Adobe Stock Assets Limits on Paid Subscription

[Sheri31479824o4eu]

Hi Community! I have had a bit of a hiatius (about 2 years) from using my Adobe Stock subscription due to personal reasons and just starting using it again. I noticed I only had 120 assets and should've had A LOT more seeing as I was paying $29.99 per month for all those months. When I called support, they told me I had a limit of 120 assets and that I could not have a refund of any kind on an active subscription. I recieved no other information. I asked to speak to someone stateside and they told me there is no support in the US. So reaching out for the first time to my Adobe community, because I'm in a bit of a hard spot after losing my job and trying to freelance to make ends meet. I will use all the assets between my freelance biz and sharing with the 13 YO in middle school for his school projects. Does anyone know if my subscription is cancelled, do I loose the assets I do have? Would I be able get a refund for so many months of subcription fees I was charged with no assets to show for it, or somehow obtain the assets I've paid for over the last couple of years? Can a company take $$ from customers without providing a product? Any help or advice is appreciated! Thank you!

[WendellaBee · Accepted solution]

@Sheri31479824o4eu 

Your subscription is active and you would have received emails whenever your plan renewed. You can manage your subscription in Account Management: https://account.adobe.com

When you signed up for your Adobe Stock subscription the terms you agreed to stated that your unused quota expires one year after it was issued. The maximum quota you can accrue is 120 licenses/plan credits with a 10 asset plan. If you decide to cancel your subscription you will lose your unused quota but you will retain access to any items you've already licensed. These can be accessed via your license history: https://stock.adobe.com/Dashboard/LicenseHistory

[Sheri31479824o4eu]

ok @WendellaBee thank you. Have a good day today.

[Jill_C]

See the FAQ page which will answer some of your questions:

Common Questions about plans, purchasing, and availability, Adobe Stock

Here's the explanation regarding roll-over assets:
"With the three-asset/month plan, the 10-asset/month plan, and the 40-asset/month plan, your unused licenses roll over to the next month as long as your subscription is active. The rollover limit is 12 times your subscription entitlement; for example, a maximum of 120 assets roll over for the 10-asset/month plan."

If you cancel your subscription, you'll lose the accrued unused credits. This is similar to cancelling your cable tv subscription; once you cancel, you can no longer use the service, no matter how many movies you had put in your watchlist.

If you cancel you subscription, you will not lose any previously licensed assets; you retain those licenses in perpetuity. However, be sure you've actually downloaded all licensed assets in your Library. Sometimes a Contributor removes an asset from their portfolio, and then you'd have no way of accessing it. 

These terms are made clear in the License Agreement and/or on the website, so it's unlikely that you'd be able to get a refund for not having used the service while you were paying for it. I would use the cable tv analogy here also. If I go on vacation for an extended period of time and don't use the service, I can't try to negotiate reimbursement for that time that I'm away. The "product" Adobe is providing to you is access to a large database of assets. If you choose not to fully utilize that service during the time you're paying for it, they have no obligation to reimburse you for the unused portion.

Regarding the images you might want to use for your child's school projects, Adobe now offers a database of ~1.1 million Free assets. You should be able to find what you need among those.

[Sheri31479824o4eu]

Thank you so much @Jill_C  for taking the time to provide such a detailed and helpful response to my inquiry! I appreciate your effort to share the policy of the Adobe Stock subscription.

My concern is less about utilization, and more about the perceived value exchange between myself as a customer, and Adobe Stock as the provider of a service selling commodities associated with it. By definition, an asset is a useful and desirable thing and is a single item of ownership having an exchange value. In this case, I see an Adobe asset as a thing I buy in exchange for money. I have been paying for the subscription that entitles me to 10 assets per month, and my disagreement is not about the use or non-use of those assets, but about their accrual and availability to me as a paying customer.

To be fair, the analogy of a cable TV subscription does not fully capture the essence of my concerns as it provides an ongoing service, irrespective of user engagement, while Adobe Stock assets are commodities that are traded for money. I’m thinking a fairer comparison may be to a mobile phone data plan, where the user pays for a certain amount of data each month, and any unused data can roll over to the next month, akin to the unused Adobe Stock assets. Up until last month I was actually on a 4GB plan with my provider. If I didn’t use the entire 4GB in a given month, my provider automatically rolled over any of my unused data including any additional data I purchased in a month, and it was available for me to use in subsequent months. That’s kind of what I am looking for in my Adobe Stock subscription - the 10 assets I have paid for each month but not used available for me to use at any time.

Regarding the refund, I do understand Adobe's terms and conditions. However, as a customer who has been faithfully paying for a service, albeit not utilizing it to its fullest, it's disheartening to learn that the assets I've paid for but not used are not available to me. I will have to keep my subscription, because I surely do not want to lose the assets available to me that I have now. Heck, I have nearly a thousand dollars invested in my 120 assets!

Your suggestion to use the free assets for school projects is also appreciated, and I will certainly explore that option. Yet, it does not resolve the larger issue at hand. I hope my concerns are transparent, and I would be grateful if you or anyone else in the community could guide me on this matter, or possibly direct me to the right department within Adobe to address my concerns. I believe in fairness and understanding from both sides to make this situation better.

Thanks again for your thoughtful response to my inquiry Jill!

[Jill_C]

You have already received a response from an Adobe representative @WendellaBee above. You accepted the Adobe T&C's at the time you subscribed to the service, so it seems unlikely that you'll be able to renegotiate those terms with Adobe. You can contact Customer Service using the Contact Us in chat icon on this page:

https://helpx.adobe.com/support/stock.html

[Sheri31479824o4eu]

Thank you Jill. Yes I did, and I assumed that there would likely be no consideration from Adobe, but it doesn't hurt to see what the community has to say. Once again, thank you, and I hope you have a great rest of your day!