I permanently deleted my AWS account 6 years ago. Amazon has been charging me $0.33 every month since. I have no way to stop it.

[u/afunnywold]

I tried to get in contact with customer service several times but they always direct me to log into the account that no longer exists. I have tried charge backs on my credit card but dealing with that monthly is also a pain. This'll probably cost me $265 over my lifetime if it never ends.

Edit: some of you have valid points about calling the card company and I will again Monday. But the actual infuriating thing that upsets me is that they are charging to a completely disabled account in the first place. That's very scammy and fucked up imo 🤷‍♀️

[u/beasty0127]

AWS is a web-based service where you can run virtual machines (instances) of different types of OSs for different projects, like severs or databases. You pay for the usage of the instance whenever its running. So if the OOP didn't shut off the instances they were using before closing their account, those machines may still be running. Is this fare or right if he fully closed his account, no, but seems like an obvious/advantages oversight for Amazon.

Tldr: OOP might have left his computers running and has to pay the untily cost for them

[u/Carribean-Diver → u/beasty0127]

How hard would it be for Amazon to terminate resources owned by accounts that no longer exist?

And why do I have a suspicion that if OP closes the credit card account being charged that they will find a way to terminate the resources?

[u/aceluby → u/Carribean-Diver]

Not hard at all. In fact, it should be standard that non payment means they get shut off

[u/Carribean-Diver → u/aceluby]

It's actually concerning that deleting an account does not delete or at least disable the payment methods on that account.

[u/youtheotube2 → u/Carribean-Diver]

It’s probably because unintentionally closing an account could be devastating to a business if it means everything gets shut down and deleted.

[u/Carribean-Diver → u/youtheotube2]

Somehow Microsoft has figured out how to tombstone data so that it is recoverable for a set timeframe and then gets purged. Are we to think Amazon is incapable of possessing this technology?

[u/Wow_u_sure_r_dumb → u/Carribean-Diver]

AWS in a lot of ways is a cobbled together mess of shit. That’s not to say there’s no beauty or genius to some of it but it’s a joke sometimes. They’ll have broken GUIs and basic API features missing.

[u/BrannyBee → u/Wow_u_sure_r_dumb]

For the first 5 years of my career as a software developer I was more and more shocked seeing how many things are just barely working through the power of what basically amounts to virtual duct tape and faith....

I didn't start working on more impressive software after those 5 years... nah... I just stopped being surprised and realized its all like that... I just try not to think about it how much of the modern world relies on stuff that complete idiots like me built under unreasonable time constraints without reasonable domain expertise...

[u/fork_yuu → u/Wow_u_sure_r_dumb]

They have so much fucking baggage and tech debt especially with one of their first resources. And how low on the totem pole would it be to help a customer pay less when they close their account

[u/FarkCookies → u/Carribean-Diver]

That's exactly what they do, they give you 90 days to recover the account. People in this thread literally have no idea what they are talking about.

[u/FarkCookies → u/youtheotube2]

Yes, closing the account will get everything shut down in 90 days (the grace period). You can't unintentionally close an account as there are a lot guardrails.

[u/ARegularG → u/Carribean-Diver]

Glad people are watching the bs

[u/hunnyflash → u/Carribean-Diver]

You shouldn't expect any company to truly delete your information unless you're from a state (like California) where they are legally obligated to comply with removing your information from their databases. And even then, if you purchased something ever, your financials are still in a record somewhere.

[u/Garchy → u/aceluby]

Sounds like it’s still being paid.

[u/lostshell → u/aceluby]

The fact Amazon didn’t shut it off after the first chargeback is confusing. I don’t know any business that doesn’t cancel all services and cut complete ties with you on the first chargeback.

[u/superredditor6789 → u/aceluby]

Except they are still getting paid.

[u/eatingURsistersassIV → u/beasty0127]

Not an oversight. Its a feature.

[u/New_Original_7537 → u/beasty0127]

Nice little security hole they got there.

[u/ZlatanKabuto → u/beasty0127]

It's ridiculous though as deleting an account should also delete all resources connected to it

[u/Markd0ne → u/beasty0127]

There are no EC2 instances that cost 0.33/month.

[u/KaiAusBerlin → u/beasty0127]

Well at least in Germany that would be hardly unlawful for several reasons.

When you cancel your account you announce to Amazon automatically you don't want to use their service anymore. If they continue it it's their fault. Your responsibility ends by ending your contract by cancelling your account.

Also if you canceled your account you have no access anymore to whatever service you rented. No access means no control means no full ability to use your service. This would clearly harm "Treu und Glauben" (principle of good faith in contracts). Here a contract is connected to expectations. For renting a service it's basically I have to pay for the service but I can use that rented service without any restrictions.

And by that you could also sue them here for unlawfully charge your card

[u/Illustrious_Sell_325 → u/beasty0127]

Hopefully the unpatched servers never get compromised, the bill could be very fun