Customer support says online issues do not count as 'exceptional circumstances'
EA is not taking refunds from SimCity customers who bought the title through Origin over the problematic server issues that have plagued the game’s early release.
Reports sparked across the internet earlier today from angry consumers that the publisher’s customer support group was not offering money back.
This is despite EA's Origin global community manager Marcel Hatam previously stating: "If you regrettably feel that we let you down, you can of course request a refund for your order at help.origin.com/contact-us, though we are currently still in the process of resolving this issue.
Develop took to EA Origin’s customer support to clarify the reports, and has been told that a refund would not be offered for the purchase of SimCity due to the server problems.
Customers can claim refunds in “exceptional circumstances”, but when asked whether connection issues for the always online title came under that description, a customer service representative told us “not right now”.
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You can find a transcription of the chat below – names have been taken out in the interests of privacy.
Develop: Would it be possible to get a refund on SimCity if server problems persist?
Customer Support: Refunds are only given in exceptional circumstances, that is the only word I have on the matter right now.
Develop: Does this count as an exceptional circumstance?
Customer Support: Not right now
Develop: Is there a point when it would be, or has that yet to be discussed?
Customer Support: If that were to come about, it would be announced widely - I have no idea if that will even come to be, or any other information about it
Despite largely positive reviews for the latest entry into the SimCity franchise, garnering an average Metacritic rating of 82, Maxis’ intent with the ambitious title has arguably been undermined by its parent company’s customer service response.
The issue also brings up consumers’ rights when downloading a title from a digital distribution platform, and what is considered an ‘exceptional circumstance’.
After an angry response to the game’s early struggles from consumers, EA has apologised for its handling of the launch, and stated that it was working to fix the issues as soon as possible and was sorry for any inconvenience caused.
“We are working to clear traffic from the roads and hope to have all players managing their cities as soon as possible," read a statement.
"We’re sorry for any inconvenience this may cause and appreciate your patience while we work on a resolution to this issue.”
Maxis senior producer Kip Katsarelis has also said that the developer is paying close attention to all bug reports, with the development team working night and day to resolve the problems.
“What we are doing is deploying more servers over the coming two days which will alleviate many of the ongoing issues. We are also paying close attention to all the bug reports we are receiving from our fans. We’ve already pushed several updates in the last few days. Our live ops team is working 24/7 to resolve issues and ensure that bug fixes roll into the game as quickly as possible."
I sure hope they get this game to work. I'm very excited and my birthday is coming up. This is all I want for my birthday. Of course I can't get it if it's only an online game, but I'm sure Sim City will be able to be played without internet soon enough. I feel lucky I didn't get a prepaid download of something that waits for cloud servers to get fixed. Sounds like a terrible idea to me. Like, overkill paranoia of pirate copies. I've bought all the others and will buy this when it's fixed. Good Luck Maxix and EA. BTW - if you make this game only cloud and only internet, say good-bye to lots of loyal customers like me who pay full price for each version and actually play and enjoy them all. Also, don't be like microsoft and autodesk, releasing software that doesn't work and putting out patches after the fact. It must be a PC game OTB that only requires a PC.
I filed a complaint with the BBB and FTC over the refusal of refunding my money
If you paid for it with a credit card or PayPal, dispute the charge with them and get your money refunded, then they will go after EA. I think this qualifies as fraud in that the game is not working as advertised.
Just got refused for a refund myself, after being on hold for almost an hour. I can't believe that we have no recourse but to sit here and take EA's D*** with no lube...
The person I spoke to even going so far as to tell me my call would be terminated if i tried asking for a refund from a supervisor.
LoL, Amazon stopped selling the digital version earlier today and are no longer selling the physical discs through their own channel (you can still purchase through "Other Sellers").
Not refunding peoples money?
I just did the same.
Filed complaint with BB against EA.
I filed a complaint as well after being denied a refund. I will never buy anything from EA again.
This SimCity thing has gotten both infuriating and ridiculous. But I came across this funny video someone made spoofing the the server debacle:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcX0fEL3dUg
Hilarious and worth checking out.
If you're in a country with consumer protection laws, be sure to invoke them when asking for your refund. e.g. in Australia they'd have to write on the box that there will be server outages to get out of these refunds.
http://i.imgur.com/VEJIVmk.jpg
Also, it's very sad that they DID originally offer refunds, and then withdrew the offer once they realized how many people were taking them up on that offer: http://i.imgur.com/ktqJ8Zq.png
When will publishers realise that restrictive always-online DRM hurts their customers, and hurts their business in the end.
Please file complaints and paypal disputes. Then sign the petition as well. We can only win against morons like this, as a group.
There are several petitions out there, but let's all stay with one.
Here is the one with the most promise:
http://www.change.org/petitions/electronic-arts-100-refund-for-sim-city-2013#
If you brought your game in Australia you have access to there consumer laws in which case any stipulation made by a company over service that conflicts with them is void a product purchased must meet reasonable quality & service standards. Call the ACCC this sort of thing is what they were created for.
to further remove attempts from people trying to receive refunds, EA is sensoring their customer support number on their own forums.
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> info: You are now ready to chat with Tania.
> Tania: Thanks for contacting EA Help! My name is Tania how may I help you?
> you: hi
> Tania: Hello Gabriel
> you: after waiting 4 hours please hopefully you can help i need a refund for sim city purchased and pre order it doesnt work
> Tania: Gabriel, May I know what is the exact error that you are getting?
> Tania: Please accept my apologies for such an unusually prolonged hold time. We are experiencing high chat inflow today.
> you: the game gives all this errors im going to buy the copy at my local best buy please give me a refund please
> Tania: Gabriel, May I have your Order number for the purchase please?
> you: 13218628019
> Tania: Do you mind holding for some time while I pull up the account details?
> you: go ahead
> Tania: Can I please see your screen so that I may have a better idea of your issue? This way I will not be required to ask so many questions to find the root cause of the problem.
> you: all i want is a refund i want to get the physical copy at my best buy when the game is a little more stable the game freezes my computer and reboots it.....now i know its not my ram or comp because i play crysis i high settings and everything is great nothing happens. And i definitly dont want to wait another 4 hours once my comp resets
> you: Please
> Tania: Gabriel, I'm really sorry I wont be able to provide you a refund till the time I verify the technical issue with your PC.
> you: ok and how do you want to do that?
> you: my comp resets i try to get a screen shot of the issue one sec
> Tania: Please attach the file to the case ID : 07986951
> you: how do i send you the picture
> Tania: Please use the following steps to upload the file :-
> Tania: Log in to the Customer Portal at help.ea.com.
> Tania: Locate the open case underneath "CONTACT US" in the "MY CASES" section.
> Tania: (Do not open the case from within "CONTACT US")
> Tania: Open the current case you wish to attach a file to.
> Tania: Scroll down to "BROWSE FILE."
> Tania: Choose the file you wish to attach and select "Open."
> Tania: Be sure to write a note in the white box above the Browse File and Add Note buttons.
> Tania: Click "Add Note" to attach this file successfully.
> you: i dont see add not anywere in this chat
> Tania: Log in to the Customer Portal at help.ea.com.
> Tania: Locate the open case underneath "CONTACT US" in the "MY CASES" section.
> Tania: (Do not open the case from within "CONTACT US")
> Tania: Open the current case you wish to attach a file to.
> Tania: Scroll down to "BROWSE FILE."
> Tania: Choose the file you wish to attach and select "Open."
> Tania: Be sure to write a note in the white box above the Browse File and Add Note buttons.
> Tania: Click "Add Note" to attach this file successfully.
> you: keeps giving me error code smcy-19 also could not communicate with the Simcity update server
> Tania: Gabriel, I can understand how disappointing it is. Some of the customers have reported this issue. Our developers are aware of it and are working for a resolution. We appreciate your patience while the issue is being looked into.
> Tania: The servers are currently down at the moment.
> Tania: Nobody is able to play the game at the moment.
> you: mam i need to speak to your supervisor i understand that you guy are having problems with the game but that is not my problem i dont want to be mean but i patiently waited for a long time along time paid my 80 dollars for this game and all i ask is for a little of customer service here i have purchased hundreds of dollars from ea and this really sucks please help me if not let me speak to a supervisor
> Tania: In Order to verify the purchase and the account, please provide me your :
> Tania: - last 4 digits of the credit card used for the purchase.
> Tania: - expiry date of the card used.
> Tania: - And answer for the security question : "wedding day"
> you: last 4=6966.........exp:08/2015.......security question:04142013
> Tania: Thank you for the information.
> Tania: Would you mind, if I place your chat on hold for couple of minutes to work on your case?
> you: OK
> Tania: Refund number 408222509 has been created for this transaction in the amount of $86.59
> Tania: Please note that the refund will be split into multiple credit transactions.
> you: why is that? i get two credits? or one of 86.59?
> Tania: The refund amount would be credited in your account in multiple credit transactions.
> you: ok when should i expect a refund and do i get a email confirmation?
> Tania: You would be getting the email confirmation in couple of hours and the credits will be there on your account in 5-7 working days.
> you: ok we are done then? or anything else you need from me?
> info: Your chat transcript will be sent to castillog.uh06@yahoo.com at the end of your chat session.
> Tania: No that will be all.
> Tania: Thank you for contacting EA. Is there anything else I can help you with today?
> you: thanks bye
