalty.

That’s right. Adobe — after trying to get over 100 quid from me to cancel — then gave me a new contract that I could cancel for free.

Er, thanks, I guess.

Of course, I only found this out after two lots of support sessions.

But at least now I have that largely unused account closed, at no cost — and a refund on my current month too.

And now my quest to find alternatives begins in earnest in the knowledge I can also cancel my other contract the same way.

If you want to leave your Creative Cloud contract and don’t want to pay their 50% fee — now you know how.

And do check Joseph’s great YouTube playlist where he talks about alternatives and, if you choose to do the same, good luck in your post Adobe world!

ps. the image above is from Adobe’s stock library. Something else that I should cancel.