# Beware of Hulu and their shady business practices! - worst streaming service



## alcyone (Dec 27, 2005)

I've had Hulu Live TV for a couple of years until I recently canceled. Despite the fact that their service is glitchy / unreliable and they bombard you with ads and fees every chance they get, they have some very shady billing practices.

Back in 2020, I moved from one state to another. After doing so, I updated my new zip code on my Hulu account, updated my new address on my PayPal account (that I used to pay Hulu). I also updated my address on my checking account that was attached to my PayPal account.

With this being the case, one would think that Hulu would begin billing me under my new zip code, but they didn't. Why does this matter??? The jurisdiction I moved from began charging taxes on internet streaming services back in April of this year. Hence, I've paid about $60 in taxes that I shouldn't have, all due to an error in Hulu's billing system. The jurisdiction I moved to doesn't charge taxes for internet streaming services.

I called them to get this straightened out. They very firmly told me they couldn't do anything. I even told them just give me a $25 credit and I'll let the rest go. They couldn't do that either.

In the end, I filled multiple disputes with PayPal and was able to get chargebacks for the last 6 months of the TAXES I PAID ONLY - Not the entire billed amount. This was good and I have to give PayPal props for this.

However, Hulu retaliated against me and disconnected my service a week early before it was scheduled to be shut off. So now, I'm out a week of service that I paid for, but can't receive. 

I called them again and they said their escalation department was so overwhelmed they couldn't help me. Gee! I wonder why. They must have multiple people with similar issues.

It's no wonder Hulu is loosing subscribers. Their service is glitchy, their streaming quality is poor, their billing practices are unethical and they don't give 2 hoots about their subscribers.

If anyone looking to pay for an internet streaming service, I suggest going with anyone but Hulu or their Disney conglomerate services.


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## mjwagner (Oct 8, 2005)

alcyone said:


> I've had Hulu Live TV for a couple of years until I recently canceled. Despite the fact that their service is glitchy / unreliable and they bombard you with ads and fees every chance they get, they have some very shady billing practices.
> 
> Back in 2020, I moved from one state to another. After doing so, I updated my new zip code on my Hulu account, updated my new address on my PayPal account (that I used to pay Hulu). I also updated my address on my checking account that was attached to my PayPal account.
> 
> ...


While Hulu clearly should have been willing to work with you resolve this issue I'm curious why it took you so long to notice you weren't being billed the correct amount. If Hulu charges you monthly why did it take you so long to notice the error. Perhaps I'm just different than the average person but I monitor my charges and make sure they all match what I'm supposed to be charged and/or spot any unknown/unauthorized charges. The few times that I have seen incorrect charges from merchants I have been able to get them corrected before my CC bill was even due so it was no money out of my pocket a all. Early detection and correction is worth it to me.


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## alcyone (Dec 27, 2005)

Excellent question mjwagner. When Hulu sends you a bill, it's not itemized. So there's no breakdown of charges and nowhere on the website when you log in does it show your billing zip code or your monthly charge breakdown. Hence, I only saw the total monthly charge every month. This is shady in and of itself. Every bill from every utility that I have gives me itemizations. It was only after I called them to inquire about how I could lower the bill that they told me I was being charged taxes. Prior to this, I just assumed the amount I was billed was due to the nonstop rate hikes they've had every 3 to 4 months.

It's really not about the money. The $60 or so I was charged incorrectly won't make a difference in my life. it's about getting screwed and them not making right on the situation. As I stated earlier, I'd have been happy with a credit of less than half the amount I was charged. They couldn't even do that.

The $25 dollars I initially asked for is nothing to a huge corporation like Disney, that's funded largely by Blackrock and Vanguard. Yet, they'd rather nickel and dime people and screw them over.


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## mjwagner (Oct 8, 2005)

alcyone said:


> Excellent question mjwagner. When Hulu sends you a bill, it's not itemized. So there's no breakdown of charges and nowhere on the website when you log in does it show your billing zip code or your monthly charge breakdown. Hence, I only saw the total monthly charge every month. This is shady in and of itself. Every bill from every utility that I have gives me itemizations. It was only after I called them to inquire about how I could lower the bill that they told me I was being charged taxes. Prior to this, I just assumed the amount I was billed was due to the nonstop rate hikes they've had every 3 to 4 months.
> 
> It's really not about the money. The $60 or so I was charged incorrectly won't make a difference in my life. it's about getting screwed and them not making right on the situation. As I stated earlier, I'd have been happy with a credit of less than half the amount I was charged. They couldn't even do that.
> 
> The $25 dollars I initially asked for is nothing to a huge corporation like Disney, that's funded largely by Blackrock and Vanguard. Yet, they'd rather nickel and dime people and screw them over.


It's not itemized when you login to your account on the Hulu website? I don't get paper bills for anything so that is where I would go to see the itemization. If they don't provide that itemization anywhere that is a new one on me. Not sure I would be willing to do business with any merchant that does not provide itemized bills. Do they expect you to just trust them? Sorry but that would not fly with me ever!


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## Davenlr (Sep 16, 2006)

You want to avoid YouTubeTV too if you dont want to get in a billing dispute. They have canceled me twice because they somehow could not figure out how to bill my credit card on file, and instead attempted to charge my GooglePay account (which I dont even have BTW) and then cut off my service, and refused to reinstate my promotions (totaling $20/mo for a year). I ended up with Sling. They have a few DVR glitches here and there, but they answer with real people in the US, and usually fix the issue within 48 hours. Plus, you dont have to pay that extra $20 for locals which I can get free with an antenna. If you just have to have locals, DirecTv Stream with the rip off $10 cloud DVR addon would be my next choice. I love their little boxes, but just cant justify paying $10 a month for DVR space on a cloud DVR service.


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## mjwagner (Oct 8, 2005)

Davenlr said:


> You want to avoid YouTubeTV too if you dont want to get in a billing dispute. They have canceled me twice because they somehow could not figure out how to bill my credit card on file, and instead attempted to charge my GooglePay account (which I dont even have BTW) and then cut off my service, and refused to reinstate my promotions (totaling $20/mo for a year). I ended up with Sling. They have a few DVR glitches here and there, but they answer with real people in the US, and usually fix the issue within 48 hours. Plus, you dont have to pay that extra $20 for locals which I can get free with an antenna. If you just have to have locals, DirecTv Stream with the rip off $10 cloud DVR addon would be my next choice. I love their little boxes, but just cant justify paying $10 a month for DVR space on a cloud DVR service.


Sorry to hear that you have had issues with YTTV. I've been with them since PSVue discontinued service, a few years I think, and have never had any billing issues thankfully. I've tried all the other OTT live TV services (except DTV Stream, no interest) and find YTTV the best for my requirements. Of course YMMV.


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## alcyone (Dec 27, 2005)

mjwagner, that is correct. There is no way to get an itemized bill from Hulu. The bills I'm referring to were delivered via email, which is fine. But the lack of itemizations are shady and an example very poor business practices. If my emailed bills showed the breakdowns of the charges, I certainly would've noticed the issue immediately.


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## mjwagner (Oct 8, 2005)

alcyone said:


> mjwagner, that is correct. There is no way to get an itemized bill from Hulu. The bills I'm referring to were delivered via email, which is fine. But the lack of itemizations are shady and an example very poor business practices. If my emailed bills showed the breakdowns of the charges, I certainly would've noticed the issue immediately.


That is strange. Let me be clear though. I don't expect them to itemize their base rate. None of the services do that. But any taxes or fees that are added in need to be itemized. So for example, when I look at my monthly bill for YTTV it clearly shows the base rate of $64.99 and the tax for my location as $3.90 for a total charge of $68.89. It is itemized that way on every monthly bill. No merchant should add anything to the base rate that is not itemized somewhere. Like I said before, any merchant that would add anything to the base rate without an itemization clearly showing what was added would simply not get my business.


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## NR4P (Jan 16, 2007)

I had a wonderful CS experience with Hulu. For renewal they charged my CC vs a credit from a TV purchase. On a Saturday night called Hulu, agent was wonderful and in the USA. She immediately credited my credit card and charged the credit on file. Perhaps their taxes billing is odd, but she gave me the taxes breakdown too.

Hulu gets lots of points for a US based call center that answers phones on weekends!


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## Mark Holtz (Mar 23, 2002)

It's a good thing that I get Hulu and Disney+ as part of my unlimited mobile subscription.


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## Davenlr (Sep 16, 2006)

mjwagner said:


> Sorry to hear that you have had issues with YTTV.


It wasn't so much the issues, there werent any issues to speak of. I had $10 off a month for a year from Tmobile, and 4K for $9.95 for the first year. After they billed a non-existent GooglePay account, and turned off my service, I called immediately, which I found out you cant do, so I left a callback request. They called back in about an hour, and said they would be happy to turn the service back on, and charge my credit card, but they were "Unable to reinstate the promo's" and it would cost me $105.49 instead of $83.49. (TV+RedZone+4K). That was unacceptable to me, so I told them to forget it, and tried Sling. $56.95/month for all the same channels (except locals I record on my Tivo and HDHomeRun, and ESPN which I dont watch anyway).
Tmobile crew at my local store gave me a new code when I mentioned it to them on a Tmobile Tuesday visit, but I decided I was happy with Sling and the savings I used to pay for Disney+. I might be crazy, but I just get a dirty feeling doing business with a company that purposely screwed me over. And if they honestly did not have a way to reinstate an account with the promos attached due to THEIR error, then they need to hire someone else to write their IT software.


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## rnbmusicfan (Jul 19, 2005)

I have Hulu Plus (ad-free) but without Live TV. So far I've been content with the content. I think it has more shows that I want to see than Peacock or Paramount+. The Live TV part seemed to be missing too many channels that I want, and they lack Epix for some reason. Hulu permits the other premium channels without subscribing to their base package and sometimes has promotions such as $4.99 for Showtime for 6 months. (Although Starz Showtime have promotions and credit card companies have promos usually directly through HBO Max, Starz or Showtime. Recently The Roku Channel had $.99 for two months.)

Anyways, sorry to hear about their billing and the charges you incurred. Glad, you got your money back from PayPal.


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## Holydoc (Feb 18, 2008)

Hulu shows you an itemized bill just without taxes. You can go to Account, and look at "Upcoming Charges". By clicking on "View Charges" you get an itemized list of your charges without taxes. The total it gives you includes taxes. You can subtract your charges listed and the amount that is left is taxes. For instance mine says $6.99/mo for Hulu + $6.00/mo for Hulu (no Ads) with a total of $14.71. My total for the services is $12.99. The taxes they charge me would be $14.71-$12.99 = $1.72 (13% !) That is because Florida has a "Florida Communication Services Tax". But that is a different topic....

Youtube TV gives you an itemized bill by going to Settings -> Billing and select the Billing date. This bill is itemized with taxes so you do not have to compute it.


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## mjwagner (Oct 8, 2005)

Ye


Davenlr said:


> It wasn't so much the issues, there werent any issues to speak of. I had $10 off a month for a year from Tmobile, and 4K for $9.95 for the first year. After they billed a non-existent GooglePay account, and turned off my service, I called immediately, which I found out you cant do, so I left a callback request. They called back in about an hour, and said they would be happy to turn the service back on, and charge my credit card, but they were "Unable to reinstate the promo's" and it would cost me $105.49 instead of $83.49. (TV+RedZone+4K). That was unacceptable to me, so I told them to forget it, and tried Sling. $56.95/month for all the same channels (except locals I record on my Tivo and HDHomeRun, and ESPN which I dont watch anyway).
> Tmobile crew at my local store gave me a new code when I mentioned it to them on a Tmobile Tuesday visit, but I decided I was happy with Sling and the savings I used to pay for Disney+. I might be crazy, but I just get a dirty feeling doing business with a company that purposely screwed me over. And if they honestly did not have a way to reinstate an account with the promos attached due to THEIR error, then they need to hire someone else to write their IT software.


Yes, I've read your description before and that was what I was referring to as "issues ". Sorry I didn't make that more clear.


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## mjwagner (Oct 8, 2005)

Holydoc said:


> Hulu shows you an itemized bill just without taxes. You can go to Account, and look at "Upcoming Charges". By clicking on "View Charges" you get an itemized list of your charges without taxes. The total it gives you includes taxes. You can subtract your charges listed and the amount that is left is taxes. For instance mine says $6.99/mo for Hulu + $6.00/mo for Hulu (no Ads) with a total of $14.71. My total for the services is $12.99. The taxes they charge me would be $14.71-$12.99 = $1.72 (13% !) That is because Florida has a "Florida Communication Services Tax". But that is a different topic....
> 
> Youtube TV gives you an itemized bill by going to Settings -> Billing and select the Billindate. This bill is itemized with taxes so you do not have to compute it.


Honestly, it's not an itemized bill if they don't clearly breakout all the additional items and clearly mark them as taxes, fees, or whatever they are. Something like that is required if, as an example, you itemize deductions for federal tax purposes and claim actual taxes paid in order to prove the deduction that you take.


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## NashGuy (Jan 30, 2014)

Davenlr said:


> You want to avoid YouTubeTV too if you dont want to get in a billing dispute. They have canceled me twice because they somehow could not figure out how to bill my credit card on file, and instead attempted to charge my GooglePay account (which I dont even have BTW) and then cut off my service, and refused to reinstate my promotions (totaling $20/mo for a year). I ended up with Sling. They have a few DVR glitches here and there, but they answer with real people in the US, and usually fix the issue within 48 hours. Plus, you dont have to pay that extra $20 for locals which I can get free with an antenna.


Curious: do you have Sling's AirTV 2 OTA TV tuner to integrate live and recorded OTA TV into the Sling app? Costs $100 but it comes with a $25 credit toward Sling, so an effective cost of $75. You have to supply your own USB hard drive if you want to use its DVR feature but there's no ongoing service cost for that. I have no interest in Sling but if it was something I was going to use long-term, this is probably a product I'd buy in order to have everything integrated together.


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## Davenlr (Sep 16, 2006)

NashGuy said:


> Curious: do you have Sling's AirTV 2 OTA TV tuner to integrate live and recorded OTA TV into the Sling app? Costs $100 but it comes with a $25 credit toward Sling, so an effective cost of $75. You have to supply your own USB hard drive if you want to use its DVR feature but there's no ongoing service cost for that. I have no interest in Sling but if it was something I was going to use long-term, this is probably a product I'd buy in order to have everything integrated together.


No, I don't, as I rarely watch anything on local channels, and have HDHomeRUN DVR and a Tivo OTA premier.


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## garn9173 (Apr 4, 2005)

I had HuluLive for years and had 0 issues. The only reason why I canceled the service was over them dropping my local RSN, needed to watch the Royals this past season.


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## les.m.fisher (7 mo ago)

alcyone said:


> I've had Hulu Live TV for a couple of years until I recently canceled. Despite the fact that their service is glitchy / unreliable and they bombard you with ads and fees every chance they get, they have some very shady billing practices.
> 
> Back in 2020, I moved from one state to another. After doing so, I updated my new zip code on my Hulu account, updated my new address on my PayPal account (that I used to pay Hulu). I also updated my address on my checking account that was attached to my PayPal account.
> 
> ...


I am having the same billing problem regarding inappropriate sales taxes after moving to a new state. I have not been able to fix it, either. When I contacted Hulu they tried to get me to buy a more expensive package! You are right. Hulu is corrupt and their content is weak. I have canceled.


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## les.m.fisher (7 mo ago)

NR4P said:


> I had a wonderful CS experience with Hulu. For renewal they charged my CC vs a credit from a TV purchase. On a Saturday night called Hulu, agent was wonderful and in the USA. She immediately credited my credit card and charged the credit on file. Perhaps their taxes billing is odd, but she gave me the taxes breakdown too.
> 
> Hulu gets lots of points for a US based call center that answers phones on weekends!


You were just lucky.


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## Troch2002 (May 8, 2016)

I absolutely agree its not only the worst company to deal with when it comes to knowing how to resolve anything, It was the most unreliable live tv streaming service ive ever used. Bottom of the Barrel effort in the design. And far more commercials than FuboTv, YouTube and Directv. Even their rip off ad free was such malarkey. People get sucked into Hulus content and they figure might as well say and get their live tv. 

Never again.


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