To cut a long story short, you might have a right to the 2,5$ from Steam if it was their fault and you can prove that it was their fault. But ff the price in the region you are in is 12,5$ you chances are close to zero, even if you have the right for the money if it was shown as 9.99$ on your client /browser. Especially if you bought it through the browser, there isn't really anything you can do.

It doesn't look like something that Steam did to purposely screw you, so chalk up the 2,5$ towards "educational fee" and check regional prices before buying in the future.

You could also tell us where you are, someone will find what the price was at the time at that place, and if it wasn't 12.50, you'll have another arrow in your quiver to ask for the money back.

It's obvious this was due to him buying the game over an ip whose area has the pack priced at $12.50.

But of course, heaven forbid the world not bend over fucking backwards for yet another self-righteous American.

The issue is not so much as getting my money back, but preventing this from happening to others as well as myself in the future. I asked around and it seems people that European users got billed at 12.50 USD as well but they saw the price as such, which is not akin to my situation where I saw the price at 9.99 but ended up paying 12.50...

I should mention that, checking the full priced item now, it seems that once I get to the very last payment confirmation screen (point of no return), the price changes (though you have to look for it to see the change). Guess I should be thankful I decided to buy this during the sale and paid only 2.50 for a lesson of "re-re-" checking the price of online purchases before making them....
If you had bothered to read my OP, you would have known that I am not in the US right now (how on Earth did you come up with the IP thing again?) but in another country. Or maybe you did but just didn't understand (or want to understand)?

Also, I never asked anyone to bend backwards for me, but if you are so eager to do it, be my guest. I am sure there will be someone interested in seeing how you manage it, just not me...

This appears to me like you were looking at the Steam page through a regional check of another country, something which automatically gets fixed when you go through the payment section. So even though you may see the US prices through your browser still, because it's still set to US, once you start paying you'll pay the actual price for your region. (although I'm pretty sure that's the price you should see before you actually confirm and certainly in any payment option you use eventually)

This shouldn't normally happen unless, possibly like you mentioned, you switch regions. Or, as a lot of us sometimes do, click on links with the appendage ?cc=US where US can be any country code. It'll change the prices to that country's prices for a while, even though you can't actually pay those prices, as when you go through the payment portal, it'll use the prices for your current region.

I've never had such problems with steam. But they billed you more than it was in your order recipe, and this recipe is treatet like legal offer, and they are bound by it. If you still have that 9,99 recipe, it's a proof.

You should contact some consumary rights association or sth like that. Not to recover your $2,50 , but maybe they have power to fine them as well?

In Poland we have UOKiK and Rzecznik Praw Konsumenta , and they can fine companies for unfair business practice.

Well, that's kind of the point, your IP at the time was not recognized as a US IP and thus you do not get to pay US prices. That's how Steams pricing structure works. You pay what you should according to the region you are currently in, not the one you were born in.

I'm sorry, but unless you have a receipt stating the price at the point of sale was $9.99, you have no leverage here, and no reason to feel entitled to a refund.

It's a "receipt", not a "recipe". ;-)

Unless you have your cheesecake recipe written on it as well! ;P

Most countries have consumer rights organisations (Germany: Verbraucherschutz, UK: Office of Fair Trading, US: Better Business Bureau). How sharp the teeth of these organisations are will generally depend on how business-friendly the general government disposition is. The BBB for example is fucking useless.
My Polish is a little rusty, but I'm guessing that the words are easy to confuse (in German a recipe is "ein Rezept").

This. Steam - just like every online store in the US - shows the prices without VAT. Now, according to the laws you don't have to pay VAT in the US after online purchases (except 2 states I think) but you have to pay VAT in most other countries. Probably you are in a country where online purchases are a subject to VAT.

I really think this discussion would be helped immensely by you telling us which country you were in, yet you seem to be avoiding giving that information on several occasions now. If you have some reason to not want to that's fine of course, but just putting it out there that it *is* relevant when you buy something in a country different from the US.

in polish it's either PARAGON or RACHUNEK :D
Well, at least in EU all steam prices include VAT.

But in the US they don't include VAT.