Which of the following (if any) is the correct way to say you don't want to auto-renew membership, but instead cancel it?
I hereby cancel my membership of xyz…
- effective at
- effective with
- with effect of
- with effect from
- with
- at
…the end of the current (2017/2018) membership year.
If you had a fixed date for the last day of membership, say the 15th July, in mind, could you then – in addition to the options above – say
I hereby cancel my membership
- effective on
- with the end of
15 July 2017.
Best Answer
You don't need a preposition. You could simply use:
Instead of just "effective", you could say "to become effective", which seems a little less abrupt to me. If you really want to add a preposition:
"With effect of" wouldn't apply. That would typically refer to something that results, like "with the effect of your losing me as a customer".
"From" could be used with "effective", but not for a cancellation. "From" implies that something starts at that point and continues. Everything ends with a cancellation, so your non-membership would continue, but cancellation is a one-time event. But you could talk about membership "effective from..." if your notice was about starting a membership.
The word "effective" calls attention to the fact that the action will actually take place at a later date, not immediately upon receipt of your notice. That helps to reduce human error, but it isn't necessary. Your examples 5 and 6 are also fine "with/at the end of the current (2017/2018) membership year." In fact, my "on/at/with" examples could be used without the word "effective".
Peter's answer includes "effective immediately". That's a case where "effective" adds emphasis rather than error reduction. But that's also an example where "effective" isn't necessarily required.
Your examples 7 and 8 are covered above.
I wasn't aware of the AmE vs. BrE differences that Peter mentions in his answer, so in case it isn't obvious by now, my answer reflects AmE.