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Somebody, somewhere has better skills as you have, more experience as you have, is smarter than you, has more friends as you do and can stay online longer. Just pray he's not out to get you.
This is why I always pay with game cards, or pre-paid gift cards...I simply do not trust these companies with my information. And, especially not Turbine.
Thing is, any one who had made an account with them - by the simple act of having Turbine's software on said users machine - had given them exoneration from this. And, from anything they might do in the future. Take a look at this excerpt from their EULA:
LIMITATION OF LIABILITY. IN NO EVENT SHALL TURBINE, ITS PARENT, SUBSIDIARIES OR AFFILIATES BE LIABLE FOR ANY LOSS OR DAMAGE OF ANY KIND ARISING OUT OF OR RELATING TO THE GAME AND/OR THE GAME CLIENT OR ANY USE THEREOF, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION ANY LOSS OF DATA OR GOODWILL, DISRUPTION OF SERVICE OR CLAIMS OF THIRD PARTIES. IN NO EVENT SHALL TURBINE, ITS PARENT, SUBSIDIARIES OR AFFILIATES BE LIABLE FOR ANY INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, EXEMPLARY, PUNITIVE, LIQUIDATED, OR OTHER CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES, WHETHER UNDER CONTRACT, TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE), STRICT LIABILITY OR ANY OTHER THEORY OF LIABILITY, ARISING FROM YOUR USE OF THE GAME (INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION THE GAME CLIENT). THE FOREGOING LIMITATIONS SHALL APPLY TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW, EVEN IF ANY REMEDY FAILS OF ITS ESSENTIAL PURPOSE. In no event shall Turbine's aggregate liability, whether arising in contract, tort, strict liability or otherwise, exceed the total fees paid by you to Turbine during the six (6) months immediately prior to the time such claim arose.
Not only that but it's users are pretty much required to defend their honor, no matter what and not complain (another excerpt):
INDEMNIFICATION. YOU HEREBY AGREE TO DEFEND, INDEMNIFY AND HOLD HARMLESS TURBINE, ITS PARENT, SUBSIDIARIES AND AFFILIATES, FROM AND AGAINST ANY CLAIM, LIABILITY, INJURY, DAMAGE, LOSS OR EXPENSE (INCLUDING REASONABLE ATTORNEYS' FEES) INCURRED AS A RESULT OF, ARISING FROM, OR RELATING TO YOUR USE OF THE GAME AND/OR THE GAME CLIENT.
And, many EULA/TOS across the MMORPG board are a lot like this one...If the OP has an active account with turbine (As in having their software on a computer that the OP owns), then the OP just violated their EULA with this thread. Not, trying to be a jerk about it. Just saying, that is the extent of your lack of freedoms when you play many MMORPG's. It is insane and it should be illegal. And, they should not be able to get away with this un-scaved and just sweep it under the rug...But, they will. And, if you don't like it. tough cookies.
...I have said it before and will say it again
Totally hear what you are saying .... suck a lot but very very true .... how many of us just click the accept button on EULA's .... and don't see you as being a jerk ... its great information ..
however in the UK we have thew unfair contracts ande causes act and EULA have never been tested in court because there is a very good chance they would be defeated .
however in the UK we have thew unfair contracts ande causes act and EULA have never been tested in court because there is a very good chance they would be defeated .
Yea that stuff doesn't get tested much on the other side of the pond either. The bluff tactics works just as well on us as you guys
There may come a point when they mess up too badly. To where it reflects poorly on your local government to not go after them. But, I don't think this is nearly enough to get that ball rolling, when big electric, or big oil do stuff far worse then this to their customers each year and no one bats an eyelash.
*SNIP*
While you have a point please do not compare WB/Turbine to big oil and other huge energy related organizations otherwise the rest of your post looses all credibility.
Time Warner made almost 30bil last year for having been founded in 1990. And, General Electric thereabouts of 147.5bil last year and it was founded around 1890)....And, BP made the most last year (around 390bil) and they go back as far as what 1919? and all of their entertainment subsidies did about on par with each other level for level. That is a perfectly reasonable scalable comparison. Given the scalable blunders customer service wise on part of all parties in recent times. And everything on these forums without direct evidence can only be taken as opinion and digest any way...
So I goto ask, What exactly is this credibility I have lost and why?
Even though these are boiler plate contracts, enforceability (or lack thereof), depends on the state, region, or province you are in, the court the matter is heard through, And a really good argument on either side. If you did or do any of the following:
- Pay them utilizing a line of credit not in your name.
- Install their software on a machine that you can not prove ownership of.
- Show/Have no substantial evidence of your claims.
- Agree to their ToS/EULA when not of age to legally do so where you live.
- Did not allow for adequate time according to your local laws for a resolution to the issue to be reached outside of court.
Any claim you or anyone would make on your behalf is substantially weaker. Especially if the company makes the ToS/EULA publicly available before the point of having to agree to it to proceed with use of their product (which Turbine does on their website, though it is difficult to navigate to without typing it into google).
The biggest reason that they will get away with it is because a heavy chunk of their users,are using their service illegally (or at the very least in a way that is against their explicit terms/conditions of use). If you go after them for whatever reason, they will do everything in their power to find fault with you.And, these are big boys. They won't play nice. If you have one song, movie, game or even an OS that you do not have the legal right to be in possession of or use of on your machine. be ready to go to jail soon after you start something with them.
If you start shart with a big boy...you'd best be squeaky clean to begin with. You also had best have the funds and time to commit to a very long process. Because they will draw it out as long as they can. And, you better have an air tight claim too. They have. They do. And, they will likely continue to get away with it. Because, those with the ability to hold them accountable don't care. And, those who care for the most part don't have the ability (or the drive) to see it through.
There may come a point when they mess up too badly. To where it reflects poorly on your local government to not go after them. But, I don't think this is nearly enough to get that ball rolling, when big electric, or big oil do stuff far worse then this to their customers each year and no one bats an eyelash.
It does suck, and thanks for the warning. Heck I have not enjoyed anything they have produced for sometime. And this is a final nail in the coffin for me ever playing one of their games again. And, if you got the ballz resources and ability to go after them...more power to you. But, otherwise..watcha gana do?
Tell me, on what legal ground would they have for searching my computer for music and such based on a lawsuit that would be over them illegally (note, it is only illegal if they do not make reparations for any and all charges and fees that are a direct result of this over charging, similar things have happened with other online billing systems before and they only had to pay any and all charges and fees that were a result of the over charging/multiple charging) charging my bank account to much? Any lawyer worth his degree can easily prevent them from searching my PC and can have anything they may bring up dismissed due to them not having any legal right to search my PC. As for how solid the ToS/EULA may be, it is only as solid as those signs that stores put up claiming they are not responsible for damage done by carts. Those signs are 100% incorrect and are only there to fool people. Laws require places of business keep their lots free and clear of all debris and carts are legally debris. However because sheeple always believe what they read they do not bother to actually go out and learn anything different. No ToS/EULA in the world makes the company immune to the law in any way. Therefore any claims brought to court would not be weakened by them. As far as funds and time to commit to any legal actions, something on this scale would likely become a class action suit which would greatly reduce the cost on all parts, including WB as once it reaches class action status then any person affected by this billing mistake who does not join can be denied the ability to file a single claim against WB separate from the class action suit.
Originally posted by PWN_FACE Those EULAs are there just to cow people into thinking they don't have legal rights or that they've signed them away.
This.
Besides, as i have said elsewhere already, EULAs aren't necessarily (or better: generally) binding in any way anyways. Companies, almost by definition, want to limit their accountability to zero. So they try to impose "contracts" on customers which give them all rights (e.g. to charge you recurring fees) while at the same time denying the customer any of HIS rights. Yet, what many people forget is that certain customer right's can not be denied in the first place (which these are depend on the local laws) rendering the whole (or at least the "offending" parts of the) EULA null and void.
As was said, companies want to discourage people from taking legal action against them, that's all there is to it.
and thank goodness you are F2P .. your money is safe
I'm pretty sure the words "money", "safe", and "FTP" should never be used in the same sentence.
I see what you did there. Well done.
To find an intelligent person in a PUG is not that rare, but to find a PUG made up of "all" intelligent people is one of the rarest phenomenons in the known universe.
Might be smart for them to offer even the players that were not effected some good in-game items or cash-shop money or something. This might scare off most of those who were effected by it. But, by proxy it could also loose them a lot of people who weren't out of sheer panic. After they make sure this is fully resolved and everyone gets their money back. They are probably going to have to act fast to quell remaining descent and placate their players as a whole.
There may come a point when they mess up too badly. To where it reflects poorly on your local government to not go after them. But, I don't think this is nearly enough to get that ball rolling, when big electric, or big oil do stuff far worse then this to their customers each year and no one bats an eyelash.
*SNIP*
While you have a point please do not compare WB/Turbine to big oil and other huge energy related organizations otherwise the rest of your post looses all credibility.
Time Warner made almost 30bil last year for having been founded in 1990. And, General Electric thereabouts of 147.5bil last year and it was founded around 1890)....And, BP made the most last year (around 390bil) and they go back as far as what 1919? and all of their entertainment subsidies did about on par with each other level for level. That is a perfectly reasonable scalable comparison. Given the scalable blunders customer service wise on part of all parties in recent times. And everything on these forums without direct evidence can only be taken as opinion and digest any way...
So I goto ask, What exactly is this credibility I have lost and why?
You lose credibility because it is asinine to compare 30bill to 147bil/390bil. Do you really think WB/Turbine has the same power as these big energy companies?
If these big energy companies want stuff covered up do you really thin WB or Turbine can exude the same kind of pressure/power ? LOL
It is oranges and steaks. Anyhoot this is getting off topic so believe what you will
Brenics ~ Just to point out I do believe Chris Roberts is going down as the man who cheated backers and took down crowdfunding for gaming.
There may come a point when they mess up too badly. To where it reflects poorly on your local government to not go after them. But, I don't think this is nearly enough to get that ball rolling, when big electric, or big oil do stuff far worse then this to their customers each year and no one bats an eyelash.
*SNIP*
While you have a point please do not compare WB/Turbine to big oil and other huge energy related organizations otherwise the rest of your post looses all credibility.
Time Warner made almost 30bil last year for having been founded in 1990. And, General Electric thereabouts of 147.5bil last year and it was founded around 1890)....And, BP made the most last year (around 390bil) and they go back as far as what 1919? and all of their entertainment subsidies did about on par with each other level for level. That is a perfectly reasonable scalable comparison. Given the scalable blunders customer service wise on part of all parties in recent times. And everything on these forums without direct evidence can only be taken as opinion and digest any way...
So I goto ask, What exactly is this credibility I have lost and why?
You lose credibility because it is asinine to compare 30bill to 147bil/390bil. Do you really think WB/Turbine has the same power as these big energy companies?
If these big energy companies want stuff covered up do you really thin WB or Turbine can exude the same kind of pressure/power ? LOL
It is oranges and steaks. Anyhoot this is getting off topic so believe what you will
The point is that Time Warner is shown to be, by contrast of a larger company - with more resources, and bigger blunders, only getting slaps on the wrist or fines that don't even effect them - likely to go unpunished by any one in authority. They don't need the power of a fortune 500 like General Electric. Because, respectively they have low visibility, and made a much smaller mistake. However, they can manage it with the same efficiency.
Like if the power grid fails in a rural area of a larger county. Dissolve any ties with your worst critics, control the flow of information and discussion on the matter to the best of your ability. Make the most immediate repair to the situation necessary. placate the effected. Get those who were not effected more on your side.
The same strategy is needed by the smaller company to handle their smaller issue, as is needed by the larger company to handle their larger issue. The only difference is the scale on which these things happen. And scale alone is not enough to make it a poor comparison. Especially since when you are talking about Time Warner you are talking about Warner Brothers entertainment. And, when your talking about General electric you are also talking about RCA and NBC. It may seem like two different things on the surface. But, it really is the same thing. If something has 9 ways in which it is like something else and 1 way in which it isn't (but given choice circumstances could easily be) how are they so different that they cannot be fairly compared?
Your first stop if Turbine does not rectify it voluntarly is your Bank or Credit Card Company. The Bank or Credit Card Company doesn't WANT this stuff to happen because it defeats confidence in using thier services to pay bills and for customers to keep money/accounts in. So if you are genuinely in the right here, the Bank or CC company WILL usualy be your advocate in this sort of thing though it will take some paperwork to do. No matter how much influence WB or another gaming company thinks they might have....let me assure you it doesn't hold a candle to a major bank or CC company. And unlike an EULA, the Developer will have signed a REAL and FULLY ENFORCEABLE Contract with the CC company in order to do charges.
Your second stop, if for some reason the above doesn't seem to be working well.....is (if you live in the US) to file a complaint with the Federal Trade Commision. You might also want to check with your state AG to see if there are state agencies that can assist as well. As mentioned above, EULA does not trump any rights you have as a consumer due to Federal or State law. In many cases the FTC (or State AG's) do like to go after Private Enterprises, if there are legitimate cases that involve large numbers of consumers because those Agencies can get income by charging the Private Enterprise FINES and PENALTIES which go to government coffers in addition to forcing restitution toward consumers. Cash going directly into government coffers often helps offset influence that an Enterprise might have.
In any even, most businesses try to avoid that if they can because the cost of dealing with those things is often more then the cost of dealing with a few squeeky consumers. You have to be PROACTIVE about that though.....because they figure (usualy correctly) that only a small portion of consumers will actively pursue that sort of thing, so they'll make sure those consumers get satisfied....and the rest they'll just do the minimum that they would be required to do legaly (i.e. give back the money they erroneously charged). YMMV.
Your first stop if Turbine does not rectify it voluntarly is your Bank or Credit Card Company.
To be fair, hours after it happened Turbine said they were refunding the money to anyone affected. They also said they sent e-mails to all of those who were affected as well. They even said if people got overdraft charges or similar to contact them so they can rectify that.
They did respond quite quickly. The OP was mad that they didn't post in the general forums (they posted in the account forums which makes sense) and that they didn't keep coming back to repeat that they did in fact do the refunds (which they said could take a few days to show up depending on the bank).
That isn't to say that anything Turbine did here is ok, it is absolutely not and it is actually about the worst thing you could do. They did handle it properly (stopped the extra charges and refunding the money along with opening themselves up for people to report extra charges they incurred due to this problem), but some people expected them to give hourly updates even though they had already taken care of it. Not sure what they expected those updates to be "Again, we just wanted to say we did already take care of this, we will say it again next hour as well.:
At this time we are in the process of issuing direct refunds for any charges to affected accounts above the cost of monthly subscription payment(s). Please note that it may take a few days for these refunds to be reflected on bank statements after the refund is issued; the length of processing time depends on your bank. Once the refund has been processed, your bank can verify the transaction before it shows on your statement. If you need further assistance, or have questions with regards to the refund or any potential related fees, we recommend that you contact the phone number on the back of your bank card.
If you do not see the refund on your statement after a few days, if you incurred any penalties due to the charges, or if you need further assistance with your account or billing, our Customer Service Agents will be happy to take care of you. You can get in touch with Account Support by going to support.turbine.com, then clicking on "Support Center" and "Submit a Ticket." Players can also contact Account Support toll-free at 1-855-WBGAMES (Account Support Hours: 10am – 7pm Eastern Time 7 days a week (GMT -5).)
We deeply apologize for this situation, and any difficulties this has caused. We want to assure everyone that Turbine is dedicated to making sure we provide you with the best game experience and support possible, and that we are treating this issue with the highest priority. We are taking steps to ensure this never happens again to any of our players.
Yea this is going to make them real popular with the banks. Putting aside the customer pushback for the moment. Banks really really do not like this sort of thing. It popped fraud flags all over the place and doing it twice in 6 mo. makes doing business with them somewhat less attractive.
If you do not see the refund on your statement after a few days, if you incurred any penalties due to the charges, or if you need further assistance with your account or billing, our Customer Service Agents will be happy to take care of you. You can get in touch with Account Support by going to support.turbine.com, then clicking on "Support Center" and "Submit a Ticket." Players can also contact Account Support toll-free at 1-855-WBGAMES (Account Support Hours: 10am – 7pm Eastern Time 7 days a week (GMT -5).)
If you have been playing turbine games in the last few years you will know that the support system is beyond hopeless ... people have been calling regarding this and being told its a known issue and saying there is nothing more they can do .... Saying they will pay the money back is a given and no-one should have point that out .... this does not cover people that had no money over the weekend ....
Tomorrow they are having a company meeting and have announced that their phone support system will be offline for a time ....
If you actually read my original post you will see that I included that link as well with that exact same information in it .... and its not about being mad (thank for your mind reading abilities there its totally awesome) it about having $3.95 in my account when I need to do grocery shopping, my rent is due tomorrow and my car payment is due the next day along with my storage unit, my apartment blocks utilizes bill etc etc etc ... I have no doubt all the money will be paid back and they "say" extra charges will be covered .. but as many have already found out that the phones are just ringing out or the technician is a total prat and closes the ticket ... the work that I have to do now to prove to Turbine that I have overdraft fee's, late car payment fees, late rent fee's etc etc .. I understand that having proof is needed as some people will claim they had extra charges that they didn't incur .... but its a PITA that I don't really have the time for but will do it ....
Maybe tomorrow's company wide meeting will be to address some of these issues ..... and as other people have pointed out this is not the first time by a long shot that this has happened ... proving that there are horrible Q&A processes in the IT department ...... so again its not about being "mad" ..... when you have your whole bi-weekly pay check totally drained from your account before you've had a chance to even buy groceries, and you have to wait till possibly Wednesday till you get your money back .... and then you have to sit on the phone with baffoons for hours repeating the same information, getting put on hold, then repeating the same information, and then get all the documentation that you've been charged fee's by multiple establishments and then get that in the hand of Turbine .. then sit on the phone for hours with the bafoons just to make sure they do what they say, then come back and share your wonderfully insightful information
If you have used Turbines support in the past few year for anything slightly complicated then you would never have posted any of that ...
AND ... communicating in a side forum that next to nobody reads and removing/closing any post from general discussion and facebook and twitter feeds, maybe 10% of the AC community dont read the forums either ... sending emails is fine and again it a given they should not even need to announce that ... people already know they have a problem because they have no money
I have not received an email btw .... so that system is working like a rock star as well
Many players insisting on not using the different forums for their purpose (and always complaining there aren't announcements about downtimes even though they're posted in the announcement forums) isn't them trying to hide it.
They put a post about account issues in the forum that is for "Technical and Account Issues", it kind of makes sense.
Your first post implied they were trying to cover it up or dust it under the rug when they in fact have a post anyone can see (as their forums are open to the public to read) saying there was an issue and saying the steps they took.
I understand plenty of people were pissed about this, and they had/have every right to be. No company should ever charge someone multiple times or in ways they did not agree to. There is no excuse, there is no explanation, no justification that would ever allow for it or that would make it ok that it happened. People should be angry, they should post that they're angry, they should yell and scream about how the hell this could ever happen. All of that is 100% justified. There is also nothing wrong with you coming here and posting the information as well.
However, there was false information being tossed about by a few of those who were mad and there were some people (not saying you're one of them although suggesting they're trying to hide the issue is inflammatory) who were deliberately trying to inflame the situation as much as possible (in some cases because they weren't happy with other things like content changes or PvP issues so they used this as a platform to rage from).
My post was intended to show that they did in fact acknowledge the issue, they did stop the multiple charges, and they did say they had begun to process the refunds, to contact them with any extra charge issues, and that they had contacted those affected by this (although you've said you haven't gotten an e-mail so it may not have been perfect. Did you verify which e-mail was attached to the account? I've known many AC players to use throw away e-mail accounts for their billing before, also check your spam filter just in case). So outside of the fact that they let this happen, which as I said is inexcusable, they did at least appear to be taking the proper steps and taking them quickly which is contrary to a lot of the information being put out there.
I'm just really not sure what other type of post people wanted from them as that seemed to be the source of a lot of outrage. They posted acknowledging it happened and the steps they were taking to correct it. They also tried to funnel the discussions of it to the proper location, but people saw that as a cover-up even though they had their own public post about it.
If you call the announcements/technical issues forums "public", yes they are there for anyone to see but its like public TV that plays at midnight and only the weirdo's watch it.... on any of there truly public sources (twitter, facebook) they deleted any post with in seconds of anyone posting explaining they got over charged .... <------ this is the source of the rumblings of a cover-up ... then to add to that the closing of threads added to the insult .... I do understand what you are saying to an extent ... but they use the general forum for announcements about other things technical
Again it sounds like you have not played AC at all or not for a very long time .... this is by no means an isolated incident .. in the last few years --
2011 -- multiple charging of accounts
2012 -- upgrades to the accounts pages deleted a large number of people characters and the "support guys" took in excess of 3-4 weeks to be able to play the game ... all the while still being charged the monthly fee
2012 - multiple charging of accounts an a mass scale
2012 - random people over the space of 6 months being double charged each month
2012-13 billing and accounts system "upgraded" after which no one could log in with out first re-entering there CC details again ... at the same time people could not change there CC details if they wanted to use a different card. Then the system would not let people cancel their subscription
2013 - multiple people that have un-subbed for months have all of a sudden started getting billed again
2013 - authentication server down for months on and off meaning people could not log in (if you where logged in you where fine) ... the random accounts got corrupted and took often a month or more to resolve before that person could log in
2013 - a majority of the AC and AC2 player base is charged anywhere between $100-$6000 for this month subscription fee
("rumors" of LOTR and DDO being handed the same "present" with forums posts being deleted -- I saw it but have no proof as the posts are being deleted, others have reported the same)
2011-2013 -- so much down time on the server infrastructure that 150% xp/lum weekends are becoming a common thing
2013 - bugs being introduced into the game that are game breaking and not being fixed till the next patch or beyond ...
This is just a few things off the top of my head if I went back through threads and google searches I'd find more ... they archived / deleted any thread from mid 2012 so its hard to find anything beyond that ....
each of these alone can be looked upon as a glitch, pain in arse but a glitch... though this last one in my opinion needs VP public announcement (real public as on the main Turbine website and their social media sites) showing the companies concern ....
add all that together and this basically causes the frustration and venting that people are doing right now .... and no matter what you or others think its totally warranted
They have updated their thread in the side forum now which is good to see ---
Hello, everyone! We wanted to touch base with folks, and provide a brief update to the billing issues that took place last Friday. On Friday, we reached out directly to contact a number of users who received erroneous subscription charges, and worked quickly to resolve those erroneous charges.
At this time, we have resolved almost all erroneous charges. In particular, we have sent out emails to all affected Paypal users, seeking information which will help us resolve Paypal-specific concerns more easily. If you use Paypal to pay for your Asheron’s Call subscription, and received erroneous charges on Friday, please check the inbox of the email address connected to your Asheron’s Call subscription for more information. Please note, however, that depending on the practices of the various banks used by our customers, it may take a few business days for these changes to be reflected on bank statements. People who still have statement-related questions should contact the phone number on the back of their bank cards, and get in touch with their bank directly.
If players have not seen refunds after a few days, or if any other assistance is needed with account or billing-related matters, please contact our Customer Service agents so we can take care of you. You can get in touch with Account Support by going to support.turbine.com, then clicking on "Support Center" and "Submit a Ticket." Players can also contact Account Support toll-free at 1-855-WBGAMES. Account Support Hours are 10am – 7pm Eastern Time, 7 days a week (GMT -5).
Once again, we deeply apologize for this situation, and are working diligently to make sure that this cannot happen again to any of our players.
AC is dead, if you don't believe me just look at what is keeping it a-float. Multiple account subs from the small community of diehard AC fans. I played for years, in fact I was about to resub but after seeing this I am done forever. I had 5 accounts at once and it wasn't cheap @ $12.95 a month for a game this old is kinda ridiculous now that I think about it. Plus it is known fact if you play AC beyond level 130+ and are addicted to it you will have to have at least 1 alternate account to hold all your shit because AC has the most items of any other MMORPG I have ever seen.
Let me put that into perspective for you WB/Turbine. If you have 600 players at peak times on your popular server then you have at least 300 real subscribers at the minimum, most players have 3+ accounts so that number goes down even more. Now take this mess up from billing and you just lost at least 75% of your subscriber base for about a month or two until these players can feel safe trusting your billing again. How long can you keep a dead MMORPG going? Why no F2P yet?
F2P would make sense, you wont even need in game item mall, you could easily just make the item mall on account services page and the items you buy you redeem in game through an NPC where you click them and select receive items or whatever. That way the NPC checks your account and knows what you have coming to you and BAM you get the items in your backpack.
If you call the announcements/technical issues forums "public", yes they are there for anyone to see but its like public TV that plays at midnight and only the weirdo's watch it.... on any of there truly public sources (twitter, facebook) they deleted any post with in seconds of anyone posting explaining they got over charged .... <------ this is the source of the rumblings of a cover-up ... then to add to that the closing of threads added to the insult .... I do understand what you are saying to an extent ... but they use the general forum for announcements about other things technical
Again it sounds like you have not played AC at all or not for a very long time .... this is by no means an isolated incident .. in the last few years --
2011 -- multiple charging of accounts
2012 -- upgrades to the accounts pages deleted a large number of people characters and the "support guys" took in excess of 3-4 weeks to be able to play the game ... all the while still being charged the monthly fee
2012 - multiple charging of accounts an a mass scale
2012 - random people over the space of 6 months being double charged each month
2012-13 billing and accounts system "upgraded" after which no one could log in with out first re-entering there CC details again ... at the same time people could not change there CC details if they wanted to use a different card. Then the system would not let people cancel their subscription
2013 - multiple people that have un-subbed for months have all of a sudden started getting billed again
2013 - authentication server down for months on and off meaning people could not log in (if you where logged in you where fine) ... the random accounts got corrupted and took often a month or more to resolve before that person could log in
2013 - a majority of the AC and AC2 player base is charged anywhere between $100-$6000 for this month subscription fee
("rumors" of LOTR and DDO being handed the same "present" with forums posts being deleted -- I saw it but have no proof as the posts are being deleted, others have reported the same)
2011-2013 -- so much down time on the server infrastructure that 150% xp/lum weekends are becoming a common thing
2013 - bugs being introduced into the game that are game breaking and not being fixed till the next patch or beyond ...
This is just a few things off the top of my head if I went back through threads and google searches I'd find more ... they archived / deleted any thread from mid 2012 so its hard to find anything beyond that ....
each of these alone can be looked upon as a glitch, pain in arse but a glitch... though this last one in my opinion needs VP public announcement (real public as on the main Turbine website and their social media sites) showing the companies concern ....
add all that together and this basically causes the frustration and venting that people are doing right now .... and no matter what you or others think its totally warranted
You're also forgetting another bug in their billing system:
Certain players have 'bugged' accounts that require them to log onto the billing EACH time they wish to log onto Asheron's Call. OR they'll receive an authentication error when trying to log in.
On the PLUS side of this bug, the players don't get charged - at all. A developer responded to this problem a few months ago and pretty much said, "Welp...enjoy free AC" (I don't want to dig for that response, but believe me, it was just a brush-off and no ETA on a fix)
You're also forgetting another bug in their billing system:
Certain players have 'bugged' accounts that require them to log onto the billing EACH time they wish to log onto Asheron's Call. OR they'll receive an authentication error when trying to log in.
On the PLUS side of this bug, the players don't get charged - at all. A developer responded to this problem a few months ago and pretty much said, "Welp...enjoy free AC" (I don't want to dig for that response, but believe me, it was just a brush-off and no ETA on a fix)
That's been fixed and that is my point about misinformation. It was a bug, it isn't currently a bug so you clearly also can't say there is no ETA on it since it has been fixed.
Read the last response in the thread before crying "misinformation" obviously because you cant let a point go and stuck on the needle when the hay stack is on fire ..... and that particular problem has been going on with the "no ETA" message for a year ... the resolved was post on the 9th September (if its actually fixed as they have posted its fixed before and had to go back to the drawing board on it ..... and speaking of proving points ..... if 10% of the AC players read the forums and maybe 5% of those 10% only read the General discussions .... the resolution is not on their facebook or twitter accounts pages where around 15K people follow them ... and more importantly it should have been in huge flashing light on their account page letting users know they no longer have to go through this arduous process just to play...... and the biggest one that they didn't do is putting information on the AC Launcher ..... not many people stay on that screen for long but its one central place where all customers go to play the game .... though a large % use the silent switch to log in with out the launcher or they use ACDC to log in which by passes the launcher all together ....... but .... in fairness to Turbine they to have a link to the billing update now which is awesome ... they also state on the launcher to check fackbook and twitter for the latest and most updated information.....
(and we know that not a peep about any issues beyond down time gets posted to these forms of media) the last post on face book was a "competition" asking for you vote on who would win between 2 of the new monsters they recently introduced ...... and as mentioned before any post that's posted by one of there 7700 followers on face book that mentions the billing is being instantly deleted
btw have you ever or do you play AC ?? it sounds like you don't as you have no clue just popping over to the AC forums and then coming back with some "detective work" (inconclusive at that) ... but don't want to jump to conclusions
Comments
Somebody, somewhere has better skills as you have, more experience as you have, is smarter than you, has more friends as you do and can stay online longer. Just pray he's not out to get you.
however in the UK we have thew unfair contracts ande causes act and EULA have never been tested in court because there is a very good chance they would be defeated .
Yea that stuff doesn't get tested much on the other side of the pond either. The bluff tactics works just as well on us as you guys
Time Warner made almost 30bil last year for having been founded in 1990. And, General Electric thereabouts of 147.5bil last year and it was founded around 1890)....And, BP made the most last year (around 390bil) and they go back as far as what 1919? and all of their entertainment subsidies did about on par with each other level for level. That is a perfectly reasonable scalable comparison. Given the scalable blunders customer service wise on part of all parties in recent times. And everything on these forums without direct evidence can only be taken as opinion and digest any way...
So I goto ask, What exactly is this credibility I have lost and why?
Tell me, on what legal ground would they have for searching my computer for music and such based on a lawsuit that would be over them illegally (note, it is only illegal if they do not make reparations for any and all charges and fees that are a direct result of this over charging, similar things have happened with other online billing systems before and they only had to pay any and all charges and fees that were a result of the over charging/multiple charging) charging my bank account to much? Any lawyer worth his degree can easily prevent them from searching my PC and can have anything they may bring up dismissed due to them not having any legal right to search my PC. As for how solid the ToS/EULA may be, it is only as solid as those signs that stores put up claiming they are not responsible for damage done by carts. Those signs are 100% incorrect and are only there to fool people. Laws require places of business keep their lots free and clear of all debris and carts are legally debris. However because sheeple always believe what they read they do not bother to actually go out and learn anything different. No ToS/EULA in the world makes the company immune to the law in any way. Therefore any claims brought to court would not be weakened by them. As far as funds and time to commit to any legal actions, something on this scale would likely become a class action suit which would greatly reduce the cost on all parts, including WB as once it reaches class action status then any person affected by this billing mistake who does not join can be denied the ability to file a single claim against WB separate from the class action suit.
Besides, as i have said elsewhere already, EULAs aren't necessarily (or better: generally) binding in any way anyways.
Companies, almost by definition, want to limit their accountability to zero.
So they try to impose "contracts" on customers which give them all rights (e.g. to charge you recurring fees) while at the same time denying the customer any of HIS rights.
Yet, what many people forget is that certain customer right's can not be denied in the first place (which these are depend on the local laws) rendering the whole (or at least the "offending" parts of the) EULA null and void.
As was said, companies want to discourage people from taking legal action against them, that's all there is to it.
I see what you did there. Well done.
To find an intelligent person in a PUG is not that rare, but to find a PUG made up of "all" intelligent people is one of the rarest phenomenons in the known universe.
i remember the first one several months back, but again? geez
You lose credibility because it is asinine to compare 30bill to 147bil/390bil. Do you really think WB/Turbine has the same power as these big energy companies?
If these big energy companies want stuff covered up do you really thin WB or Turbine can exude the same kind of pressure/power ? LOL
It is oranges and steaks. Anyhoot this is getting off topic so believe what you will
Brenics ~ Just to point out I do believe Chris Roberts is going down as the man who cheated backers and took down crowdfunding for gaming.
The point is that Time Warner is shown to be, by contrast of a larger company - with more resources, and bigger blunders, only getting slaps on the wrist or fines that don't even effect them - likely to go unpunished by any one in authority. They don't need the power of a fortune 500 like General Electric. Because, respectively they have low visibility, and made a much smaller mistake. However, they can manage it with the same efficiency.
Like if the power grid fails in a rural area of a larger county. Dissolve any ties with your worst critics, control the flow of information and discussion on the matter to the best of your ability. Make the most immediate repair to the situation necessary. placate the effected. Get those who were not effected more on your side.
The same strategy is needed by the smaller company to handle their smaller issue, as is needed by the larger company to handle their larger issue. The only difference is the scale on which these things happen. And scale alone is not enough to make it a poor comparison. Especially since when you are talking about Time Warner you are talking about Warner Brothers entertainment. And, when your talking about General electric you are also talking about RCA and NBC. It may seem like two different things on the surface. But, it really is the same thing. If something has 9 ways in which it is like something else and 1 way in which it isn't (but given choice circumstances could easily be) how are they so different that they cannot be fairly compared?
IANAL,
Your first stop if Turbine does not rectify it voluntarly is your Bank or Credit Card Company. The Bank or Credit Card Company doesn't WANT this stuff to happen because it defeats confidence in using thier services to pay bills and for customers to keep money/accounts in. So if you are genuinely in the right here, the Bank or CC company WILL usualy be your advocate in this sort of thing though it will take some paperwork to do. No matter how much influence WB or another gaming company thinks they might have....let me assure you it doesn't hold a candle to a major bank or CC company. And unlike an EULA, the Developer will have signed a REAL and FULLY ENFORCEABLE Contract with the CC company in order to do charges.
Your second stop, if for some reason the above doesn't seem to be working well.....is (if you live in the US) to file a complaint with the Federal Trade Commision. You might also want to check with your state AG to see if there are state agencies that can assist as well. As mentioned above, EULA does not trump any rights you have as a consumer due to Federal or State law. In many cases the FTC (or State AG's) do like to go after Private Enterprises, if there are legitimate cases that involve large numbers of consumers because those Agencies can get income by charging the Private Enterprise FINES and PENALTIES which go to government coffers in addition to forcing restitution toward consumers. Cash going directly into government coffers often helps offset influence that an Enterprise might have.
In any even, most businesses try to avoid that if they can because the cost of dealing with those things is often more then the cost of dealing with a few squeeky consumers. You have to be PROACTIVE about that though.....because they figure (usualy correctly) that only a small portion of consumers will actively pursue that sort of thing, so they'll make sure those consumers get satisfied....and the rest they'll just do the minimum that they would be required to do legaly (i.e. give back the money they erroneously charged). YMMV.
To be fair, hours after it happened Turbine said they were refunding the money to anyone affected. They also said they sent e-mails to all of those who were affected as well. They even said if people got overdraft charges or similar to contact them so they can rectify that.
They did respond quite quickly. The OP was mad that they didn't post in the general forums (they posted in the account forums which makes sense) and that they didn't keep coming back to repeat that they did in fact do the refunds (which they said could take a few days to show up depending on the bank).
That isn't to say that anything Turbine did here is ok, it is absolutely not and it is actually about the worst thing you could do. They did handle it properly (stopped the extra charges and refunding the money along with opening themselves up for people to report extra charges they incurred due to this problem), but some people expected them to give hourly updates even though they had already taken care of it. Not sure what they expected those updates to be "Again, we just wanted to say we did already take care of this, we will say it again next hour as well.:
Here is their post:
https://www.asheronscall.com/en/forums/showthread.php?61605-Billing-Issue-Update
At this time we are in the process of issuing direct refunds for any charges to affected accounts above the cost of monthly subscription payment(s). Please note that it may take a few days for these refunds to be reflected on bank statements after the refund is issued; the length of processing time depends on your bank. Once the refund has been processed, your bank can verify the transaction before it shows on your statement. If you need further assistance, or have questions with regards to the refund or any potential related fees, we recommend that you contact the phone number on the back of your bank card.
If you do not see the refund on your statement after a few days, if you incurred any penalties due to the charges, or if you need further assistance with your account or billing, our Customer Service Agents will be happy to take care of you. You can get in touch with Account Support by going to support.turbine.com, then clicking on "Support Center" and "Submit a Ticket." Players can also contact Account Support toll-free at 1-855-WBGAMES (Account Support Hours: 10am – 7pm Eastern Time 7 days a week (GMT -5).)
We deeply apologize for this situation, and any difficulties this has caused. We want to assure everyone that Turbine is dedicated to making sure we provide you with the best game experience and support possible, and that we are treating this issue with the highest priority. We are taking steps to ensure this never happens again to any of our players.
http://www.tentonhammer.com/ddo/news/turbine-ddo-billing-issue-overcharges-some-players
Posted Wed, Apr 24, 2013
Following a recent maintenance phase, some players started noticing that their accounts had been overcharged for their subscriptions, some over a hundred of times. The silver lining (as best as it can be) is that Turbine is aware of the issue and working with their partners to correct the problem according to a recent post from Turbine’s Tolero.
http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/634/view/forums/thread/383291/Major-Turbine-Billing-Glitch-players-are-being-charged-thousands-of-dollars.html
hope Turbine gets it worked out -- twice in same year
EQ2 fan sites
Yea this is going to make them real popular with the banks. Putting aside the customer pushback for the moment. Banks really really do not like this sort of thing. It popped fraud flags all over the place and doing it twice in 6 mo. makes doing business with them somewhat less attractive.
This part ---
If you do not see the refund on your statement after a few days, if you incurred any penalties due to the charges, or if you need further assistance with your account or billing, our Customer Service Agents will be happy to take care of you. You can get in touch with Account Support by going to support.turbine.com, then clicking on "Support Center" and "Submit a Ticket." Players can also contact Account Support toll-free at 1-855-WBGAMES (Account Support Hours: 10am – 7pm Eastern Time 7 days a week (GMT -5).)
If you have been playing turbine games in the last few years you will know that the support system is beyond hopeless ... people have been calling regarding this and being told its a known issue and saying there is nothing more they can do .... Saying they will pay the money back is a given and no-one should have point that out .... this does not cover people that had no money over the weekend ....
Tomorrow they are having a company meeting and have announced that their phone support system will be offline for a time ....
If you actually read my original post you will see that I included that link as well with that exact same information in it .... and its not about being mad (thank for your mind reading abilities there its totally awesome) it about having $3.95 in my account when I need to do grocery shopping, my rent is due tomorrow and my car payment is due the next day along with my storage unit, my apartment blocks utilizes bill etc etc etc ... I have no doubt all the money will be paid back and they "say" extra charges will be covered .. but as many have already found out that the phones are just ringing out or the technician is a total prat and closes the ticket ... the work that I have to do now to prove to Turbine that I have overdraft fee's, late car payment fees, late rent fee's etc etc .. I understand that having proof is needed as some people will claim they had extra charges that they didn't incur .... but its a PITA that I don't really have the time for but will do it ....
Maybe tomorrow's company wide meeting will be to address some of these issues ..... and as other people have pointed out this is not the first time by a long shot that this has happened ... proving that there are horrible Q&A processes in the IT department ...... so again its not about being "mad" ..... when you have your whole bi-weekly pay check totally drained from your account before you've had a chance to even buy groceries, and you have to wait till possibly Wednesday till you get your money back .... and then you have to sit on the phone with baffoons for hours repeating the same information, getting put on hold, then repeating the same information, and then get all the documentation that you've been charged fee's by multiple establishments and then get that in the hand of Turbine .. then sit on the phone for hours with the bafoons just to make sure they do what they say, then come back and share your wonderfully insightful information
If you have used Turbines support in the past few year for anything slightly complicated then you would never have posted any of that ...
AND ... communicating in a side forum that next to nobody reads and removing/closing any post from general discussion and facebook and twitter feeds, maybe 10% of the AC community dont read the forums either ... sending emails is fine and again it a given they should not even need to announce that ... people already know they have a problem because they have no money
I have not received an email btw .... so that system is working like a rock star as well
Many players insisting on not using the different forums for their purpose (and always complaining there aren't announcements about downtimes even though they're posted in the announcement forums) isn't them trying to hide it.
They put a post about account issues in the forum that is for "Technical and Account Issues", it kind of makes sense.
Your first post implied they were trying to cover it up or dust it under the rug when they in fact have a post anyone can see (as their forums are open to the public to read) saying there was an issue and saying the steps they took.
I understand plenty of people were pissed about this, and they had/have every right to be. No company should ever charge someone multiple times or in ways they did not agree to. There is no excuse, there is no explanation, no justification that would ever allow for it or that would make it ok that it happened. People should be angry, they should post that they're angry, they should yell and scream about how the hell this could ever happen. All of that is 100% justified. There is also nothing wrong with you coming here and posting the information as well.
However, there was false information being tossed about by a few of those who were mad and there were some people (not saying you're one of them although suggesting they're trying to hide the issue is inflammatory) who were deliberately trying to inflame the situation as much as possible (in some cases because they weren't happy with other things like content changes or PvP issues so they used this as a platform to rage from).
My post was intended to show that they did in fact acknowledge the issue, they did stop the multiple charges, and they did say they had begun to process the refunds, to contact them with any extra charge issues, and that they had contacted those affected by this (although you've said you haven't gotten an e-mail so it may not have been perfect. Did you verify which e-mail was attached to the account? I've known many AC players to use throw away e-mail accounts for their billing before, also check your spam filter just in case). So outside of the fact that they let this happen, which as I said is inexcusable, they did at least appear to be taking the proper steps and taking them quickly which is contrary to a lot of the information being put out there.
I'm just really not sure what other type of post people wanted from them as that seemed to be the source of a lot of outrage. They posted acknowledging it happened and the steps they were taking to correct it. They also tried to funnel the discussions of it to the proper location, but people saw that as a cover-up even though they had their own public post about it.
If you call the announcements/technical issues forums "public", yes they are there for anyone to see but its like public TV that plays at midnight and only the weirdo's watch it.... on any of there truly public sources (twitter, facebook) they deleted any post with in seconds of anyone posting explaining they got over charged .... <------ this is the source of the rumblings of a cover-up ... then to add to that the closing of threads added to the insult .... I do understand what you are saying to an extent ... but they use the general forum for announcements about other things technical
Again it sounds like you have not played AC at all or not for a very long time .... this is by no means an isolated incident .. in the last few years --
2011 -- multiple charging of accounts
2012 -- upgrades to the accounts pages deleted a large number of people characters and the "support guys" took in excess of 3-4 weeks to be able to play the game ... all the while still being charged the monthly fee
2012 - multiple charging of accounts an a mass scale
2012 - random people over the space of 6 months being double charged each month
2012-13 billing and accounts system "upgraded" after which no one could log in with out first re-entering there CC details again ... at the same time people could not change there CC details if they wanted to use a different card. Then the system would not let people cancel their subscription
2013 - multiple people that have un-subbed for months have all of a sudden started getting billed again
2013 - authentication server down for months on and off meaning people could not log in (if you where logged in you where fine) ... the random accounts got corrupted and took often a month or more to resolve before that person could log in
2013 - a majority of the AC and AC2 player base is charged anywhere between $100-$6000 for this month subscription fee
("rumors" of LOTR and DDO being handed the same "present" with forums posts being deleted -- I saw it but have no proof as the posts are being deleted, others have reported the same)
2011-2013 -- so much down time on the server infrastructure that 150% xp/lum weekends are becoming a common thing
2013 - bugs being introduced into the game that are game breaking and not being fixed till the next patch or beyond ...
This is just a few things off the top of my head if I went back through threads and google searches I'd find more ... they archived / deleted any thread from mid 2012 so its hard to find anything beyond that ....
each of these alone can be looked upon as a glitch, pain in arse but a glitch... though this last one in my opinion needs VP public announcement (real public as on the main Turbine website and their social media sites) showing the companies concern ....
add all that together and this basically causes the frustration and venting that people are doing right now .... and no matter what you or others think its totally warranted
They have updated their thread in the side forum now which is good to see ---
Hello, everyone! We wanted to touch base with folks, and provide a brief update to the billing issues that took place last Friday. On Friday, we reached out directly to contact a number of users who received erroneous subscription charges, and worked quickly to resolve those erroneous charges.
At this time, we have resolved almost all erroneous charges. In particular, we have sent out emails to all affected Paypal users, seeking information which will help us resolve Paypal-specific concerns more easily. If you use Paypal to pay for your Asheron’s Call subscription, and received erroneous charges on Friday, please check the inbox of the email address connected to your Asheron’s Call subscription for more information. Please note, however, that depending on the practices of the various banks used by our customers, it may take a few business days for these changes to be reflected on bank statements. People who still have statement-related questions should contact the phone number on the back of their bank cards, and get in touch with their bank directly.
If players have not seen refunds after a few days, or if any other assistance is needed with account or billing-related matters, please contact our Customer Service agents so we can take care of you. You can get in touch with Account Support by going to support.turbine.com, then clicking on "Support Center" and "Submit a Ticket." Players can also contact Account Support toll-free at 1-855-WBGAMES. Account Support Hours are 10am – 7pm Eastern Time, 7 days a week (GMT -5).
Once again, we deeply apologize for this situation, and are working diligently to make sure that this cannot happen again to any of our players.
AC is dead, if you don't believe me just look at what is keeping it a-float. Multiple account subs from the small community of diehard AC fans. I played for years, in fact I was about to resub but after seeing this I am done forever. I had 5 accounts at once and it wasn't cheap @ $12.95 a month for a game this old is kinda ridiculous now that I think about it. Plus it is known fact if you play AC beyond level 130+ and are addicted to it you will have to have at least 1 alternate account to hold all your shit because AC has the most items of any other MMORPG I have ever seen.
Let me put that into perspective for you WB/Turbine. If you have 600 players at peak times on your popular server then you have at least 300 real subscribers at the minimum, most players have 3+ accounts so that number goes down even more. Now take this mess up from billing and you just lost at least 75% of your subscriber base for about a month or two until these players can feel safe trusting your billing again. How long can you keep a dead MMORPG going? Why no F2P yet?
F2P would make sense, you wont even need in game item mall, you could easily just make the item mall on account services page and the items you buy you redeem in game through an NPC where you click them and select receive items or whatever. That way the NPC checks your account and knows what you have coming to you and BAM you get the items in your backpack.
You're also forgetting another bug in their billing system:
Certain players have 'bugged' accounts that require them to log onto the billing EACH time they wish to log onto Asheron's Call. OR they'll receive an authentication error when trying to log in.
On the PLUS side of this bug, the players don't get charged - at all. A developer responded to this problem a few months ago and pretty much said, "Welp...enjoy free AC" (I don't want to dig for that response, but believe me, it was just a brush-off and no ETA on a fix)
https://www.asheronscall.com/en/forums/showthread.php?61351-FIXED-Daily-Log-In-to-My-Account-site-Required-to-Access-Game
That's been fixed and that is my point about misinformation. It was a bug, it isn't currently a bug so you clearly also can't say there is no ETA on it since it has been fixed.
Read the last response in the thread before crying "misinformation" obviously because you cant let a point go and stuck on the needle when the hay stack is on fire ..... and that particular problem has been going on with the "no ETA" message for a year ... the resolved was post on the 9th September (if its actually fixed as they have posted its fixed before and had to go back to the drawing board on it ..... and speaking of proving points ..... if 10% of the AC players read the forums and maybe 5% of those 10% only read the General discussions .... the resolution is not on their facebook or twitter accounts pages where around 15K people follow them ... and more importantly it should have been in huge flashing light on their account page letting users know they no longer have to go through this arduous process just to play...... and the biggest one that they didn't do is putting information on the AC Launcher ..... not many people stay on that screen for long but its one central place where all customers go to play the game .... though a large % use the silent switch to log in with out the launcher or they use ACDC to log in which by passes the launcher all together ....... but .... in fairness to Turbine they to have a link to the billing update now which is awesome ... they also state on the launcher to check fackbook and twitter for the latest and most updated information.....
(and we know that not a peep about any issues beyond down time gets posted to these forms of media) the last post on face book was a "competition" asking for you vote on who would win between 2 of the new monsters they recently introduced ...... and as mentioned before any post that's posted by one of there 7700 followers on face book that mentions the billing is being instantly deleted
btw have you ever or do you play AC ?? it sounds like you don't as you have no clue just popping over to the AC forums and then coming back with some "detective work" (inconclusive at that) ... but don't want to jump to conclusions