If it is a day order, the time just ran out. You do not have to ask for an expiration. It required no action on your part. Expire is not a cancellation. If it is a GTC (Good till Cancell) order that would require your action to cancel.
My 2006 IB statement shows only 70$ in cancelations fees ( with total commish > 20k) . I do a lot of cancelations/changes , but I always selecting Smart. 70$ sounds like a non issue for me .
It depends on what your goal for the trade is. If an option is $3.20x$3.40 and you generally want a 20 cent profit per trade, when opening the position it's worth trying to buy the option for $3.30, and then cancelling if you don't get it at that price. Sometimes, the spread is so wide and there are no other market participants other than you and the MM, so you have to negotiate with the MM. I was trading options yesterday that were sometimes quoted at $.70x$1.30 with a delta of .4, and a 2% move in the price of the underlying didn't change the NBBO at all. So you have to try various prices inside the spread until you get a fill.
If you are trading for 20 cents then what are you doing scalping ops with 60 cents edge? Not trying to be argumentative, just trying to see the logic behind it.
With the 60-cent spread options, I was trying to get more than 20 cents profit out of the round trip. I had bought them at .70 the previous day (when the spread was .50x1.00). I ultimately sold them at $1.10 and $1.20.
To the person saying 1 cancel makes the $1.75 commish worth it, that depends, are you doing 1 contract a trade? The $1.75 is PER CONTRACT The $1.20 modification/cancel fee is PER ORDER