We Love Cosmetics Charge: Cancel, Block, and Dispute It

A “We Love Cosmetics” charge on your credit card or bank statement is a billing descriptor tied to a cosmetics or beauty purchase, often an online order or a recurring subscription enrolled during checkout. Beauty companies frequently bill under an abbreviated legal or DBA name that looks nothing like the storefront brand, which is why the line item can look unfamiliar even when the underlying purchase was real. If you don’t recognize it, work through four steps in order: identify the merchant, cancel any subscription, block further billing, and dispute the charge with your card issuer if it turns out to be unauthorized.

How to Identify the Merchant

Start with the descriptor itself. Enter the exact text from your statement in quotation marks in a search engine; other consumers frequently post about the same billing name and identify the brand behind it.

Then search your email inbox and spam folder for the exact dollar amount, cents included. Order confirmations and shipping notices usually name the actual brand.¹

Open the transaction in your bank app or online portal and check the metadata. Many issuers show a phone number, website URL, or merchant category code alongside the charge, any of which can lead you straight to the merchant.¹

If none of that resolves it, call your card issuer. The bank can pull the merchant’s full legal name, industry code, and verified billing address.

Cancel the Subscription First

Many cosmetics charges that look unauthorized are automatic renewals or auto-replenish subscriptions bundled into a trial offer or first purchase. Cancel before you dispute; otherwise the next billing cycle can produce another charge while your dispute is pending.

Log into your account on the merchant’s website and look for subscription or account settings. If you signed up through a mobile app, check your Apple App Store or Google Play subscription settings, where many recurring charges can be turned off directly.
If online cancellation isn’t offered or doesn’t work, contact customer service by phone or email and request cancellation in writing. Ask for a confirmation notice with the cancellation date.
Save every confirmation, chat transcript, and email. You will need this if further charges appear or you have to file a dispute.

If the company makes cancellation unreasonably hard, federal law is on your side. The Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act (ROSCA) requires any seller using a negative-option feature, where silence is treated as consent to keep billing, to provide “simple mechanisms” for consumers to stop recurring charges.² The FTC has said cancellation processes that involve excessive steps, long hold times, or restricted service hours may violate that requirement.³

Block Future Charges

Some consumers report that charges continue after cancellation. A few options cut off the merchant’s access to your payment method.

Ask your bank or card issuer for a stop-payment order that blocks the specific merchant. Some issuers charge a fee.⁴
Request a new card number. If the merchant has your card on file and the issuer cannot block them, replacing the number retires the credentials they hold.
For any future trials, use a virtual or disposable card number so a merchant never has open-ended access to your account.

Dispute the Charge With Your Card Issuer

If the charge is unauthorized, or if the merchant refuses a refund after cancellation, the Fair Credit Billing Act (FCBA) gives you the right to dispute it with your card issuer.

How to File

Send a written dispute letter to the issuer’s billing-inquiry address, not the regular payment address, within 60 days of the date the charge first appeared on your statement.⁵ Include your name, account number, the amount and date of the charge, and a clear explanation of why you believe it is an error. Send it by certified mail with a return receipt.³

What Happens After You File

The card issuer must acknowledge the dispute in writing within 30 days and resolve it within 90 days.⁶ While the investigation is open, you can withhold payment on the disputed amount, and the issuer cannot report you as delinquent, take collection action, or threaten your credit rating over that specific charge.³

If the issuer finds the charge was an error, it must remove the amount along with any related interest or fees. If it sides with the merchant, it must explain why in writing, and you then have 10 days to respond with additional evidence.⁶ An issuer that fails to follow these procedures forfeits the right to collect up to $50 of the disputed amount, even if the charge turns out to be valid.³

If You Missed the 60-Day Window

Consumers in some states can still assert “claims and defenses” against the issuer for up to one year, provided the disputed amount exceeds $50, a good-faith effort was made to resolve it with the seller first, and the charge has not been paid in full.⁶

Where to Report a Deceptive Subscription

ROSCA, enacted in 2010, requires online sellers to clearly disclose all material terms of a subscription before collecting billing information, obtain express informed consent before charging, and provide a simple way to cancel.² In October 2024, the FTC finalized a modernized Negative Option Rule, often called the click-to-cancel rule, which requires companies to make cancellation at least as easy as sign-up and to obtain express consent before any recurring charge.⁷ The rule took effect January 14, 2025, with a compliance deadline of May 14, 2025, for its core consent and cancellation provisions.⁸

If you believe a company violated these rules, file a complaint with the FTC or with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which handles credit card billing disputes.⁵

1
Airwallex. What Is This Charge on My Credit Card
2
U.S. Congress. Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act, Public Law 111-345
3
FTC. Using Credit Cards and Disputing Charges
4
Bankrate. Tools to Stop Recurring Card Charges
5
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. How Do I Dispute a Charge on My Credit Card Bill
6
California Office of the Attorney General. Credit Cards – Dispute a Charge
7
FTC. Negative Option Rule
8
Federal Register. Negative Option Rule