A recurring $19 Smarty cashback charge on your bank or credit card statement is a SmartyPlus subscription fee. It usually starts as a $3, seven-day trial that converts to $19 per month unless you cancel first.1Smarty Help Center. Is There A Trial Period For SmartyPlus? You can stop it by canceling through your Smarty account, by phone, or by email, and if Smarty won’t refund you, federal law lets you dispute the charge with your card issuer or bank.
How the Charge Shows Up
Smarty charges typically appear on statements under descriptors like “SMARTY.CASH,” “JOINSMARTY.COM,” or “WPYSMARTY.CASH” followed by a phone number. The amount is almost always exactly $19.00. If you see that same figure hitting your account every month, you’re looking at a SmartyPlus subscription, even if you don’t remember opening one.
Why You’re Being Charged
SmartyPlus offers a seven-day trial for $3. After the seventh day, the subscription rolls over to $19 per month automatically unless you cancel inside the trial window.1Smarty Help Center. Is There A Trial Period For SmartyPlus? The signup often happens during checkout on an unrelated retail site, where a cashback offer appears next to the order. Entering your payment information to claim the offer creates the subscription.
That’s why the charge catches people off guard. If someone with access to your card made a purchase and accepted a cashback pop-up, the trial started quietly and the full $19 billing began a week later. It will keep recurring every month until the account is canceled.
How to Cancel SmartyPlus
Smarty gives you three ways to cancel:2Smarty Help Center. How Do I Cancel My Account?
- Online: Log in to your SmartyPlus account, open your profile, click the membership tab, scroll to the bottom, and click “Cancel Smarty+ Subscription.”
- Phone: Call (877) 808-0810 or (310) 593-4557 and ask the representative to close the account.
- Email: Send a cancellation request to support@joinsmarty.com.
Before you reach out, find the email address used at signup and the last four digits of the card on file. A membership confirmation number from the original welcome email helps too. If you cancel by phone or email, ask for a confirmation number or a written acknowledgment. That gives you proof the cancellation went through if charges keep appearing.
Uninstalling the browser extension on its own does not cancel the subscription. The billing is tied to your SmartyPlus account, not the extension.
How to Request a Refund From Smarty
After you cancel, you can ask Smarty’s support team for a refund through any of the same three channels. Refunds for the most recent billing cycle are the most likely to be approved, so don’t wait. Once Smarty approves a refund, it generally takes three to seven business days to show up on your statement, depending on your bank.
If Smarty refuses, stops responding, or you can’t get anyone on the line, you still have options through your card issuer or bank.
Disputing a Smarty Charge on a Credit Card
If the charge hit a credit card, the Fair Credit Billing Act lets you dispute it as a billing error. You have 60 days from the date the charge first appeared on your statement to send a written dispute to your card issuer.3Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 US Code 1666 – Correction of Billing Errors The notice should include your name, account number, the amount in dispute, and a short explanation of why you believe the charge is an error.
Send the letter to the billing inquiries address on your statement, not the payment address. Certified mail with a return receipt gives you proof the issuer received it. Calling the issuer first to flag the dispute is fine, but the written notice is what preserves your legal rights.4Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. How Do I Dispute a Charge on My Credit Card Bill?
Once your issuer has the notice, it must acknowledge the dispute within 30 days and finish its investigation within two billing cycles, up to a maximum of 90 days.3Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 US Code 1666 – Correction of Billing Errors While it investigates, the issuer cannot try to collect the disputed amount or report it as delinquent. If the dispute goes your way, the charge is removed from the bill.
Disputing a Smarty Charge on a Debit Card
Debit card disputes follow different rules, and the money has already left your account, so timing matters more. Under the Electronic Fund Transfer Act, you have 60 days from the date the statement containing the charge was sent to report the error to your bank.5Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 US Code 1693f – Error Resolution The bank then has 10 business days to investigate and report back.
Liability caps are less forgiving on debit cards. Report an unauthorized charge promptly and your maximum loss is $50. Wait more than two business days after discovering the problem and your exposure rises to $500. Miss the 60-day window and you can be liable for the full amount of any charges that occurred after that deadline.6Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 US Code 1693g – Consumer Liability If Smarty has been billing a debit card for several months, report it right away.
Stopping Future Charges Through Your Bank
If you’ve canceled but you’re worried the charges will keep coming, you can place a stop-payment order on the recurring debit. Contact your bank at least three business days before the next scheduled payment.7Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Regulation E 1005.10 – Preauthorized Transfers You can do this over the phone, but the bank may require written confirmation within 14 days. If you don’t send the written follow-up when asked, an oral stop-payment order expires.
You should also revoke Smarty’s authorization to debit your account. Notify Smarty in writing that you’re revoking authorization, keep a copy, then tell your bank the merchant no longer has permission to charge you.8HelpWithMyBank.gov. How Can I Stop a Preauthorized Debit? If Smarty charges you after that, you can dispute those transactions as unauthorized.
Banks typically charge $15 to $35 for a stop-payment order, and the order often expires after six months unless you renew it. For a $19 charge, that fee may only be worth paying if canceling directly hasn’t stopped the billing.
Where to File a Complaint
The Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act makes it illegal to charge consumers through an online negative option offer unless the seller clearly discloses all material terms before collecting billing information, gets the consumer’s express informed consent, and provides a simple way to stop recurring charges.9Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 US Code 8403 – Negative Option Marketing on the Internet If you believe Smarty enrolled you without meeting those requirements, or if cancellation was made unreasonably difficult, you can report the company to the FTC at ReportFraud.ftc.gov and file a complaint with your state attorney general’s office.10Federal Trade Commission. Getting In and Out of Free Trials, Auto-Renewals, and Negative Option Subscriptions Individual complaints rarely trigger immediate action on their own, but the FTC uses complaint volume to identify patterns and build enforcement cases.