CancelWitness

Who it's for

Compliance owners at consumer SaaS companies with Stripe or Paddle subscriptions; today they use a manual test account, screenshots in Google Docs, and a lawyer checklist.

The problem

Legal and time hurt: negative-option auto-renewal rules require proof of clear consent and easy cancellation, but assembling timestamped UI and email evidence takes hours and is weak in disputes.

How to build it

Web dashboard plus open-source CLI runner: connects to Stripe/Paddle test mode, scripts the checkout-to-cancel flow with a headless browser, captures emails in a disposable mailbox, outputs signed PDF/JSON.

How it makes money

Consumer SaaS compliance owners pay $199 per audit or $99/month for weekly reruns; they pay because lawyer review or enforcement response costs over $1,000, and the free Stripe sandbox only proves billing status, not required disclosures or cancellation emails.

Why it doesn't exist yet

Incumbent billing platforms expose cancellation state but not jurisdiction-specific evidence; legal e-discovery tools do not execute consumer flows. Indie gap: maintain a narrow scripted checkout-to-cancel test and a public evidence bundle.

First users

First 10 users come from indie SaaS founders worried about California auto-renewal law who get a free public cancellation receipt, plus compliance consultants using it as a fixed-fee audit artifact.

Build size

1 person x 10 weeks; includes Stripe/Paddle test-mode subscription creation, headless cancellation capture, 24-hour mailbox parsing, fixed 12-item report; excludes mobile app-store subscriptions, custom billing portals, and non-English locales.

Biggest risk

Stripe or Paddle ships a native cancellation-compliance certificate export, making the third-party packet unnecessary.

Conditions for a hit (all 3 required)

• Given Stripe or Paddle test credentials and a checkout URL, it creates a disposable subscription, follows the published cancel flow, and stores timestamped screenshots plus HAR in a report within 30 minutes.
• It watches a generated mailbox for 24 hours and reports whether the first cancellation confirmation email contains a timestamp, account identifier, and a working cancellation or unsubscribe link.
• It emits a signed PDF/JSON with pass/fail on a fixed 12-item ROSCA/California ARL checklist, and each failure cites the missing screen text or email field.

How it's judged (in 6 months)

GitHub repository reaches 1,000 stars(judgment date 2027-03-27)

AI self-confidence 55/100 — self-reported likelihood of meeting the criterion, not a business success rate