NYC’s “Click To Cancel” Rule Is Now In Effect: What Subscription Businesses Need To Know

The Bottom Line

• New York City is now its own compliance jurisdiction. Compliance with New York State’s Automatic Renewal Law is necessary but not sufficient. Businesses with New York City subscribers should audit their disclosures, notices, and cancellation flows against the City rule.
• Offer an online cancellation option to every subscriber. The requirement that in-person enrollments include an online cancellation path is the clearest operational change. Extending that option nationwide is the most efficient way to future-proof an evolving compliance framework.
• Prepare for complaint-driven enforcement. With a new complaint portal, a DCWP mediation process, per-violation fines of up to $3,500, and restitution measured from the first cancellation attempt, businesses should eliminate friction in cancellation and save flows, document every cancellation request, and be ready to respond quickly to DCWP inquiries.

On October 1, 2026, New York City’s “Click to Cancel” rule took effect, making the City the first municipality in the United States to impose its own subscription cancellation requirements.

The rule treats noncompliant automatic renewal and continuous service practices as deceptive and unconscionable trade practices under the City’s Consumer Protection Law. While the City rule largely tracks New York State’s Automatic Renewal Law, it departs from it in several meaningful ways.

Businesses that have already aligned their programs with New York State’s Automatic Renewal Law should not assume that no further action is required.

A First-of-Its-Kind Municipal Rule

The rule implements Mayor Mamdani’s Executive Order No. 10 , which directed DCWP to prioritize enforcement against subscription “tricks and traps” and to pursue rulemaking. After receiving more than 100 consumer complaints related to cancellation difficulties in 2025, DCWP moved forward with formal rulemaking, ultimately adopting the final rule in July 2026. The City estimates the rule will save New Yorkers between $21.5 million and $162.5 million annually.

The rule arrives amid an increasingly fragmented regulatory landscape. Although the FTC’s Click to Cancel Rule was vacated in 2025, states continue to adopt automatic renewal and cancellation requirements, and the FTC remains active through enforcement under the Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act (ROSCA).

New York City now adds a municipal layer to that patchwork. DCWP Commissioner Samuel Levine, who previously led the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection during its own “click to cancel” rulemaking process, has said he expects more municipalities to act before the federal government does. Businesses should treat New York City as a test case, not an outlier.

What This Means for a National Compliance Framework

As we discussed in our prior alert, the most durable approach to a fragmented regulatory landscape is to build a program around core compliance objectives that apply across jurisdictions: clear and conspicuous disclosure of material terms, separate affirmative consent, timely reminder notices, and cancellation that is as easy as enrollment.

The City rule changes the analysis in two ways. First, compliance is now triggered by geography at the city level. A business can comply fully with New York State law and still violate the City rule when its subscriber is a New York City consumer. Second, the City rule sets a new high-water mark for omnichannel businesses.

Companies that enroll consumers in person, such as gyms, fitness studios, telecommunications and broadband providers, retail membership programs, and service businesses, must now offer an online cancellation path for those consumers. DCWP expressly declined to exempt FCC-regulated wireless and telecommunications providers, noting that commenters had not identified any federal “click to cancel” requirement that applies to them.

For companies operating nationally, the practical approach is to design around the most protective standard. Offering every subscriber an online cancellation option regardless of how they enrolled is likely to satisfy New York City requirements and position businesses well as other jurisdictions adopt similar rules. Businesses also should not assume that contractual choice-of-law provisions will override applicable state or local consumer protection laws.

What Counts as an “Unreasonable Barrier” to Cancellation?

The rule prohibits businesses from imposing “unreasonable or unlawful conditions” on cancellation, and from refusing to acknowledge, obstructing, or unreasonably delaying cancellation requests or attempts to request cancellation.

The rule provides a non-exhaustive list of prohibited conduct, including:

• Hanging up on consumers who call to cancel
• Obscuring or providing false information about how to cancel
• Misrepresenting the consequences or costs of cancellation
• Misrepresenting the reasons for delays in processing cancellation requests

The word “obscuring” does not appear in the parallel state provision, which refers only to “providing false information” about how to cancel. That addition suggests that DCWP may treat cancellation links buried in account menus, hidden behind multiple navigation layers, or presented in low-visibility design as violations, even when the information presented is technically accurate.

DCWP has also identified several other practices likely to draw scrutiny, including requiring consumers who enrolled online to cancel by phone or in person, delaying cancellation requests, failing to disclose material subscription terms, and sending products without affirmative consent. For example, under the rule, products shipped without a consumer’s consent are considered unconditional gifts and consumers cannot be required to bear the cost of shipping them back.

Are Save Offers Still Permitted?

Yes, with limits.

Businesses may continue to present discounted offers, retention benefits, or information about the effect of cancellation when a consumer seeks to cancel. However, such an offer cannot impose unreasonable conditions on, obstruct, or unreasonably delay the cancellation. How this will play out in practice remains to be seen. For now, businesses should ensure that any save flow is brief, easy to bypass, and does not stand between the consumer and a completed cancellation.

Complaint-Driven Enforcement

The Mamdani administration has paired the rule with a dedicated complaint mechanism, available through nyc.gov/click-to-cancel.

The process has direct consequences for businesses. After a complaint is filed, the consumer receives a complaint number to track its status. DCWP reviews the complaint and may follow up for documents. DCWP may also assign a mediator, in which case it will send the complaint to the business for a written response and then attempt to negotiate a resolution with both parties. DCWP has also indicated that a pattern of complaints against a particular business could prompt broader investigation and legal action.

Businesses should designate a point of contact to respond promptly to DCWP inquiries and preserve records of each cancellation request and how it was handled.

Penalties and Fines

Violations are subject to the following penalty schedule: $525 for a first violation, $1,050 for a second violation, and $3,500 for a third or subsequent violation. Because each deceptive statement, description, or omission may constitute a separate violation, aggregate exposure can grow quickly for businesses with large numbers of New York City subscribers.

The rule also makes violators liable for restitution equal to the amount charged to the consumer after the consumer’s first attempt to cancel. That measure makes a business’s records of cancellation attempts, including chat logs, call records, and abandoned online flows, central to any enforcement matter.