Forced to change country to make a purchase, support unwilling to change back despite FAQ

[Morroes]

As the title says, I was living abroad in Malaysia recently, and as a gift for family over there, I needed to change region to make a purchase. Now I have returned unexpectedly early, and I cannot redeem any retail keys at all until the end of April, cannot make any purchases as I no longer have a Malaysian origin payment method.

Account is completely bricked for over a month, and all support can offer is: "Steam support can't do anything about that." EVEN when their own FAQ states:

"If you are unable to complete a purchase using a payment method from the region you have moved to please contact Steam Support."

If the agents are telling the truth and there is literally nothing in place for this, this seems like a horrible system to have in place for no reason when a simple switch could be added for steam support, especially when steam themselves tell you to get in touch if any issues.

Can anyone tell me if there is a way to merge accounts? All I can think with support being unwilling to help at all is to make a second steam account in the meantime then merge them after?

[nullable]

First off, you weren't forced to do anything. You chose to do something and that had consequences. Cherry picking the FAQ and arguing Valve isn't following their own rules/processes doesn't negate the rules and processes you're ignoring when it comes to changing regions.

Your payment didn't randomly fail. You're account is stuck in another region and no matter how you torture the language to make it seem like it's a separate issue your real problem is the region switching cool down and no amount of mental gymnastics is going to get you around it. You're just going to have to wait until you can change your account region, like it or not.

No you can't merge accounts. No there isn't anything you can do to rush your account back to your region. If you change account regions you're subject to those rules. Those rules are not a secret, and are clearly defined. Valve is not responsible for your current circumstances. Having to wait a few more weeks to make purchases isn't the end of the world.

[Rin]

The reason no quick solution exists is precisely because of (serial) region hoppers like a certain someone.

[d3str0y3r]

You should not be changing your region to avoid gift or any other region restrictions. That is a violation of the SSA and can get your account terminated.

No you cannot merge accounts.

[MalikQayum]

I have observed a lot of accounts and what struck me was some accounts were unexpectedly able to either change region before the 3 months cooldown or they were being reset.
these accounts had something in common, they all had an recently password reset and their steam guard recently enabled.

which to me indicates that there might be a way to trigger a store region reset.
now if you wanted to try some things out, i would suggest doing a self-lock on the account then provide steam support the needed proof of ownership to unlock it.

if you are uncertain you have enough proof of ownership, i would probably not be attempting that.

the second thing could be to do a password reset, not a password change but a reset and then also disable steam guard and re-enabling it again.

[Morroes]

I do love how the first 3 comments immediately label someone a serial region hopper or a SSA violator etc.

I had planned to be in Malaysia alot longer, before a family passing sooner than expected. I could not make purchases there unless I changed my region. Steam would not allow me to use my UK method from a Malaysian region.
What I am ridiculing is that there is no way to flip the switch, even from support apparently, now that I am back in the UK, no matter how much proof and evidence provided.

Thank you Malik, for being the only one to actually offer something worth reading instead of bandwagon jumping, will give it a try.

[Rin]

You played yourself. You wanted to region hop and pay with a payment provider/bank based in the UK in a country that is not. It does not matter what your actual intent was, the fact is that you did it. Cry more. Blocked.

[nullable]

Originally posted by Morroes:

I do love how the first 3 comments immediately label someone a serial region hopper or a SSA violator etc.

I like how I did no such thing. I stated you were cherry picking the applicable rules and apparently aren't willing to accept region switching rules apply to you. Thank you.

You change regions, you wait for the cooldown.

[MonkehMaster]

Originally posted by Morroes:

I do love how the first 3 comments immediately label someone a serial region hopper or a SSA violator etc.

I had planned to be in Malaysia alot longer, before a family passing sooner than expected. I could not make purchases there unless I changed my region. Steam would not allow me to use my UK method from a Malaysian region.
What I am ridiculing is that there is no way to flip the switch, even from support apparently, now that I am back in the UK, no matter how much proof and evidence provided.

Thank you Malik, for being the only one to actually offer something worth reading instead of bandwagon jumping, will give it a try.

thats the normal thing people here on steam do, they immediately label people as bad, no matter what you say, or evidence you provide, in the end, there is no point bring any discussion here, all it leads to is a mob of people blaming you of everything under the sun, or defending policies.

only bring your complaints to support and not to the forums, cause people here dont like seeing complaints about steam, thats the sad fact of these forums.

if support tells you to come to the forums, just dont...

in any case, best to block, ignore and report if needed, the people who feel the need to argue you down and out of the forum.