Three routes exist to get money back, and they have almost nothing in common. The route you have was decided at checkout, which is the argument for thinking about this before subscribing rather than when you are annoyed.
Route 1: bought through an app store
If you subscribed inside an iOS or Android app, Apple or Google took the money, not the company whose app it is.
This is good for refunds. Both run a formal request process, both are more generous than most small operators, and neither requires you to explain yourself to the app's support team. Apple's is at reportaproblem.apple.com; Google's is in Play's order history.
It is also where you must cancel. Not in the app's settings — in your store subscriptions. This is the single most common reason people believe they cancelled and were charged again, and it is covered in browser or app store.
Expect a limited window and a limited number of goodwill refunds before requests start being declined.
Route 2: bought directly from the company
The company took the money and the company decides. Policies range from a genuine no-questions window to nothing at all.
What actually works here:
Ask quickly. A request on day two is a different conversation from one on day twenty.
Ask for something specific. "Refund the charge from 14 September" beats a complaint. Name the amount and the date.
Give a concrete reason. "I was charged after cancelling", "the feature I subscribed for is not in this tier", "renewal price differed from the advertised price" are all actionable. "I did not use it much" is not.
Stay civil. These are small support teams with wide discretion, and discretion is exercised in favour of polite people.
If the app was bought directly and the money matters, ask before the renewal posts rather than after.
Route 3: the EU and UK withdrawal right
If you are in the EU or UK buying from a trader, you have a 14-day right of withdrawal on distance contracts. Both our French and Dutch editions cover apps sold under this rule.
The catch matters. For digital content and services, that right can be waived — and checkout flows routinely ask you to waive it, usually as a tick box agreeing that service begins immediately. Tick it and the 14-day right is generally gone.
So: read the checkbox at checkout. If you want the withdrawal window, do not agree to immediate performance. If you want to use the app tonight, accept that you are trading the window for access.
Where the right survives, you claim it in writing to the trader, not to your bank.
What cancelling does and does not do
Cancelling stops the next charge. It does not refund the current period and it does not delete anything. You normally keep access until the period ends and then drop to the free tier with your character intact.
Deleting the account is a separate action with separate consequences, in deleting an AI companion account.
Chargebacks: last resort, real consequences
A chargeback is you telling your bank to reverse the payment. It works, and it costs you things:
- The merchant is charged a fee on top of losing the money, so they respond accordingly.
- Your account is very likely terminated, along with the history in it.
- That merchant — and sometimes their processor — may block your card permanently.
Justified when the charge is genuinely unauthorised, when you cancelled and were billed anyway with evidence, or when support has stopped replying. Not justified as a shortcut around a refund policy you did not read.
Always ask the merchant first and keep the correspondence. Banks ask whether you tried.
The habits that avoid all of this
Diary the renewal. Put it in a calendar on the day you subscribe. Most refund requests in this category exist because a renewal was a surprise.
Monthly before annual. An annual plan is where the money is large enough to fight over, and it is the purchase most likely to be regretted — see monthly, annual or credits.
Screenshot the price you were shown. Intro pricing disputes are the most winnable and the hardest to prove from memory.
Buy direct when you want a relationship, through the store when you want a process. Direct billing is usually cheaper and the company can be reasoned with. Store billing costs more and gives you an arbiter. Both are defensible; picking deliberately is the point.
Apps that accumulate long histories — Replika and Nomi among those in our ranking — are the ones where a chargeback costs you the most, because terminating the account throws away the thing you were paying for.
