Valve Faces Legal Action In Australia Over Refund Policy

[Jagger100]

The laws in Australia don't give you the right to return something if you simply don't like it or change your mind, there has to be something fundamentally wrong with the goods which makes them unfit for purpose or if they are misdescribed. Even then, the seller at first instance is not obliged to provide a refund, they have the right to first attempt to repair the good or offer an exchange.

Absolutely no way to enforce that. If someone says their game doesn't run, are they going to lug in their desktop setup and show the retailer or the retailer going to a make a house call. Just how do you verify they're not BS'ing? Even so, is a game company going to call back the development team and recode the game so it won't crash on little Joey's home made machine. So repair is out, here. Its refund propably having to take the consumers word.

The government has nothing to do with the pricing of content here, it is entirely on the companies who provide the most the most flippant and insipid excuses to justify their positions. There was a recent gov't enquiry into digital pricing and most of the major companies couldn't even be stuffed showing up, they had to be compelled to attend. The conclusion reached was that there was no reasonable justification for the massive divide in prices and the consumers should actively use VPN services.

Nobody is plotting to ruin Australians' day. They are looking at the place like a market and 'market pricing'. They basically are looking to maximize (profit per unit)x(number of sales). Whatever price makes that biggest is going to be the price. I guarantee that US pricing is set the same way.

So the higher prices in Australia comes from two possibilities
1) problem with the profit per unit vs. the US. I could only say for a Valve who doesn't have to deal with physical travel or B&M store, taxes/fees could be the only possible reason.
2) change in volume with higher prices has a weaker gradient than the US. Basically in the US consumers are more likely to not buy if the prices appear excessively high. So the lose too much volume.

 

[DF-1]

valve needs to be taken down a peg. zero customer support, some stupid policies, and when you don't accept their brand new eula you cannot log into your steam account which makes zero sense.

 

[Hornet]

I mean if they ever close shop for whatever reason, all of your paid for games could be rendered invalid. Plus, the usual pitfalls of online DRM you've mentioned.



The problem isn't about blind fandboys using Steam, it's about refusing to accept any criticism. Even worse when hypocritically bashing the same things elsewhere.

Yeah I do agree there are blind fanboys out there for everything (just look at the graphic card section, lol), doubt they are the majority though

And yeah, you're right, any online DRM relies on the existence of an online service. Only time will tell what happens if a DD service such as Steam cease to exist, although Valve did mention that they could easily patch out the client.

But whatever downside there are with Steam, it is certainly isn't unique to Steam only, and they are certainly not the first to do it as well.

 

[Balhazer]

And BTW, for those who don't know about how the anti-business policies of Australia's government is hurting their people, lets try to understand why Ausies always act like they live in poverty:
Pack of cigs: $18.62
Gallon of gas: $5.87
1 Pair of Levis 501 Jeans: $94.84
Internet (6 Mbps): $63.31
Porsche Carrera S: $282,800 ($88K in the US BTW)
Coke/Pepsi (0.33 liter bottle): $2.86
Eggs (12): $4.04
1 min. of Prepaid Mobile Tariff Local (No Discounts or Plans): $0.84 (its around 10-15 cents here)
Domestic Beer (0.5 liter bottle): $4.53
Price per Square Meter to Buy Apartment: $7,148.26

Anti-business hippies sometimes forget that you can demand anything you want, but someone, ie the consumer, ends up paying for it.

In Mexico the gov. & the business piss on the entire population, we have all those prices withput any protection at all.

We only had internet, eggs & cellphone cheaper.

 

[Lord_Exodia]

The thing is that Value didn't start the no refunds, that has been an industry standard for years. You have never been able to buy a movie at a store, go home and open it, watch it and bring it back to get your money back. same for pc games, once you open the game and installed it, you were stuck with it. Valve and the rest have just taken this from how it has been with physical copies and moved it to digital.

Now they should be willing to work with customers that their system gives the wrong game to after checkout or stuff like that. But I can't really fault them for not giving refunds all the time to people. Otherwise people would abuse that all the time. Buy a game, play it then turn around and demand a refund. So they do need to have some type of rules in place, and they choice to go with the ones that have been there for decades.

In cases of really broken game they have given refunds. So it does happen though.

I wish it were that simple. If that's all it was this thread wouldn't have reached a 3rd page. Valve denies refunds or price match for games purchased even if the game was never played or downloaded (the equivalent of opened to me)

I had a sittuation where a game I bought and never downloaded would not be returned. Another game (same scenario) went on sale for half of what I paid and they refused a price match. It's not just a standard policy or mindset. They lack customer service common courtesy.

 

[Tak Ne]

I wish it were that simple. If that's all it was this thread wouldn't have reached a 3rd page. Valve denies refunds or price match for games purchased even if the game was never played or downloaded (the equivalent of opened to me)

I had a sittuation where a game I bought and never downloaded would not be returned. Another game (same scenario) went on sale for half of what I paid and they refused a price match. It's not just a standard policy or mindset. They lack customer service common courtesy.

Price matching on unused digital goods??? Thats a joke right?

Even if Valve offered refunds it would only ever be credit for games purchased through steam otherwise it would be abused by people trying to get refunds on $1 bundles and games bought with stolen credit cards off dodgy key sites.

 

[chrcoluk]

and the last reply I think is the problem, steam seem extremely paranoid about security (hence me having 2 reverify my email address every 2-4 weeks), steamguard etc. So they may well have security issues and those issues are leading them to treat customers like dirt and break various trading laws around the world.

 

[Lord_Exodia]

Price matching on unused digital goods??? Thats a joke right?

Even if Valve offered refunds it would only ever be credit for games purchased through steam otherwise it would be abused by people trying to get refunds on $1 bundles and games bought with stolen credit cards off dodgy key sites.

I see what your saying. The first game I didn't want to buy and bought it on accident, I actually already owned the game (I forgot it was included in a recently purchased humble bundle). The second game went on sale the day after I bought it on steam for 1/2 what I paid.

In my request on both I asked for store credit since I'd likely be buying something else very soon.

In both cases even though the games were not downloaded or played they rejected the request. This kind of thing can probably fly here in the US but in other countries such as Austrailia this kind of thing will probably not fly.

 

[TwistedAegis]

Steam tracks every minute you're playing the game; they absolutely should have some 15 minutes or less policy.

Also, if you can't figure out getting goods to Australia will make them cost more (no, doesn't apply to digital goods, but talking about cars imported to Australia being more expensive...duh?)...