Spotify asks delinquent Family Plan customers for GPS coordinates

All good scams end eventually.

Spotify has been sending some users on its premium Family Plan messages asking them to confirm their address with GPS coordinates, according to Quartz. 

Spotify is classifying the messages as part of a test for improvements to its Family Plan user experience. But the requests, and Spotify’s customer service messages, suggest that the streaming service is trying to weed out customers on the family plan who are not actually in the same single home-based family.

Spotify’s Family Plan lets customers pay $14.99 per month for up to five premium accounts. The small print makes it clear that the plan is for people who “reside at your same address.”

Image: screenshot: spotify/rachel kraus/mashable

But like so many streaming services before it, there’s not much preventing families who live at separate addresses, or just groups of friends, from signing up for the plan and saving up to $9 bucks per month off of a regular $12.99/month premium plan. (If you’re a new premium customer, you pay $9.99/month. But returning premium customers play $12.99).

Some users sharing their notifications on social media point out that you don’t have to live at the same address to be a family. While that’s certainly true, Spotify — via its “Spotify Cares” Twitter handle — is not so much addressing what it means to be a family as the qualifications for the *family plan.* Ok, Spotify. Harsh but fair.

It’s not clear how Spotify is choosing its victims, er, customers, with regard to who’s getting these GPS notifications. But it’s not already tracking people’s locations; there’s no option to turn location services on or off in Settings.

Spotify says that GPS requests are part of a test for user experience improvements, and did not share how it’s choosing who receives these requests.

“Spotify is currently testing improvements to the user experience of Premium for Family with small user groups in select markets,” a Spotify spokesperson told Mashable over email. “We are always testing new products and experiences at Spotify, but have no further news to share regarding this particular feature test at this time.”

Until we know more, Family Plan customers might want to spend some extra time at mom’s house.