Unopened Gifts

[(NSW)FlatAffect]

Hello all, 

I had an incident recently where someone's irl name had a mild spelling difference than their in game name. As a result, I sent a gift to the wrong person. I understand not being able to reverse a transaction. It was my mistake, 100%.

HOWEVER... 

The account which received the gift is a dead account, likely from someone who briefly tried the game and decided it wasn't for them. I asked if gifts would return (preferably in the form of plat spent) if it remained unopened. I was told that no, the gift is "theirs forever". How is it theirs if they never open it? 

This is a terrible policy, imo. Digital Extremes, by using this policy, you are allowing players to throw money down a well. I can understand not reversing a transaction for an opened gift. But allowing a gift to be released into the nether, never to be opened let alone used, only benefits Digital Extremes. I cannot see a reason to justify this lack of a return mechanism for unopened gifts. 

I supported Digital Extremes during the Nintendo tennogen debacle. Licensing is a legitimate issue, one which could lead to serious repercussions. Digital extremes did their best to rectify the situation and assuage hurt feelings. If there is some crucial aspect I am missing, please let me know. Otherwise, this just seems lazy, a bit greedy, and oblivious to how these situations negatively affect the player base.

--

FlatAffect

 

[Lazarow]

You tried support?

[Zelmen]

I think their bigger issue is the hundreds of accounts that were created and have 0 secs of play time and are MR0. It really messed up I had to contact DE to say the name I want is owned by one of these accounts and I want it. They agreed it was a dead account and then I had to pay 200p to change my name because they don't clean up these damn placeholder accounts. A friend went through the same thing. 

Point is I bet the account you sent it to was one of these BS account that shouldn't exist after 2-3 months of 0sec of time played. Which would have given you an error and not your current issue.

[(NSW)FlatAffect]

7 hours ago, AwkwardLazarow said:

You tried support?

They are the ones who basically told me "all gifts are final, even ones you toss into the void by accident" 

6 hours ago, Zelmen said:

I think their bigger issue is the hundreds of accounts that were created and have 0 secs of play time and are MR0. It really messed up I had to contact DE to say the name I want is owned by one of these accounts and I want it. They agreed it was a dead account and then I had to pay 200p to change my name because they don't clean up these damn placeholder accounts. A friend went through the same thing. 

Point is I bet the account you sent it to was one of these BS account that shouldn't exist after 2-3 months of 0sec of time played. Which would have given you an error and not your current issue.

Large part of my issue here. Allowing an item to sit unclaimed in an account that will never be used again is irresponsible on the part of the vendor, in this case, regrettably, DE. 

[xMarvin732]

Gerade eben schrieb (NSW)FlatAffect:

They are the ones who basically told me "all gifts are final, even ones you toss into the void by accident" 

Large part of my issue here. Allowing an item to sit unclaimed in an account that will never be used again is irresponsible on the part of the vendor, in this case, regrettably, DE. 

Writing the Name correctly would've done the right thing, no need to blame the vendor, both sides are at fault.

[(NSW)FlatAffect]

11 hours ago, xMarvin732 said:

Writing the Name correctly would've done the right thing, no need to blame the vendor, both sides are at fault.

Did you even read my post? That's the third sentence in the opening paragraph.

 

The point of my post still applies if you send it to the correct person who, for whatever reason, decides to stop playing and never opens the item. 

Edited May 23, 2019 by (NSW)FlatAffect

[xMarvin732]

vor 2 Stunden schrieb (NSW)FlatAffect:

Did you even read my post? That's the third sentence in the opening paragraph.

 

The point of my post still applies if you send it to the correct person who, for whatever reason, decides to stop playing and never opens the item. 

Gift are gifts, why should they be reversed?
Unfair to those who got the gift, even if its by accident.

[(PSN)AyinDygra]

14 minutes ago, xMarvin732 said:

Gift are gifts, why should they be reversed?
Unfair to those who got the gift, even if its by accident.

Not a problem if it's never been opened... and likely never will be on dead accounts.

[(NSW)FlatAffect]

2 hours ago, xMarvin732 said:

Gift are gifts, why should they be reversed?
Unfair to those who got the gift, even if its by accident.

Read the post, I'm not talking about returns on an erroneous gift. That was my personal example, but you've missed the point completely. Seriously, actually read the post before replying. 

[(NSW)Sniperfox47]

I understand where you're coming from, but the logistics of that is likely much more complicated than it seems at first glance. Going digging through databases of account information to check whether a gift was opened or not in order to return it may not really be feasible on their end.

[(NSW)FlatAffect]

22 hours ago, (NSW)Sniperfox47 said:

I understand where you're coming from, but the logistics of that is likely much more complicated than it seems at first glance. Going digging through databases of account information to check whether a gift was opened or not in order to return it may not really be feasible on their end.

It's as simple as writing a db script that would process returns after so many days. The logistical implications are incredibly low. 

[(NSW)FlatAffect]

On 2019-05-23 at 12:07 PM, xMarvin732 said:

Gift are gifts, why should they be reversed?
Unfair to those who got the gift, even if its by accident.

Read. The. Post. I covered this. Your comments are irrelevant and missing the point completely. 

(edit: replied to the wrong post, already covered this. Read. Your. Replies, FlatAffect.)

Edited May 24, 2019 by (NSW)FlatAffect
Unnecessary reply on my part

[Fire2box]

On 2019-05-23 at 6:47 AM, (NSW)FlatAffect said:

Did you even read my post? That's the third sentence in the opening paragraph.

 

The point of my post still applies if you send it to the correct person who, for whatever reason, decides to stop playing and never opens the item. 

maybe they'll log back in at somepoint and get surprised lol. 

[MagPrime]

idk, this morning I woke up to an email from Support telling me my plat had been returned from a gift I sent to someone.  I think you're getting shafted by someone who can't be bothered.

[(NSW)FlatAffect]

On 2019-05-24 at 4:55 PM, MagPrime said:

idk, this morning I woke up to an email from Support telling me my plat had been returned from a gift I sent to someone.  I think you're getting shafted by someone who can't be bothered.

I've heard they've reversed gifts before, but only under the premise of DE thinking the exchange was a plat for cash irl deal. 

[Fire2box]

7 minutes ago, (NSW)FlatAffect said:

I've heard they've reversed gifts before, but only under the premise of DE thinking the exchange was a plat for cash irl deal. 

That would be RMT and get both offending accounts banned. 

Edited May 26, 2019 by Fire2box

[MagPrime]

2 hours ago, (NSW)FlatAffect said:

I've heard they've reversed gifts before, but only under the premise of DE thinking the exchange was a plat for cash irl deal. 

Not in my experience. 

Both times I've had play refunded was for gifting mix ups.  Someone sent me a Syandana is had already bought, so I asked to have their plat returned and thisntjme, same thing but in reverse; I gifted someone a cosmetic they had just bought minutes before. 

[5H4DE]

Imo, dead accounts with 0 seconds to a few minutes of gameplay should just be deleted, or "vaulted" (make them unable to receive gifts and put their name up for the taking). There's no reason to consider accounts that are years old with close to no playtime as active accounts.

[KIREEK]

You are correct, when you gift something the item will instantly appear in that person inventory even without opening it.

The entire gift animation and message is just a visual effect alongside the actual item that was given to you, but if you search extensively, you can check what you received even without opening the gift.

[(NSW)FlatAffect]

On 2019-05-25 at 11:23 PM, MagPrime said:

Not in my experience. 

Both times I've had play refunded was for gifting mix ups.  Someone sent me a Syandana is had already bought, so I asked to have their plat returned and thisntjme, same thing but in reverse; I gifted someone a cosmetic they had just bought minutes before. 

Unfortunately, this was not a case of a duplicate gift received. The recipient has not logged in to even be aware of the issue, let alone be able to request a return. Not like I would even ask them to do that. My mistake, they lucked out, and the real issue is how there is no mechanism to return gifts that essentially go nowhere. 

[(NSW)FlatAffect]

On 2019-05-25 at 9:22 PM, Fire2box said:

That would be RMT and get both offending accounts banned. 

It was a forum post I found one day about people getting caught up in accusations of RMT for accepting gifts from friendly strangers around Christmas. Their accounts were suspended, I imagine because DE found the exchange fishy but without hard evidence of RMT. The thread goes on about other horror stories where people try to cheat the system (send a gift then try to chargeback the transaction through their bank or credit card company), and it's the recipient who ends up with a negative plat balance. I was able to dig up the link:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/230410/discussions/0/2906376154314986797/?ctp=4

[Fire2box]

On 2019-05-27 at 9:17 PM, (NSW)FlatAffect said:

It was a forum post I found one day about people getting caught up in accusations of RMT for accepting gifts from friendly strangers around Christmas. Their accounts were suspended, I imagine because DE found the exchange fishy but without hard evidence of RMT. The thread goes on about other horror stories where people try to cheat the system (send a gift then try to chargeback the transaction through their bank or credit card company), and it's the recipient who ends up with a negative plat balance. I was able to dig up the link:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/230410/discussions/0/2906376154314986797/?ctp=4

More reason i'm glad I diversify my plat sources (no big incoming 1,200+ plat trades) and turned off getting gifts as I got more plat then I generally know what to do with, until the roomba's came.