Paypal + Steam...maybe not good choice...

I've been using my card since day 1. I lost interest in paypal as soon as it took over a week to confirm my bank account.
 
I think I'll avoid PayPal just because it's a frivolous service when you have a CC.
 
"I receive an email from Paypal, explaining that my Paypal account has been put on hold as part of a routine check"

I've never received an email like this, nor have I heard of paypal accounts being put 'on hold' for a 'check'.

This seems to be about as rare as getting struck by lightning, or it might even be his own fault. I find it odd that paypal wouldn't send an email before the check, warning him what date and time they are going to activate the hold.
 
Vegeta897 said:
"I receive an email from Paypal, explaining that my Paypal account has been put on hold as part of a routine check"

I've never received an email like this, nor have I heard of paypal accounts being put 'on hold' for a 'check'.

This seems to be about as rare as getting struck by lightning, or it might even be his own fault. I find it odd that paypal wouldn't send an email before the check, warning him what date and time they are going to activate the hold.
Click to expand...

It just happened with the Minecraft guy. They froze his account with over £600,000 in it.

Though in his case it's "slightly" more reasonable, since they're investigating potential fraud... but they can still withhold the right to simply steal all the money.
 
charmanderpaypal.png
 
Vegeta897 said:
"I receive an email from Paypal, explaining that my Paypal account has been put on hold as part of a routine check"

I've never received an email like this, nor have I heard of paypal accounts being put 'on hold' for a 'check'.

This seems to be about as rare as getting struck by lightning, or it might even be his own fault. I find it odd that paypal wouldn't send an email before the check, warning him what date and time they are going to activate the hold.
Click to expand...

Its not an uncommon occurrence. I've never had it from Paypal, but I have from HSBC when I used my MasterCard for the first time in a long while. Its a standard safety protocol, that's really there to protect the customer, but its a pain in the ass when its triggered by a false flag.

But Steam's policy of disabling people's accounts permanently is one thats frightened me for a long time. I've heard similar stories like this where legitimate customers lose hundreds of dollars because Steam thinks they're doing something wrong. Or if someone hacks your account, you're ****ed no matter what. Even if you prove your account was hacked, they never give it back. And with my account sitting around $2,000 I am deathly afraid of something happening, because I know Steam wont do anything to help me if something happens. They're like the WWII Russian officers in Stalingrad, if you're faced with a shitty situation and come back to them for help, they'll shoot you even though you're supposed to be on the same side.
 
Heh, they should offer account insurance. Or you should be protected somehow if you've invested that much money.
 
Seriously.

And to add to my last post... this isn't a paypal + steam issue. Its any credit/debit provider. Hell, even if you pay direct from your checking account, your bank can put a hold on it if they suspect its a fraudulent withdrawal.

Also, theres lots of bullshit reasons why your account can permanently be disabled for no real reason. If you get VACed falsely for some reason, there is no disputing it. They say on their support page that they won't do shit about it. Which is why getting your account hacked sucks, because if the hacker uses cheats, you're ****ed. And another one is if you're gifted a game, but the person who got it for you has something like this paypal holds thing happen, YOUR account gets disabled, because you have the game.

19871186.jpg
 
Well this makes sense to me. If Steam doesn't receive money for purchases, they can just assume you're fraudulently using someone's paypal account and their absolute best route is to lock the account. There's no way around that. Paypal seems to be the issue here. However, the lack of Steam's reply was part of the problem. However, upon resolution of the investigation, paypal should continue transactions assuming they find no problems. Seems like if they did that, the whole thing would be avoided.

I think it is strange for a distributor to have control over your games though. But I think it falls under the same grounds as in an MMO where they can basically delete everything you have in the game since they own it even though you paid for it. However, you do have all of the data from your games downloaded so I figure there's some way to work around it. I mean you can use Steam offline too so... I'm just guessing.
 
They reversed the payment before the issue was resolved (because of the lack of contact from Valve), and then couldn't "un-reverse" it due to technical limitations. Seems perfectly reasonable to me. Valve's response doesn't.

Really though, this does seem like an incredibly ill-advised policy rather than actual malicious intent on Valve's part, as I can't imagine how they'd profit from it. I mean, how many people would really be willing to buy back their hundreds or thousands of dollars worth of games, most of which would have been bought during sales that likely no longer apply, from the very service that (to borrow the author's hyperbole) just "stole" them from them? I'd think those people would be in the minority, and even then there's no telling whether that profit would exceed what these people would have spent on the service anyway. Even in this case, where the matter was eventually resolved (sort of), the customer was obviously left deeply unsatisfied and Valve have no doubt lost some business as a result - certainly in excess of a paltry $11.24.

Doesn't seem like very sound business practice to me, and Valve are usually better than this, at least outwardly. I'd think at the very least they'd want to avoid this kind of negative word of mouth.

On the flipside, I saw this on reddit just now:

THnvh.png
 
You've got me terrified for my account, now.

I was fuming when I first discovered I had to buy CS:S again, because my dad had originally registered the game when I first got Half-Life 2. Obviously, buying the Orange Box, it was only half a problem. The worst part was when I showed proof that the game was mine with a photo of the key and box, they sent my Dad's account details.
 
only time I use Paypal is for hotfile and rapidshare...never use it on STEAM
 
I always used paypal; but now that my Maestro has been upgraded to a Visa Debit I have stopped using the service and been making straight up payments.
 
Yeah, I've heard of many people over at PC Gamer's site reporting being locked out of their Steam account (and their games) for using Paypal, so for the time being I can't recommend anyone use Paypal to buy Steam Games, and it's best to just stick with Credit Card or Debit card. My brother uses Paypal when he shops online, and so I warned him to not buy Steam games with Paypal. I myself don't but from Steam directly unless it's a title around 2-3 gigs big (My internet isn't all that fast), I usually buy physical copies.
 
That's a bit of a horror story, but Commandos is totally worth $15.
 
Steam has done plenty of shady things in the past with me as well. They arn't really that shady but it's almost like signing a contract with blood and Valve when you buy a game on Steam.

If an account gets hacked and they get a VAC ban on it, it's irreversible which is completely stupid. I'm surprised they could reverse it with the COD4 folks but their whole VAC system which they know is junk still bans people and they let it happen. Hell it happened twice with COD4 users!

I purchased L4D 2 a while back and 15min later it went on sale. I asked for a refund of I believe $4.49. I told them I know it's a petty amount but it's still money. They told me no refunds. :rolleyes:

I bought back in 2001 the HL: Platinum Collection and when Steam came out, I registered some cd-keys which gave me 2 accounts with games. One account ironically has HL:S on it while the other does not. I asked customer support if I could merge these 2 accounts. They said they could not so that is why I have a friend called "hool10 clone".

Valve has major issues with day 0 releases since HL2. They act like that event was in the past and totally botched but if you bought any game since then and tried to play it on the first day, you are screwed. Long de-decryption process, and VAC servers constantly dropping or any game that uses Cloud. I remember learning that I would have to wait a full week to play COD4 because I didn't buy it in a store. Also Valve likes to put out patches when servers are under an extreme load making waiting times worse. They have random unannounced downtimes as well. Games that rely upon matchmaking are unplayable during that time. Chatting with people also gets cut off and you must wait until the servers go back online.

Steam is a great service though but actually playing the game on release and buying games is horrible. No excuses, you are a criminal, we take the shirt off your back, not irreversible is Valves motto with Steam.
 
Yeah, I never use Paypal for anything except for Ebay.
 
I use Paypal for everything and have never, ever had a problem with it in five years I've used it.
 
DEATH eVADER said:
I always used paypal; but now that my Maestro has been upgraded to a Visa Debit I have stopped using the service and been making straight up payments.
Click to expand...

Hmm, didn't know Steam accepted the new Visa Debits from Natwest, Guess I'll ditch Paypal as well then.
 
I always use Visa or Mastercard on Steam. Too bad to read this kind of thing can happen, though.
 
Valve needs to adjust their support policies big time. The whole if you have a debt to us it must be paid from the exact same location thing is utter BS for starters. If I have a debt with anyone I can pay it off however the hell I like. Typically having a debt usually means the account I was paying with has no funds so how can I pay you with that account without dicking around?

Debit cards have saved my arse on numerous occasions.

ING Visa
CBA Mastercard
ANZ Visa

Thank god for those.
 
Wanted Bob said:
Yeah, I never use Paypal for anything except for Ebay.
Click to expand...

Same.

Sometimes I ponder about what would happen if Valve went bankrupt and the Steam service was terminated, I guess the money I spent there would be completely forfeit and I would lose all access to my products.

I just feel it's such a waste of physical space to buy retail games for me, I already have a hard time finding space with just my console titles, would be tons worse if I started buying all my PC titles as physical retail copies too.

Anyone feel the same?
 
Gargantou said:
Same.

Sometimes I ponder about what would happen if Valve went bankrupt and the Steam service was terminated, I guess the money I spent there would be completely forfeit and I would lose all access to my products.

I just feel it's such a waste of physical space to buy retail games for me, I already have a hard time finding space with just my console titles, would be tons worse if I started buying all my PC titles as physical retail copies too.

Anyone feel the same?
Click to expand...

*raises hand*

i go out of my way now to make sure my pc games are on steam pretty much. I cant remember the last pc game i got in a box before SC2
 
I hate having physical copies really. Its needless clutter, and I move around a lot, so its a pain in the ass to pack all my dvds and such every time, then have to dig through the boxes later to find what I want.
 
If a games on Steam I'll get it on Steam rather than buy a physical copy (Unless the game uses steam works then I'll buy the physical copy 'cause they're usually cheaper).

I only really buy physical copies now for collectors editons, and since they mostly suck that doesn't happen often.

Don't use paypal myself except to receive money.
 
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