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Thanks to Australian customer protection laws, Steam has some of the most lenient refund policies among digital software stores. You can usually get a full refu

Thanks to Australian customer protection laws, Steam has some of the most lenient refund policies among digital software stores. You can usually get a full refund if your play time is less than a few hours. Plus there are frequent sales. Don’t underestimate the psychological impact of making people feel “I have to buy this now or the deal will be gone.” I genuinely do not know how to get a refund from the google play store or the apple equivalent. (The downside of the Steam policy is it makes Steam unviable for games that can be played in full very quickly. Develops can also game the system by dragging out early game so the player is over the refundable time by the time they reach the rough parts. But this is for another discussion.)

Shaanie 1y ago
There's no problem getting a refund for apps in my experience, I've done it a handful of times when I've changed my mind and it was easy and fully automated.
- latexr 1y ago
  Anecdotally, as a counterpoint, I asked for refunds on the iOS App Store maybe twice in a row and since then every purchase was met with a dialog where I had to confirm I waved my right to a refund. This was over a decade ago, so may be very outdated. I don’t even think in-app purchases were yet a thing. I wasn’t trying to abuse the apps (I pay for software) and was in fact trying to use the refund policy to allow me to buy more apps because I could test without the fear of paying for duds. Their policy had the opposite effect and I basically stopped buying on the App Store.
SkiFire13 1y ago
> Thanks to Australian customer protection laws Source? I always thought this was a general Steam policy, as it's available pretty much anywhere.
notpushkin 1y ago
> Thanks to Australian customer protection laws, Steam has some of the most lenient refund policies among digital software stores. You can usually get a full refund if your play time is less than a few hours. I think it’s actually worldwide?
- DecentShoes 1y ago
  Yes, but they did it because Australia forced them to.
  - whilenot-dev 1y ago
    I doubt that, EU consumer rights already stated that "the consumer shall have a period of 14 days to withdraw from a distance or off-premises contract". Steam purchases count as "digital content" in that case. [0]: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2011/83/oj#art_9.tit_1 https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2011/83/oj#art_9.tit_1
    - iggldiggl 1y ago
      In practice I've sometimes encountered that in the form of "either waive your right of withdrawal or else wait 14 days to download your content/activate your licence/etc.", though.
      - notpushkin 1y ago
        I don’t think that would fly in any EU court?
        account42 1y ago
        It would and does. There is little (EU-wide) legal protection for consumers of digital content.
    - sunaookami 1y ago
      This is not true for digital purchases when you waive your rights to withdraw which you have to accept for digital storefronts. See under point 19).
    - account42 1y ago
      You can doubt whatever you want but the fact is Steam did NOT offer refunds until they were sued in Australia and lost. As for EU consumer rights, look at Article 16 (m) in the link you posted: > Exceptions from the right of withdrawal > Member States shall not provide for the right of withdrawal set out in Articles 9 to 15 in respect of distance and off-premises contracts as regards the following: > [...] > (m) the supply of digital content which is not supplied on a tangible medium if the performance has begun with the consumer’s prior express consent and his acknowledgment that he thereby loses his right of withdrawal.
endgame 1y ago
The ACCC did win a $3M AUD judgement against them for their refund policies: * https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/valve-to-pay-3-million-in-penalties-for-misrepresenting-gamers-consumer-guarantee-rights https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/valve-to-pay-3-million... (not currently loading for me) * https://archive.is/9mE7i#selection-4964.0-4978.0 https://archive.is/9mE7i#selection-4964.0-4978.0 (archive of the above) > The Court held that the terms and conditions in the Steam subscriber agreements, and Steam’s refund policies, included false or misleading representations about consumers’ rights to obtain a refund for games if they were not of acceptable quality. > In determining the appropriate penalty to impose on Valve, Justice Edelman noted that “even if a very small percentage of Valve’s consumers had read the misrepresentations then this might have involved hundreds, possibly thousands, of consumers being affected”. > Justice Edelman also took into account “Valve’s culture of compliance [which] was, and is, very poor”. Valve’s evidence was ‘disturbing’ to the Court because Valve ‘formed a view …that it was not subject to Australian law…and with the view that even if advice had been obtained that Valve was required to comply with the Australian law the advice might have been ignored”. He also noted that Valve had ‘contested liability on almost every imaginable point’. Valve's notice to consumers is archived here, and no longer on their live website: https://web.archive.org/web/20180427063845/https://store.steampowered.com/consumer_rights_notice/ https://web.archive.org/web/20180427063845/https://store.ste... I can find news articles saying that the court action began in late Aug/early Sep 2014. https://www.news.com.au/finance/business/retail/steamowner-valve-taken-to-court-by-accc-over-alleged-violations/news-story/8d6663161936f53914ff7285566cd1ee https://www.news.com.au/finance/business/retail/steamowner-v... Here's an old reddit comment discussing how Valve failed to implement AUD and KRW pricing on schedule, and speculates that at least in Australia's case, it's because of local compliance reasons. https://old.reddit.com/r/Steam/comments/38dlvd/the_real_reason_for_introducing_steam_refunds/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Steam/comments/38dlvd/the_real_reas... But I can't find anything that definitively ties the rollout of refund policies to an attempt to get the ACCC off their back. The comments on the above reddit post show that GOG and Origin had active refund policies at this time.
Agingcoder 1y ago
I got one from the play store once - I called them. The conversation was a bit surreal ( they kept telling me it wasn’t their fault , before eventually suggesting a refund )
latexr 1y ago
> You can usually get a full refund if your play time is less than a few hours. The explicit rule is you can get a refund on any game for any reason if both of these are true: * You have played for less than two hours. * You bought it in the past two weeks. https://store.steampowered.com/steam_refunds/ https://store.steampowered.com/steam_refunds/

Shaanie 1y ago

There's no problem getting a refund for apps in my experience, I've done it a handful of times when I've changed my mind and it was easy and fully automated.

latexr 1y ago
Anecdotally, as a counterpoint, I asked for refunds on the iOS App Store maybe twice in a row and since then every purchase was met with a dialog where I had to confirm I waved my right to a refund. This was over a decade ago, so may be very outdated. I don’t even think in-app purchases were yet a thing. I wasn’t trying to abuse the apps (I pay for software) and was in fact trying to use the refund policy to allow me to buy more apps because I could test without the fear of paying for duds. Their policy had the opposite effect and I basically stopped buying on the App Store.

SkiFire13 1y ago

> Thanks to Australian customer protection laws Source? I always thought this was a general Steam policy, as it's available pretty much anywhere.

notpushkin 1y ago

> Thanks to Australian customer protection laws, Steam has some of the most lenient refund policies among digital software stores. You can usually get a full refund if your play time is less than a few hours. I think it’s actually worldwide?

DecentShoes 1y ago
Yes, but they did it because Australia forced them to.
- whilenot-dev 1y ago
  I doubt that, EU consumer rights already stated that "the consumer shall have a period of 14 days to withdraw from a distance or off-premises contract". Steam purchases count as "digital content" in that case. [0]: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2011/83/oj#art_9.tit_1 https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2011/83/oj#art_9.tit_1
  - iggldiggl 1y ago
    In practice I've sometimes encountered that in the form of "either waive your right of withdrawal or else wait 14 days to download your content/activate your licence/etc.", though.
    - notpushkin 1y ago
      I don’t think that would fly in any EU court?
      - account42 1y ago
        It would and does. There is little (EU-wide) legal protection for consumers of digital content.
  - sunaookami 1y ago
    This is not true for digital purchases when you waive your rights to withdraw which you have to accept for digital storefronts. See under point 19).
  - account42 1y ago
    You can doubt whatever you want but the fact is Steam did NOT offer refunds until they were sued in Australia and lost. As for EU consumer rights, look at Article 16 (m) in the link you posted: > Exceptions from the right of withdrawal > Member States shall not provide for the right of withdrawal set out in Articles 9 to 15 in respect of distance and off-premises contracts as regards the following: > [...] > (m) the supply of digital content which is not supplied on a tangible medium if the performance has begun with the consumer’s prior express consent and his acknowledgment that he thereby loses his right of withdrawal.

endgame 1y ago

The ACCC did win a $3M AUD judgement against them for their refund policies: * https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/valve-to-pay-3-million-in-penalties-for-misrepresenting-gamers-consumer-guarantee-rights https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/valve-to-pay-3-million... (not currently loading for me) * https://archive.is/9mE7i#selection-4964.0-4978.0 https://archive.is/9mE7i#selection-4964.0-4978.0 (archive of the above) > The Court held that the terms and conditions in the Steam subscriber agreements, and Steam’s refund policies, included false or misleading representations about consumers’ rights to obtain a refund for games if they were not of acceptable quality. > In determining the appropriate penalty to impose on Valve, Justice Edelman noted that “even if a very small percentage of Valve’s consumers had read the misrepresentations then this might have involved hundreds, possibly thousands, of consumers being affected”. > Justice Edelman also took into account “Valve’s culture of compliance [which] was, and is, very poor”. Valve’s evidence was ‘disturbing’ to the Court because Valve ‘formed a view …that it was not subject to Australian law…and with the view that even if advice had been obtained that Valve was required to comply with the Australian law the advice might have been ignored”. He also noted that Valve had ‘contested liability on almost every imaginable point’. Valve's notice to consumers is archived here, and no longer on their live website: https://web.archive.org/web/20180427063845/https://store.steampowered.com/consumer_rights_notice/ https://web.archive.org/web/20180427063845/https://store.ste... I can find news articles saying that the court action began in late Aug/early Sep 2014. https://www.news.com.au/finance/business/retail/steamowner-valve-taken-to-court-by-accc-over-alleged-violations/news-story/8d6663161936f53914ff7285566cd1ee https://www.news.com.au/finance/business/retail/steamowner-v... Here's an old reddit comment discussing how Valve failed to implement AUD and KRW pricing on schedule, and speculates that at least in Australia's case, it's because of local compliance reasons. https://old.reddit.com/r/Steam/comments/38dlvd/the_real_reason_for_introducing_steam_refunds/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Steam/comments/38dlvd/the_real_reas... But I can't find anything that definitively ties the rollout of refund policies to an attempt to get the ACCC off their back. The comments on the above reddit post show that GOG and Origin had active refund policies at this time.

Agingcoder 1y ago

I got one from the play store once - I called them. The conversation was a bit surreal ( they kept telling me it wasn’t their fault , before eventually suggesting a refund )

latexr 1y ago

> You can usually get a full refund if your play time is less than a few hours. The explicit rule is you can get a refund on any game for any reason if both of these are true: * You have played for less than two hours. * You bought it in the past two weeks. https://store.steampowered.com/steam_refunds/ https://store.steampowered.com/steam_refunds/