None of this required the refund system Steam has now. It's not like refunds didn't happen before the new system they implemented, they just weren't guaranteed like they are now.

The ACCC lawsuit's issue was not informing AU customers of their rights. It was not about people not getting refunds they deserved. in fact, they brought up cases of refunds in the courtcase and those were dismissed because the ACCC wouldn't have resulted in a refund in those cases either.

The only thing that court case required Steam to do was have a localized AU version of their terms for purchasers from an AU IP stating clearly what their rights when it comes to refunds are, same as us EU people are already getting a version that states ours.

You're alluding to potential other cases that either were or might have followed this but I don't get the impression you're actually aware of any.

Also, the long wait times for support at the time (for a long time) were mostly due to the massive hijackings that were clogging up support. They've made major changes since then to trading/account security as well as made separate queues for Steam support, the average waiting times are publicly available these days: https://store.steampowered.com/stats/support

Are you seriously implying that Steam would've created an entire automated refund system, that is offering way more than the ACCC ever required of them, and then offered it on a global scale, just because the workload might have increased some in one country in the world?

No I'm not aware of any, but I am aware of how legal cases snowball. The chances of other consumer groups not using this would have been slim.

Going through previous SSA from 2014 onward, seems there have been many iterations. About 2015 they dropped "NO REFUNDS EVER" (don't know when the ACCC case started), but before that they even insisted downloading a game was akin to watching a Streaming performance in order to nullify refunds.


THough on the ACCC website refunds is clearly stated as an issue.
https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/federal-court-finds-valve-made-misleading-representations-about-consumer-guarantees

No I'm saying their "No refunds" policy, that they ran for over 10 years, could no longer be used.

The ACCC court case, and strengthening of other laws (such as the 2014 consumer goods act) was forcing Valve to drop the clause from the SSA. Even then they tried evade their responsibilities by bending inappropriate clauses to protect them (saying a download was a Streaming performance, the SSA actually had the word performance for a while).

With the clause gone they needed to enact a refund system, one that would cause them the least amount of trouble.

If not for legal cases and changes to the law Valve would still be running "No Refunds". It was not a change made for their customers, it was a reaction to external forces that they fought against.

Legal cases snowball if there's a law that's being broken, and unless people can point to a law that they are breaking then it's not likely to happen. They were already following the EU rules for refunds just fine before this case even happened, yes, even including the part where people can waive their right to a refund once the product is delivered (which people in the EU needed to tag to proceed with their purchase). That's an exception that was specifically written into those EU rules.

If they're breaking any more consumer rules I'd love to hear it, I think the UK might actually be a country that has some exceptions. I'm just tired of people concluding 1+2= 5, especially when it comes to the ACCC courtcase which really didn't cover as much as some people seem to think it did.

I personally think the refund system was a reaction to a combination of things like yes, tightening of consumer law on digital goods but also because of competition, where Origin had it's refunds on EA goods back in 2013 and in 2014 when GOG shored up their refund policy in response to the EU refund changes. And then a year later Steam came with theirs.

Also, horoscopes are not as reliable as they used to be. :-(((

I think the ACCC case (and more importantly the public interest it got) could have been the final straw. Combine that with the influx of substandard products of Steam, refund requests would have been tying up Support time. The automated system was a response to that.

Again I'm simply pointing out as the dominant force (damn near monopoly) Valve simply has no need to improve or change to improve for its customers, changes such as the refund system are reactions to external forces not customer satisfaction.

The only thing I believe was driven my customer opinion was dropping paid mods. No, that was Valve trying to use a clause intended for streaming performances to nullify refunds. At that point its SSA was not compliant with EU law. I don't know what happened to make Valve change the SSA later, but they do, and "performance" is removed from the SSA.

It is also worth noting we don't see the legal pressure put onto a company before it hits litigation. It is possible a legal body would have had words with Valve over their use of the performance clause. I honestly don't believe valve would have changed it if they thought they could have kept using it.

I have noticed that I can't run Steam any more in my Linux machine. Since the bug when they wiped the users /home directory I don't trust it so I run it in firejail so that might be the reason. However it worked before Ubuntu 18.04. Wine version also does not work. I've tried running Steam on my older computer, surprise surprise, nothing.

Go figure.

This I can probably agree with, I just don't believe it was the driving core behind it. I'm not aware of any legal structures (for now) that would require them to do anything like that for the moment. But it's a good point that the opening of 'the flood gates' so to say may have led to enough of an increase in requests that it made sense to go that way anyway. Not entirely sure what change you're referring to here.

Agreed that we probably don't see all the legal pressure. Ultimately all changes have good reasons behind them of course. It's just that I'd believe consumer agency pressure a lot more if there were actual known rules being broken, and most of the time people don't seem capable of coming up with those or assume buggy = broken = deserves a refund, where really almost no consumer laws are that simple when it comes to software. "Bugs" fall under the 'within expectation' section when buying software and can usually only lead to a full refund if it completely makes the game unplayable
.

The 2014 consumer act attempted to clarify the existing consumer laws in the framework of a digital world. Unfortunately, much of it was designed for streaming and distance buying of physical goods. Buying online was treated a bit like buying through mail order, you got 14 days to cancel and pull out (for any reason). There was an clause to protect Streaming services, that once the performance had started you couldn't get a refund.

Valve tied to use that clause for downloads.

As far as I am aware there is still no solid laws protecting what you actually get when you download software nor the legal strength of a EULA. The "fit for purpose" laws are still for the 70's, and there's nothing about rights to access and Valves ability to control and remove your assets post purchase.

Actually I'm wrong. The 2014 consumer act did have clauses for fit for use software ensuring that software should work as intended. Rights to refund if not.

It has clauses to give the developer "reasonable time" to rectify. Of course "reasonable time" is mutable regard size of product and nature of issue.

It was just lacking clear ownership rights

Do you have any links to the notion that that clause only applied to streaming? Even now the clause specifically states "if you have already started downloading or streaming it"

I don't see why there'd be that distinction if it only applied to streaming.

To be honest I don't have the will power to wade through through the 2014 consumer act, but that opt out clause you have to agree to was part of a section covering Streaming performances not downloads.

As I said the Consumer act mostly covered streaming and buying online. There was nothing covering downloading software, only that software had to be fit for purpose. So Valve is using that streaming clause to cover downloading.

I haven't purchased it. That's what I was trying to do. :)

Calling them names doesn't often work anyway. Usually some first level support person or intern answering the emails. Trying to get something escalated with a company never seems to work. GoG won't do it for example.

That is a curse of modern companies, there is a thick wall of bureaucracy between customer facing services and those that can actual do anything to change a company

Including Hatred. :)

This thread again eh?