Apple offered a free three-month membership trial when it launched its Music streaming service on June 30. Now users who signed up for it early on are seeing charges come through from Apple, some having not remembered that they had to cancel the service before three months were up to avoid a $9.99 monthly fee.
If you’re among the Music users who were just billed for November and have decided you don’t want to pay for the service, you can contact Apple support to cancel and request a full refund. Go to the Apple support site and log your request, selecting iTunes from the options.
From the support site, I scheduled a call with Apple this weekend. When they called, I explained that I had forgotten to cancel the trial and they issued me a credit for the $9.99 I had been billed. (I asked Apple’s media relations team whether it was the company’s policy to do this for anyone who reaches out to support, and will update this when I hear back from them.)
If you signed up for an Apple Music trial and haven’t been billed yet, here’s how to cancel your membership and turn off auto renewal:
On your iPhone: Open the Music app, and click on the head icon in the upper left to go to the Account page. Choose View Apple ID. Then choose Manage under Subscriptions. On the Subscriptions page, choose Apple Music Membership. Once there, you can turn off auto renewal.
In iTunes on your computer: Click on the head icon in the top right center of iTunes. Then click on Account Info and scroll down to Settings. Click on Manage to the right of Subscriptions, and you’ll see the Apple Music settings you can modify.
You can still use Music without paying for a membership, but the service is much more limited. (Apple clearly itemizes the differences here.) And if you’re enjoying the service and are happy to pay for it—as Apple is hoping millions of people are—you don’t have to do anything.