Like a cockroach that’s still kicking weeks after its head is cut off, MoviePass is somehow still managing to create headlines, weeks after its demise. The New York Post reports that the movie-watching membership program is still charging its former customers’ cards.
Two women told the New York paper that they were actually charged twice in September. One of the women said she was charged the $9.95 membership fee, and a separate and unrelated $5.64 fee, was charged on the day MoviePass officially shut down. Once loyal fans and customers of the service are not holding back on what is just the latest in MoviePass’s many stumbles. The Daily Beast reported that a former member of the company tweeted out, “A big middle finger to MoviePass… there’s a reason why this company failed.”
Many of its former members have likely shared the same sentiment for the vast majority of 2019. It was a shock to many the subscription service even made it to 2019. We’ve have been reporting on the MoviePass saga for some time now. And boy, has it been a dozy.
To summarize, MoviePass went from a bad 2018 to a worse 2019. In January, the company was attempting to tread water by announcing its confusing three-tier pricing structure. It was a sneaky and confusing pricing tier, that including potentially tacking on an additional $3-$5 to the advertised price, as per geography.
Unsurprisingly, a mere two months later, MoviePass attempted a different plan of attack. As a last-ditch effort to salvage the company, MoviePass introduced an “uncapped” plan which rang familiar of its original “see whatever you want, whenever you want plan.” But turns out, it was too little too late for MoviePass members. A month later, we reported that the company lost a staggering 90% of its former subscribers.
The company continued to take a nosedive for the next few months. Back in July, CEO Mitch Lowe announced that MoviePass would be “temporarily” shutting down to update the app. And in strange final power move, Lowe allegedly ordered employees to alter users’ passwords to effectively lock them out of the service.
And that brings us to today. After taking members on a useless roller coaster ride for the last year, the company refuses to let them off the ride easily. Many users claimed they have attempted to reach out to MoviePass’s customer support about this charging issue without avail, since the app was shuttered over a month ago. According to the Daily Beast, MoviePass and its parent company, Helios and Matheson, have yet to publicly comment on the matter.
Who would’ve thought these ridiculous blunders would continue post-mortem? Okay, probably most of us. It’s not an understatement to say that MoviePass has become the laughing stock of the entertainment industry — I mean, Chicago movie theater The Music Box offered its patrons a free large popcorn when they turned in their defunct MoviePass cards. But it’s only fitting that an entertainment company would still provide us entertainment past its demise, even it’s not in quite the way they intended.
