Positive practices

Positive practices are pro-consumer business approaches that prioritize the interests, rights, and well-being of customers. They are designed to empower consumers and offer fairness, transparency, and value:

• Transparency

Clearly disclosing pricing, terms, conditions, and product information upfront.

• Fair value

Offering products/services at reasonable prices that match the value provided.

• Consumer control and choice

Giving customers options, simple cancellation, ownership rights, and repair ability.

• Longevity and durability

Designing products to last and be repairable, reducing waste and repeat costs.

• Respectful support

Providing accessible, helpful, and fair customer service to identify and resolve issues.

Examples

Common Positive Practices

Practice	Description
One-Time Purchase	Offering a product or service for a single payment with no recurring fees for core functionality.
Right to Repair	Designing products to be repairable by the consumer, and making parts, tools, manuals, and software accessible to the public.
Transparent Pricing	Clearly displaying the full price (including all mandatory fees/taxes) upfront in advertising or early during checkout.
Fair Return Policy	Offering returns, exchanges, or refunds within a reasonable time frame.
Clear Cancellation Policy	Maintaining a simple and straightforward process for cancelling subscriptions without unnecessary steps.
Ownership model	Ensuring consumers own what they purchase, including the ability to use, modify, resell, or transfer the product freely.
Honest Marketing	Providing accurate information about products.
Proactive Customer Support	Offering readily available support to identify and resolve issues efficiently.
Privacy By Design	A product or service is designed in a way that collecting metadata and accessing users' information is technically impossible even for the manufacturer or the entity running the service.

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Subscription or single purchase

Subscriptions prioritize continuous access and updates, while one-time purchases emphasize ownership.

One-time

A single payment granting permanent ownership or access to a physical product or lifetime software license.

Positives

• No long-term financial commitment required.
• No ongoing costs allows customers to avoid recurring fees.
• The users retains access indefinitely without dependency on the provider.

Negatives

• Higher initial cost may deter budget-conscious buyers.
• Limited updates and future improvements may require additional purchases.
• Businesses rely on new sales for sustained income.

Subscription

Recurring monthly or annual payments provide ongoing access to a product or service.

Positives

• Lower entry cost spreads payments over time, making services more accessible.
• Subscribers receive continuous updates, ongoing improvements, and support.
• Businesses get a predictable revenue stream from recurring payments.

Negatives

• Long-term cost may become more expensive over time than a one-time purchase.
• Ongoing commitment requires active cancellation to stop payments.
• Subscription fatigue may cause consumers to feel overwhelmed by multiple recurring charges.

Considerations for subscription plans

• Does this service update frequently or at least within the subscription time frame?
• How long will I be needing this service, and will it be compatible with me for that amount of time?

Considerations for one-time purchases

• Will I need this for more than a single month (or subscription period)?
• How soon will this product become redundant or outdated? Is it an annual subscription in disguise?

Offline product vs. online services for digital goods

Services that run exclusively online innately allow the company to maintain greater control over how their products operate and are received. This form of control can lead to changes in the product that can improve it, but can otherwise also introduce a myriad of issues such as incompatibility and the removal of functionality. Digital goods that are completely operational offline allow the consumer to decide how long those goods will be used. As long as the downloaded product can be stored and correctly rendered, it has no expiration.

Considerations for online services

• Is this product made for online connectivity and interaction?
  • Example: Online social games such as World of Warcraft
• Is this product more secure online?
• Is required online connectivity an artificial constraint or is it legitimately necessary for the product's functionality?
• How likely am I to maintain an internet connection to this service?
• Can this service alter itself into an incompatible state? Can this service remove functionality that I need?
• Is this service distributed from a centralized organization?
  • If so, is there legislation and effective enforcement in said organization's location that protects me from malicious practices with my data?

Considerations for offline products

• Will I be able to effectively download and store this?
• Does the product contain DRM protections?
• Does it have any dependencies, and can those dependencies become redundant?
  • Example: Products designed for a limited set of operating systems that may become outdated

Source availability

Oftentimes, companies will actively obscure, or simply not provide, details about a product's functionality. This exacerbates the potential pitfalls mentioned above, but when information is provided it can eliminate many of them.

Considerations for physical goods

• Does the product provide schematics?
• Are parts available?
  • This helps product longevity by making repair easier, regardless of who performs the repair.
• Are there anti-repair measures in place?

Considerations for digital goods

• Is the source code available?
  • This can allow patches if unwanted updates are pushed or support is dropped.
• Are there DRM measures in place?