If you’ve experienced problems with Avast Software as described on this site, feel free to tell us and everyone else about it here.
If you’ve experienced problems with Avast Software as described on this site, feel free to tell us and everyone else about it here.
In May 2017 I renewed my subscription with Avast for 1PC – 1 year (Avast Premier) – *only 3 months ago. Yet for several days I have
been getting notices that my subscription is running out (5 days to go). I will try to contact them to see what is going on. But I do not need this harrasment!
They are the worst company I have ever dealt with,GOOD LUCK. you will need it
In a “special offer”, I signed up (on March 11, of 2017) for a year of Avast (via Digital River), for $19.99. Within 2 weeks, or less, I was getting daily messages from them: “Entry Point Not Found”. I have periodically gone online since then, armed with Product SKU #, Order #, Date of order, the (supposed) Password to my account with them, and cannot reach anyone to cancel a service that apparently never even installed in the first place. Apparently, it is impossible to resolve any problem with them by online means, which seems really bizarre since “Avast” specializes in “computer stuff”! Perhaps I should simply contact the Oregon Attorney General’s office.
My bad, I guess, since a couple of years ago I’d signed up for a trial offer (etc.), paid the fee, and kept getting offers to upgrade to the paid version, from the free version. Seemed odd, but I chalked it up to “a glitch”, not fraud. Lesson learned!
For several years now Avast has been using an “Automatic Renew” mechanism for their subscriptions. I get an email saying that my subscription will renew in “XX” days. If I scroll down the price is displayed. If I do nothing, I will be billed for that amount.
But wait….. I’ve discovered that if I go into the Avast Application’s user interface, and use the application’s manual renew option, it goes to their website where the product is being offered at a SIGNIFICANTLY lower price, usually by about 50%. So, I have to go back to the renew email and click on the “Stop the Auto-Renewal” link. This cancels the automatic renewal. Then I proceed with the renew manually through the app, which gets me the much better price.
To me this is a scam billing practice, that just SUCKS. It leaves me with a bad taste about Avast. I know that I will have to go through this “scam dance” again next year.
At least you can cancel the automatic renewal. I entered the information that they gave me to find my order number but it keeps telling me that it’s an invalid order number. I found a phone number and was referred back to the same site by a robot. There is literally no way to contact Avast on billing issues. And my credit card does not allow me to prevent the charge. I have to take the time and trouble to dispute it and they will have access to my $49.99 which I can only hope will be returned some day.
If Avast cannot produce a ‘valid’ order no. and proof, one would think they cannot charge you, having no ‘proof of purchase’. I can’t see why your bank will not dispute and reverse charges unless your complaint exceeded their timeline for disputing a charge (up to 90 days after statement reflecting charge is received from bank . You might try calling bank customer service and asking for a supervisor and if no assistance is forthcoming, request your state Banking Commission’s complaint number and the state atty general’s number. >)
AVAST FRAUD they have charged my Paypal for an “annual fee” of $44.95 they have also just deducted $44.95 from my bank account. They make it virtually impossible to cancel..They need to be STOPPED I’m calling the District Attorney and my Bank on 8/28/17
THESE PEOPLE THIEVES THEY NEED TO BE STOPPED NOW
Thanks for this alert.
A new twist appears to have occurred with me and I do not know if this is a one off or whether others have suffered the same.
We noticed 2 identical payments a week apart for the same software on our credit card . We rang the support line and apparently had one reversed (we will be checking) but before you know it we were spun off to a tech support spiv because obviously “there is something wrong”. They sent an email check to our address and wouldn’t you know it it – it wasn’t shown as having been read. Lots of tut tutting, and they asked to investigate our email file logs – and amazingly, a lot of records were there that showed someone had taken control of our computer!! Luckily they had someone who could fix that that – Avast wouldn’t charge us but this Macgeek group would do the job in 1.5 hours, give 3 years warranty, and only charge us $399!! Needless to say my Spidie senses were jingling by now. These guys are smooth, fast, aggressive and pushy.
They can’t lose…if we don’t notice them double charging our account they keep the money and win. If we ring them we (might) get our payment reversed but we have been served up to the clutches of online spivs and fear merchants.
I think it is time to cancel the Avast subscription for this subscription. I’m off to check my Nortons Auto Renew payments on the other computers now.
I received two renewal notices one week apart for the same service but there were minor differences between the two pages. The first thing that I thought of was that they would probably charge me twice for a service that I bought once. I have tried to prevent Avast from charging anything to my credit card but I can’t pre-empt that.
The phone number that I found for support won’t give me a real person to deal with a billing issue. What number did you call?
I signed up for a 30-day free trial of Avast Cleanup. I received the invoice with information to allow me to register and get the license. They sent me an email advising me that my auto-renewal was set for 6 days from now. So I have attempted for 2 days to discontinue auto-renewal so I won’t pay for this. No matter with way I attempt to enter the order ID and password that is on my invoice, the website says my info is invalid! is there any help for this? I haven’t yet been charged.
In March2017, I notified Avast I did not wish to Renew the Subscription with them. On March 24, 2017, I received notice ” Changes might take time to take effect. Once completed, you will receive an email confirmation that automatic billing was successfully stopped. If you need help, contact us at hhtp://www.avast.com/support .”
Dated 07/13/2017 Avast charged $64.94 to my Credit Card.(I have since cancelled.) As of today’s date of Sept. 6, 2017, I am not being successful in this disputed charge.
I purchased avast internet security package about 7 months ago sometime after I purchased my computer. I’ve known avast to be a good product with a good track record… until recently. After downloading the antivirus I’ve never really liked the speed or lag it creates in the computer to run the scan and I’ve had issues with FTP software that I believe is directly related to avast. To this day I cannot operate any FTP software to make changes to my friend’s company website. Anyway, initially I thought maybe it wasn’t avast and had some major lag issues with the computer, so hesitantly accepted the offer for the FREE TRIAL (yeah right) to the “cleanup” software they sell. The first time I clicked the download, I did not have any luck with the activation. So I thought nothing of it. The second time I was able to activate but the cleanup tool never properly worked, always just showed like progress was being made but the progress bar never went anywhere. I was really frustrated with the fact that it wasn’t working but put it on the back burner for a while and was going to cancel the auto renew after a few more attempts. Well… now suddenly I get a notice that the first “cleanup” subscription (the one that was never activated) is automatically renewing and I’m being charged for it!!! So I call up tech support and of course they ask to remote in. I allow them to do so with hesitation and they of course tell me that it’s “likely” not working because of other preinstalled antivirus software on my computer. But that makes no sense to me. So of course they want me to pay even more so they can remove the software for so that the product I’ve already paid for can work. Which is just plain criminal. I should not have to pay more to get software to work on my computer when I am already paying for the software anyway. What kind of tech support is that… it’s your software!!! That is complete bologna to tell me that your software wont work with other antivirus software that isn’t currently in use. So I ask to speak to billing and of course the tech tells me THERE IS NO BILLING DEPARTMENT??? Contacting tech support was difficult enough, finding any way to contact billing is insane. And of course my password won’t work to log into file a support ticket, they won’t send me a password retrieval email (even though they claim they are sending it), and there is no # to call for an issue with billing. This is easily the worst company I’ve ever dealt with and it frightens me that I am on an automatic renewal agreement. I have clicked no to the automatic renewal of both cleanup orders that were placed but cannot find the order number for the antivirus renewal subscription. THIS IS THE WORST COMPANY EVER… and that’s a hard title to claim. STAY AWAY FROM AVAST!!!
PAY PAL SENT ME NOTICE ON 09-30-17 THAT …RIVERS CHARGED MY ACTIONS $85.81 USD, I SUPPOSE FOR VIRUS PROTECTOR!
I NEVER HAVE AND NEVER WILL AUTHORIZE ANY COMPANY TO AUTOMATICALLY USE PAY PAL OR MY CREDIT CARD!
I CALLED YESTERDAY, 10-03-17 TO SAID COMPANY, AND THEY WANTED MY NAME AND ADDRESS…NO, I SAID….YOU MADE THE SCAM CHARGE, YOU KNOW MY NAME AND ADDRESS!
ASKED TO SPEAK TO SUPERVISOR….VOICE DIDN’T SEEM TO CHANGE…TOLD THEM WHAT THEY DID WAS ILLEGAL, AND I WOULD GET IN TOUCH WITH MY STATE ATTORNEY GENERAL!
TOLD THEM THEY WERE SCAMMERS!
LONG STORY SHORT…..WITHIN 3 HOURS PAY PAL SENT ME CONFIRMATION MY PAY PAL ACCOUNT HAD BEEN CREDITED THE FULL AMOUNT!
I INTEND TO CONTACT THE VIRUS PROTECTION COMPANY I USE TO SEE IF THEY ARE AWARE THIS IS HAPPENING!
****PAY ATTENTION PEOPLE! ****
FIRST TIME THIS HAS HAPPENED TO ME!
My VISA was charged $64.93 by DRI*AVAST SOFTWARE I had to Google the name because I never heard, let alone bought anything from them.
I got from Google: Avast Software s.r.o. with its registered office at Pikrtova 1737/1a, Prague 4, Nusle, Postal Code 140 00, Czech Republic
Seems the company is a SCAM factory.
I too was subject to automatic renewal without being aware of the £30 increase in cost so £49.99 was taken from my account. A few days
later I received a message on my computer that I was unprotected (YOU ARE UNPROTECTED). As I had not yet seen my bank account I assumed the renewal had not gone through and so I paid another £26.99. I have completely lost faith in AVAST. I believe they are a corrupt organisation ready to fleece
all their customers.
Well i don’t think Avanst as a product is safe at all. My husband never registered his free version, never gave any info, any e-mail number. Suddenly we got charged on 28th 74 $ trought Paypal ( which NEVER been given out neighter ). by Digital River for Avast Software,which we never ordered. And how they knew we are using Avast anyway?!?. So my conclusion is Avast has either a very smart keylogger or anything that allows to collect ANY data. ( E-mails, cc info,debit info etc. ) . And now the funniest part, when we unistalled Avast a MESSAGE came on the PRIVATE PHONE NUMBER from my husband like “Sorry to see you go”, which also NEVER was given out. Tell me again that Avast is safe, and I’ll slap you in your face. I already send a message to friends from facebook to warn about this.WHAT IN THE ACTUAL **** IS THIS?!
Avst is cheater and fraud. It also cheated by stealing my credit card details from browser and auto renew. It costed me ₹3200. And nowhere to claim.
My AVAST software kept informing me that my subscription was about to expire and presented discounted offers if I where to renew, this lead me to believe that it was NOT set for auto renew. I also do not remember ever selecting auto renew. I am usually very vigilant to not enable auto renew. CLEVERBRIDGE the payment service used by AVAST did send me a notification email of the upcoming renew, but since I never bought anything called “CLEVERBRIDGE” I did not pay attention to the email, unlike had I received an email from AVAST!!!! I got hit with a $199 charge for several of the AVAST services that I did not sign up for!!! When I went to my software to try to DISABLE the auto renew setting, there is no way to do this! The only way to turn auto renew OFF is is contact CLEVERBRIDGE. If AVAST thinks they can stay in business by
After I renewed via charge they said the could not find the renewal information. I provided them with all the confirmation information from their acknowledgment email. They now say they want a copy of my charge statement showing the money was actually charged. I have never had to do this before. It would seem if I provided info off their email that should be sufficient. The person who is sending me emails is in Pakistan. So far I have not sent them any additional information. My computer is currently protected. Should they cancel my security package I will look elsewhere. My concern is, the money that my charge statement says they received will I be able to get that back.
I paid 39.00$ for a year of protection and it did nothing but mes up my computer. I am trying to get my money back.
Hi Connie ,
If those bastards refused to refund your money send an email to their managers. Start from the top. Their salaries are being collected from all of us. You can find their names here: https://www.avast.com/en-us/about
The company is using (last name)@avast.com (e.g. Vincent Steckler the big thief’s email address is: steckler@avast.com, Ondrej Vlcek next one email address is: vlcek@avast.com and so on..)
Do not let thieves to enjoy your money.
GREAT TO KNOW THESE EMAIL ADDRESSES TO THE TOP. Good on ya for sharing!
I’ve been offered a 30-day free trial period for use of Avast SecureLIne VPN service, which I activated on November 14th.
While subject trial period closed to it’s end, on December 06th – following the instructions given about that option upon service initiation – I tried to deactivate the auto-renewal function of 30-day trial use and received an e-mail notification about that deactivation been successful, but when examining the history of order I found out that actually it has been already extended, starting as from that very same date (06 Dec) – w/o either my knowledge, will or least participation – for a whole 2-year period (!) – up till December 05th, 2019.
(Though the preliminary conditions for eventual paid service extension, were stated clearly for one-year renewal only)
Hence I’ve got on file enough evidence for that fraudulent actions, I already notified relevant EU-institutions about that occurrence, and intend to seek through them jurisdictional assistance bringing that case to court for persistent and methodical violation of EU Directive 2005/29/EC on Unfair Commercial Practices.
A quick Internet search for DRI*AVAST leads one to immediately conclude that
DRI*AVAST is a long-running scam (at least since 2013) while
AVAST.COM [minus the DRI*] is ( was ? ) a legit organization.
( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avast_Antivirus )
but seems either unable or uninterested in getting their name/ reputation disconnected from
DRI*AVAST, In any case, there seems little one can do except avoid entering the string
on the internet. SAD !
fron James Donaldson, This is an addendum to my note:
the fihnal line should have concluded:
” . . . avoid entering the string AVAST on the internet. “
James, that isn’t really accurate. “DRI Avast” is nothing more than Digital River, processing payments on Avast’s behalf. There’s nothing wrong with Digital River, as far as I know. They are simply Avast’s payments processor. Another way to look at this would be a scammer selling counterfeit products on Ebay, using Paypal to accept payments. In this case, the scammer would be the seller, not Paypal, as Paypal would simply be processing the payments. So it’s actually the opposite of what you say: Avast is the scammer, Digital River is the legit outfit.
1-10-2018
PERSONAL 7 CONFIDENTIAL TO the C E O OF AVAST: you are ripping the american public off , wasting our time giving out free services , that we are dumb enough to allow you to down load to our computers, and then you mess up our computers because you aren’t protecting anything.
Bought a new Asus i7 laptop about a month ago. Runs beautifully, does everything it should. Then about a week, ago, I started poking around in the gift pack of software that came with the machine. Found the Avast! anti-virus package. No problem, I thought; I’d heard the name before, and if this anti-virus is part of the gift pack from the company who built the computer… well, that doesn’t hurt. Installed it, no problem; everything seemed to be working fine.
Two days ago, I suddenly started getting warnings from Avast! that I’m low on memory. A new i7 machine with plenty of memory. Doing nothing onerous, just surfing. Maybe I have an Excel workbook open. But since then, the low memory warnings became relentless, sometimes leading Avast! to spontaneously close Chrome while I’m using it. Nice. Then today, Avast! suddenly offered to fix these “memory problems.” Wow, that’s nice of them! Click. Oh… the most popular package that will do the job is only $20/month. How convenient.
Smelling a rat, I Googled Avast! in a prejudicial manner, only to find myself here, typing out my story. Actually, I read the other sections of the site first, to allow my dismay to consolidate, before uninstalling Avast! ye hearties, and coming to join this here modest rant-fest. Unlike the other unfortunates, I have no contact with Avast! through my credit card or by phone, and of course, I will now ensure it stays that way.
Being one of the lucky ones—I think!—I’m grateful to the creator of this helpful, well-written, aesthetic site for putting us on the map, so to speak. Victims of Avast! unite!
Yes I have had similar issues concerning Dri Avast Ive only one laptop with avast anti virus on it… but have somehow been billed for £ 39.99 for a second one. I need to be refunded..asap