Valve/Steam Refund Policy 2 Hours Play Time Vagueness

[dizkejuega]

UPDATE: GREAT NEWS!

After 6 refund attempts and 1 manual claim I have finally been fully refunded for my purchase. The best part of it all is that it was credited inmediately to my wallet.

I thank you all for your comments and having this discussion with me, it has been a great experience to analyze steam/valve user agreement and policy.

Like I said this is not about abusing the system. This is not about exploiting the system. This is about using the tools and means provided by Steam/Valve to obtain a refund and learning about the agreements we sometimes dont even read when doing it online.

Again thank you all.

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing" - Edmund Burke.


Hello guys. To give you a little background, yesterday I purchased Red Dead Redemption 2 on sale. I was excited, really wanted to play the game. To cut the story short, my Video Card RX 460 2GB wasn't enough for the game and I had a hard time running it even on low, bugs, glitches, unable to play it in full screen when I first tried it, lots of issues you name them.

Trying to fix this, I went on to YouTube like most of us do when we are looking for information, visited the forums, community, etc. looking for ways to optimize the game the best I could so I could play it with no success. I played some time with no issues for about 45 minutes, I was able to watch the cinematic at the beginning, made it to where you search for John Marston and shoot some wolves and that’s where the problems started.

On the next mission where you go to the camp and fight the Odriscols for the first time, enemies shot me without me being able to see them, they would pop in and out and would only appear if I got close to them, most likely render issues, then the snow and floor would vanish and come back like in a loop or glitch, the game would crash and or freeze on the launcher loading screen, and many more errors.

I spent a couple of hours on YouTube watching videos, I reinstalled, updated drivers, set the lowest settings, restarted the game multiple times I couldn’t get past that point.

So, unable to run the game and play it I requested a refund, to my surprise It was denied because i registered 4 hours and 50 minutes of playtime.

I was like, no, i played 45 minutes at most, the rest was me troubleshooting, trying to fix the game, trying to make it work.

Now before you start yelling at me, "well you should have checked your specs", "it’s your fault", "get gud", "get a new video card", that is not the issue that I want to discuss here and that is not the point of this thread.

The main issue is the Steams/Valve User Agreement and Refund Policy. Let me explain why, here is the User Agreement and Refund Policy:

Quote:

Steam User agreement. Section I. Refunds and Right of Withdrawal.

“Without prejudice to any statutory rights you may have, you can request a refund for your purchases on Steam in accordance with the terms of Valve´s refund Policy” The refund policy states “You can request a refund for nearly any purchase on steam-for any reason. Maybe your PC doesn’t meet the hardware requirements, maybe you bought a game by mistake, maybe you played the title for an hour and just didn´t like it. It doesn´t matter. Valve will upon request via help.steampowered.com, issue a refund for any reason if the request is made within the required return period, and, in the case of games, if the title has been played for less than two hours. There are more details below, but even if you fall outside of the refund rules we’ve described, you can ask for a refund anyway and we’ll take a look”

End quote.


If you dive deep into it, the policy engages in misleading and or deceptive conducts and makes false and or misleading representations and misleading or vague remarks when it states


“played for less than two hours”.


Who is to decide on the interpretation of “played for less than two hours” Valve, Steam, Rockstar, the court, a judge, me?

Is it actual game time, playtime, playing time, the game running, is it online, offline, both?

Is it while the user is present playing the game or absent?

On the menu screen, settings, or in a game mission?

What constitutes "played for less than two hours"


Like I said troubleshooting the game requires me to be on the graphics menu screen, restarting the game, testing to see if it works, running a mission, crashing, watching a video, reading a tutorial, going through the system settings file, etc. All of this while the game is sometimes running and adding time to steams/valves arbitrary play time clock, but I´m not actually playing the game, I’m troubleshooting it. Thanks to Obs and other recording software you can collect evidence that you are clearly not playing the game.

My point is this is misleading, deceptive and vague at best, and the last time I checked this is would be Illegal.

Like I said, I can admit to my errors on the minimum specs for the game requiring a 3GB video card for which I only have a 2GB video card, but this is irrelevant, according to the policy since it states that it will provide a refund “for any reason” as long as the request is made within the required return period and if the title has been played for less than two hours, like I said, how can you tell I was playing, by the arbitrary steam play time counter?

I’m still trying to get a refund, I have submitted multiple requests explaining the details and how the game wasn’t even played for 45 minutes of actual in game play time, that is me playing the game and not trying to fix it.

To add to all of this, I found that recent legal precedents involving both Steam and Valve specifically state that “if a customer buys a product online that is considered to be faulty, they are entitled to the same right to a repair, replacement, or refund, as if they’d walked into a store”, and although I know that is not the case here, RDR2 has multiple errors regardless of whether or not my computer meets the minimum specs of the product and it had more when it launched, RDR2 is a patched, faulty product in and of itself, which in any case by law and without prejudice of my rights, which includes us accepting user agreements would entitle you, me and everyone to a refund by law or at least the is what I make of it.

So what do you guys think, lawyers, non-lawyers, anyone who likes this type of stuff.

Like I said, this not a moral story, it is not about if its right for me to demand a refund of a product I should have checked before I bought it, it is about the policy itself and what it claims it will do.

Once again I thank you.

P.S. Please forgive my spelling and or writing as English is my second language.

[FFL2and3rocks]

Steam only tracks if the game is running or not. If the program is open, you are "playing" it.

It doesn't matter if you were actively playing the game or if you were just looking around in the options menu the entire time.

You can try submitting a manual ticket under your purchase history and "I have a question about this purchase".

[dizkejuega]

I haven´t tried that yet, I have only done the automated refund process, thanks for the tip.

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

Three things to point out.

1. Policy isn't for show, and System requirements that listed on store page isn't for show either as it was set by the game publisher / dev.

2. You can request for a refund, but doesn't mean you're guarantee for a refund, if you're outside the refund policy, hence policy isn't for show.

- Refund policy no longer than 2hrs of gameplay, transaction not older than 14days that for the automated no question ask refund.

You need to submit a ticket with a reason why you want a refund. Visit your purchase history > Select product > Select "I have question about this purchase" then explain your reason. Keeping it simple, and short helps save time from having to read a wall text that could be explain in a single sentence basically.

3. RDR2 isn't faulty as you think, or else everyone be complaining not being able to play said game, this game is very demanding, it's not meant for low end systems.

RX 460 vs low minimum GPU system requirements GTX 770 there about upwards of 80% performance gap, which is pretty huge.
https://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Nvidia-GTX-770-vs-AMD-RX-460/2174vs3641

IDK about your CPU, or your RAM, so I can only guess you may meet those, or not.

It's best to learn your system hardware capabilities and differences, that means doing research, there people who make it more simple by showing video gameplay of the game performance, but performance may vary overtime if game get updates, and may not be same in gameplay video you see on youtube for using same/similar hardware perforamnce as you.

I give you pro tip, PC is not like console, don't assume your PC can play everything at high settings, or whatever as that be mistake, and misinforming yourself, that like comparing a smart car to a sport car in a race, it's best to learn about somethings so you have better understanding of how things works. If you want things to be serve to you on a silver platter as plug-and-play with no thinking at all, that what console for. On PC there may come with troubleshooting, and learning about the issues you encounter.

[dizkejuega]

I agree with what you say in regards to my PC specs, you are right and I also agree that I should have researched more before making the purchase. It was a sale and I was in a hurry, I had just a few hours before the sale ended and did minimun research.

I do meet the other requirements I have an AMD Ryzen 3 2200G and 16GB of ram, not of the line processor but good enough.

My post can be overwhelming I know but I wanted to be as detailed about it as I could.

I do not agree however on your remarks about the policy. Like I said it clearly states that it will "issue a refund in any case" as long as it is done within 14 days and the concept that im debatting "played for less than 2 hours"

This is in my opinion vague and arbitrary.Like I said before this is not a matter of whether my reunf request is right or wrong from a moral perspective, like "why are you demanding this" "you are ungratefull" or "be content" "you should have done your research" type o thing, this is about the policy and what it claims it will do if you meet the requirements, which is basically a no questions askes refund. Now the 2 hour play time condition it sets, is arbitrary and vague it should be either more precise or clarify what play time consitutes. Since it doesn´t it leaves it to interpretation, but it pops another question, whos interpretation? I would logically assume this would be Steam/Valve, but can this be contested? Whether trough customer support, legally, is this a void on their policy that could be exploited in the future? It raises questions for me from a deductive logic point if you may.

But thanks for your comments, excuse my typos.

[↑↑↓↓←→←→BASelect]

Even if the game is running in the background it counts towards time played. No matter if you was playing it or not. It counts.

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

Postat inițial de Inamas Korvhela:

I agree with what you say in regards to my PC specs, you are right and I also agree that I should have researched more before making the purchase. It was a sale and I was in a hurry, I had just a few hours before the sale ended and did minimun research.

I do meet the other requirements I have an AMD Ryzen 3 2200G and 16GB of ram, not of the line processor but good enough.

My post can be overwhelming I know but I wanted to be as detailed about it as I could.

I do not agree however on your remarks about the policy. Like I said it clearly states that it will "issue a refund in any case" as long as it is done within 14 days and the concept that im debatting "played for less than 2 hours"

This is in my opinion vague and arbitrary.Like I said before this is not a matter of whether my reunf request is right or wrong from a moral perspective, like "why are you demanding this" "you are ungratefull" or "be content" "you should have done your research" type o thing, this is about the policy and what it claims it will do if you meet the requirements, which is basically a no questions askes refund. Now the 2 hour play time condition it sets, is arbitrary and vague it should be either more precise or clarify what play time consitutes. Since it doesn´t it leaves it to interpretation, but it pops another question, whos interpretation? I would logically assume this would be Steam/Valve, but can this be contested? Whether trough customer support, legally, is this a void on their policy that could be exploited in the future? It raises questions for me from a deductive logic point if you may.

But thanks for your comments, excuse my typos.

Sales happens often, RDR2 went on sale several times in 2020, and 1 time 2021 because it's JAN. RDR2 may go on sale again in few weeks in Steam lunar sale.

For CPU it's fine, and RAM well enough.

I can understand if want to be detail as possible but best not give long speech for tickets, because support has to read every ticket, and the longer the wall text the longer it takes them to get to the next ticket to helping those that need help.

Steam does waver the 2hrs from time to time, and sometimes people try to abuse this by playing hours, then make story up to this, which why they may get deny of refund due to policy.

People can disagree with the policy, but doesn't make them right, it's an opinion to agree, or disagree with policy, but this is their policy how they run their store, just like how you have rules for your own home when you invite a guest.

These things in quote below have no meaning to the policy, as the store has their own rights to how they want to run their store. This does not mean you can't be criticize, or not online by others in forums, and such.

"why are you demanding this" "you are ungratefull" or "be content" "you should have done your research"

I don't care to much about people making typos, as long it understandable that what matters most.

[Judgmental Amaterasu]

Postat inițial de Inamas Korvhela:

I agree with what you say in regards to my PC specs, you are right and I also agree that I should have researched more before making the purchase. It was a sale and I was in a hurry, I had just a few hours before the sale ended and did minimun research.

I do meet the other requirements I have an AMD Ryzen 3 2200G and 16GB of ram, not of the line processor but good enough.

My post can be overwhelming I know but I wanted to be as detailed about it as I could.

I do not agree however on your remarks about the policy. Like I said it clearly states that it will "issue a refund in any case" as long as it is done within 14 days and the concept that im debatting "played for less than 2 hours"

This is in my opinion vague and arbitrary.Like I said before this is not a matter of whether my reunf request is right or wrong from a moral perspective, like "why are you demanding this" "you are ungratefull" or "be content" "you should have done your research" type o thing, this is about the policy and what it claims it will do if you meet the requirements, which is basically a no questions askes refund. Now the 2 hour play time condition it sets, is arbitrary and vague it should be either more precise or clarify what play time consitutes. Since it doesn´t it leaves it to interpretation, but it pops another question, whos interpretation? I would logically assume this would be Steam/Valve, but can this be contested? Whether trough customer support, legally, is this a void on their policy that could be exploited in the future? It raises questions for me from a deductive logic point if you may.

But thanks for your comments, excuse my typos.

You're just trying to argue semantics. Play time is plainly tracked by time that the game is open hence the playtime tracked on the game in your library. No amount of pointless arguing about the definition of "play time" makes up for the fact that you chose to purchase a game that your set up was incapable of handling.

[dizkejuega]

Hey R.I.P. yes i know that it counts towards time played. I have read fun facts about this in other user forums where some claim that the counter only works if you are connected to the steam network, other say that if you loose connection the hours are not counted some even claim that if the game is moded by third party it wont even register the time played, many different things I have found about this, but still it is irrelevant to the matter. Like I said the policy establishes play time or time played, the counter assumes you are plying the time because you are running it and that is how it works. In legal terms or in policy terms this an assumption, a claim, and it has not legal merit. The counter only registers how long has the game been running or you could even say played. However the word that it is used play or play time is vague, it is not defined because it has manny meanings like I have already established, play could be running as well but play could be actually a person playing the game or even a computer playing the game, progressing into the story, doing achievements, etc. My point is this is subject to interpretation because it is clearly not defined and thus leaves a void that can be filled with any of the interpretations that I have already mentioned and many more, and since the counter only assumes or claims that the game is being played it cannot be a fact, and thus its not a valid way to determine wether or not the game is being played.

[dizkejuega]

@Fiddle Yes that is my argument, and a very valid one that is. And I´m sorry but I disagree with you, playing the game its not "plainly tracking time" this statement can be interpreted in many different ways, the lack of it being defined is what leaves it open to interpretation.

If you are redacting a legal document, in this case a policy or a user agreement, you have to make sure that if you are using a word or term that can have multiple definitions or interpretations you must specify which one you are refering to as to avoid leaving a gap for interpretationg interpretation or confussion.

That is why lawsuits use terms as vague, misleading, false, claim, etc.

In this case the term is both vague and misleading in my opininon, and it is open to interpreation and can cause confussion in the consumer or in this case the person asking for the refund. Which is me.

[Gus the Crocodile]

Check your consumer rights where you live. If you have bought a product that doesn't work as advertised, it's possible you have rights beyond Valve's policies. It's also possible you don't, of course.

[dizkejuega]

Postat inițial de Gus the Crocodile:

Check your consumer rights where you live. If you have bought a product that doesn't work as advertised, it's possible you have rights beyond Valve's policies. It's also possible you don't, of course.

Hey Gus, thanks for the comment, yes Im aware of that and we do have laws that overtun valves policies, unfortunately and even tho I could make a solid argument that produc doesnt work as advertised, that is not the case here. The product doesnt work because my PC doesn't meet the specs, it was my fault, but according to steams policy, that doesnt matter, they will still issue the refund if I meet 2 conditions, the purchased must have been made within 14 days and the game must no exceed 2 hours of play time. And this last part is what Im arguing, on my steam account it shows 4 hours and 50 minutes of "play time", however I only factually played the game for 45 minutes, which is under the time constriction of the policy but not reflected on my steam account because of how steam tracks "time played" which basically translates to a time track of the game running.

[dizkejuega]

Postat inițial de Dr.Shadowds 🐉:

Postat inițial de Inamas Korvhela:

I agree with what you say in regards to my PC specs, you are right and I also agree that I should have researched more before making the purchase. It was a sale and I was in a hurry, I had just a few hours before the sale ended and did minimun research.

I do meet the other requirements I have an AMD Ryzen 3 2200G and 16GB of ram, not of the line processor but good enough.

My post can be overwhelming I know but I wanted to be as detailed about it as I could.

I do not agree however on your remarks about the policy. Like I said it clearly states that it will "issue a refund in any case" as long as it is done within 14 days and the concept that im debatting "played for less than 2 hours"

This is in my opinion vague and arbitrary.Like I said before this is not a matter of whether my reunf request is right or wrong from a moral perspective, like "why are you demanding this" "you are ungratefull" or "be content" "you should have done your research" type o thing, this is about the policy and what it claims it will do if you meet the requirements, which is basically a no questions askes refund. Now the 2 hour play time condition it sets, is arbitrary and vague it should be either more precise or clarify what play time consitutes. Since it doesn´t it leaves it to interpretation, but it pops another question, whos interpretation? I would logically assume this would be Steam/Valve, but can this be contested? Whether trough customer support, legally, is this a void on their policy that could be exploited in the future? It raises questions for me from a deductive logic point if you may.

But thanks for your comments, excuse my typos.

Sales happens often, RDR2 went on sale several times in 2020, and 1 time 2021 because it's JAN. RDR2 may go on sale again in few weeks in Steam lunar sale.

For CPU it's fine, and RAM well enough.

I can understand if want to be detail as possible but best not give long speech for tickets, because support has to read every ticket, and the longer the wall text the longer it takes them to get to the next ticket to helping those that need help.

Steam does waver the 2hrs from time to time, and sometimes people try to abuse this by playing hours, then make story up to this, which why they may get deny of refund due to policy.

People can disagree with the policy, but doesn't make them right, it's an opinion to agree, or disagree with policy, but this is their policy how they run their store, just like how you have rules for your own home when you invite a guest.

These things in quote below have no meaning to the policy, as the store has their own rights to how they want to run their store. This does not mean you can't be criticize, or not online by others in forums, and such.

"why are you demanding this" "you are ungratefull" or "be content" "you should have done your research"

I don't care to much about people making typos, as long it understandable that what matters most.

Yes I agree people will try to abuse this refund policy, but that does not concern me.

Yes I agree steam has their own rights and corporate laws, but that does not mean they are above local and federal laws even if the are part ot a user agreement or policy, it does not grant them legitimacy, and to clarify, that is not my argument anyways.

If the make a policy public, then they have to honor it, and if in any way the policy contains a void or vaguenes or anything that is detrimental to the intended user then they are accountable for, thats not me trying to be a jackass, or me trying to abuse it, or me trying to exploit it, although this last one you could argue, thats just how the law works.

My argument is strictly based on the fact that they left a term "Play Time" open to interpretation and that is a no no in legal books.

If its open to interpretation It can be misleading, confussing and all sorts to the person that is "suscribing" to that agreement or tha is"subject" to, and that is where my argument ends.

For Fiddle play time is run time, for me play time is me playing the game, for valve/steam play time may interpret it as Fiddle to as run time given how the play time counter works, but if you have ever bragged about how many hours you have played runescape or dayz or any other game, I'm pretty sure you are making a reference to how many hours you have been playing the game, not going through the settings, or on the menu screen, or while AFK, you are actually making a reference to "Hey im really good at this game" "I have x amount of hours logged in" makes sense?

[ุ]

Postat inițial de Inamas Korvhela:

Postat inițial de Dr.Shadowds 🐉:

Sales happens often, RDR2 went on sale several times in 2020, and 1 time 2021 because it's JAN. RDR2 may go on sale again in few weeks in Steam lunar sale.

For CPU it's fine, and RAM well enough.

I can understand if want to be detail as possible but best not give long speech for tickets, because support has to read every ticket, and the longer the wall text the longer it takes them to get to the next ticket to helping those that need help.

Steam does waver the 2hrs from time to time, and sometimes people try to abuse this by playing hours, then make story up to this, which why they may get deny of refund due to policy.

People can disagree with the policy, but doesn't make them right, it's an opinion to agree, or disagree with policy, but this is their policy how they run their store, just like how you have rules for your own home when you invite a guest.

These things in quote below have no meaning to the policy, as the store has their own rights to how they want to run their store. This does not mean you can't be criticize, or not online by others in forums, and such.


I don't care to much about people making typos, as long it understandable that what matters most.

Yes I agree people will try to abuse this refund policy, but that does not concern me.

It should, overabuse of a system usually ends up with stricter rules or all out removal of the system entirely. For example Steams' returning of stolen items. People abused it en mass to duplicate items. Now, Steam doesn't return stolen items unless steam is somehow at fault for it.

[dizkejuega]

Postat inițial de <Insert Kazoo Circus Music Here>:

Postat inițial de Inamas Korvhela:

Yes I agree people will try to abuse this refund policy, but that does not concern me.

It should, overabuse of a system usually ends up with stricter rules or all out removal of the system entirely. For example Steams' returning of stolen items. People abused it en mass to duplicate items. Now, Steam doesn't return stolen items unless steam is somehow at fault for it.

See how my statement was missinterpreted, When i just say it "it does not concern me" you "intepret it" as I dont give a damm about it. However if I would have stated it, This does not concern my argument or it is irrelevant to my argument" because wether or not the sistem is abused its not the users problem but the creator of the system it makes the world a difference.

[dizkejuega]

To clear things out. As a general rule a contract or in this case a policy should be clear about the obligations of each party. If an obligation is not clear, vague or if its ambiguous there is Latin maxim "verba fortius accipiuntur contra proferentem" "words must be construed against those who use them" in this case Valve/Steam.

Meaning that if they failed to make an obligation clear enough for a common person to understand it or failed to define it strictly as to avoid missinterpretation, then this can be used against the drafter and taken to court. I woudl argue as to the later, where they failed to define it strictly as to avoid missinterpretation.

In my opinion the policy is ambiguous and or vague, and therefore it is reasonably subject to more than one interpretation and that can easily be showned just by how different people have approached this matter.

The meaning of the term/ "play time" is vague or unclear.

Now a court when dealing with this matter would use different tools for this matter. Common ussage, Industry Ussage, etc, but there is 2 that I would give a go. One would be Reassonableness, which factors in wheter one interpretation is more reasonable than another, I think its more reasonable to consider play time as actually playing the game rather then running it.

The other one would be Implied Meanings, which again I would argue that Play Time means exactly that Playing the Game, not running it, or having it iddle on the menu screen, or setting it up to begin to play, but actually progressing through the games story and achievements.

Again this is my opinion on what I consider to be an ambiguous term or vague term based on both precedent and doctrine.