Here at MMO Fallout, I have a simple philosophy: You throw me a game, I’ll make sure that people have an avenue to get into it. As many of you have pointed out over the years, I will defend any game to the point of its death as at least worth trying and I can’t honestly think of the last time I ever advocated against dealing with a specific company on this website. Back in April last year, I had a serious talk after Mythic’s billing servers exploded. At that point, I applauded Mythic for quickly dealing with an issue that was not their fault (billing for most MMOs is handled by outside companies). You may remember that, by the time Mythic had an announcement ready the company was automatically refunding extra-payments. You may also remember the Mortal Online quote I had at the bottom:
“If it had been Star Vault making the account error, they would have simply replied with “Your carebear bank account just can’t handle our hardcore billing system. Go back to WoW, noob!”
-Hypothetical, satirical view on what Star Vault might have said.
Well, back on Sunday Mortal Online’s billing servers exploded, causing a number of players to be charged double, and even triple charged. I emailed Star Vault at the time to inquire whether reimbursement would be automatic, or if players would need to contact, and received this answer:
Players will need to check their accounts and bank statements and contact us if necessary.
It was getting this statement back from Star Vault that almost prompted me to completely remove Mortal Online from MMO Fallout, a difficult task indeed, however I draw the line when the line begins to rest on fraud. Foregoing the comment on the previous article about the lack of an apology, for a company to erroneously charge customers, and then turn around and require the customer to contact them in order to obtain a refund, well that sounds legally questionable. Essentially what Star Vault is saying here is “yes we double charged people. If they don’t contact us? Well we keep their money.”
For the record, I am not in the camp that believes this was intentionally done to gain money from people who might not check their accounts. Star Vault has said that they will refund any double/triple charges, and I have to take their word until proven otherwise. My concern stems from the fact that Star Vault is not actively seeking out accounts with extra charges, and crediting back the cards, a process that should be as simple as checking which cards appear twice or more in the same day, checking which accounts those cards are tied to (to ensure the person isn’t simply paying for multiple accounts) and refunding when you find an erroneous charge. If this occurred to a low number of subscribers as I’ve been told, such a process should be quick and easy.
Or maybe I’m just overreacting, and it’s just me.
MMO Fallout 