I remember people complaining about this a few years ago, so it looks like this strategy works well in GoDaddy's favor.

I used to have 200+ domains with GoDaddy, but since they no longer offer renewal coupons I moved most of them away.

Go daddy has been a pita for as long as I can remember. I only have two sites remaining on GoDaddy and they wouldn't still be there if GD wasn't doing something funky with the transfer codes. I have requested them several times to no avail and haven't had time to call to find out what's going on. One of many reasons I advise people to register their domains elsewhere.

I left GD behind long ago. I don't understand why anyone still uses them.

Well Raja, you were right! All my domains are set back to auto renew after I specifically did not want to auto renew them.

I'm currently leaving them and transferring my domains and business to namecheap as we speak. I advice all other warriors do the same.

I noticed the same thing in my account as well, but I just
manually changed them back to how I wanted them.

Besides this I've never had a problem with them.

-Ray Edwards

This is not only a problem with Godaddy, i recently saw my domains at register.com set to autorenew and the other day my credit card was charged with a re-bill even though i had not
authorized it

I've never had this happen. In the past I've gone through challenges changing new domains away from auto renew. I've also had them email, call and send tons of mail for a few domains to try to get me to renew them, but never had this happen.

Keep in mind I've never had more than five domains with them at a time, I normally transfer them to another domain provider.

I have justhost and they auto renew as well. I prefer it that way to prevent interruptions.

For Go Daddy, check into your account every month and see if there are changes to your account or memos on policy change that you may have not read in a sent email.

When renewing domains, mention that you saw a coupon for 40% off. They will say that the coupon was for new domains and not renewals. Tell them that with all the offers you have been receiving from other companies, GD's renewal price seems substantial, then pause...be quiet ...and let the customer service/sales person on the phone speak. If they don't make you an offer, ask for one by stating, "Well, with no discount, I am going to have to think about renewing with you guys and consider other offers. Do you have any discount you can give me?"

The sales force at GD is given some lead-way on pricing in order to retain current customers who are a threat to take their business elsewhere. I have always gotten a nice price reduction when I do this. You need to be renewing over 20 domains at a time to get the price reduction.