Sony's refund policy is no April's fool.....

Sony just announced their refund policies for digital purchases. Tbf, before today there wasn't one...as in there's no refunds.

If you preorder a game and it downloads, theres no refund even if you didnt play it.

If you preorder a game up to 14 days before launch, dont download it and ask for a refund the day after launch....theres no refunds.

The same applies to any avatar etc bought on the ps store...no refunds.

But wait, there is a scenario when you can get a refund....of sorts...

If a game is faulty, you get a refund with a caveat. You dont get your money back, you get credit in your ps wallet to spend on more ps stuff. If you leave auto download on you basically have no chance of a refund, which means Sony have rendered a positive feature into a negative....

Even if you dont download a game, you still only have 14 days to claim a refund, which again comes in the form of credit, not the actual currency you paid.

What say you people....are Sony still "For the gamers"?

Sounds illegal in my country.

@vagrantsnow: Depends what your country is. If your country has a ps store, that's the policies.

If your account gets hacked and the person uses your credit card one file to purchases $2K worth of shit and you contest it Sony only gives you store credit, if you challenge it through the CC company they'll purge your account, including all your trophies and anything you owned digitally. I wonder what happens if an account gets hacked, someone else's credit card gets entered and used, and they contest charges... well, probably that person's account is fucked.

It would not be the first time a digital store front has run foul of the law.

Loldigital

Unless a game is on sale for dirt cheap digitally (under $10) there is no reason to ever buy games digitally. There is no benefit and you are supporting anti-consumer policies by doing so.

I've got an $80 refund after my daughter bought a game from my Vita. Wasn't store credit either.

right. that was old sony.

starting today is new sony.

@NathanDrakeSwag: I buy most of my games physically. Saying that there is no reason to buy digitally is ignoring the negatives that physical media present.

Way bigger environmental issue, More likely to get damaged or lost, Simply having to switch discs and other minor issues like having to go to a store vs clicking "a".

None of the above or anything you posted has anything to do with the topic. Sonys poor practices extend beyond games.. as pointed out above in the case of fraud, or services such as psnow and plus.

Its bordering on criminal.

@joshrmeyer: Really? When? These are Sonys policies as announced today...

@KBFloYd: It's better than Nintendo's digital refund policy, which is "lol, no".

Environmental issues are not my problem. Take care of your discs and put them back in the case when you're not using them and you won't break or lose them. The 10 seconds it takes to swap discs is worth it for ownership and resell value. I just sold my copy of Kingdom Hearts 3 for $40 to someone after I only paid $48 for it on release day. I was done with the game and made back nearly enough to buy another game. Had I bought it digitally I'd be stuck with a $60 (because you won't be getting discounts on digital games day 1) square on my UI that I'll never click again. Swapping discs is worth it.

@fedor: Yet worse than Xbox which allows you to play for 2 hours and then gives you your actual money back.

Theres no defending this.

@NathanDrakeSwag: Nothing you said negates the points I made about physical media, and again it has nothing to do with Sonys digital refund policy.

@sealionact: I wasn't defending it. KB was throwing stones in his glass house and I just wanted to let him know. All consoles have crap refund policies on digital. MS has the most favorable and its still far behind Steam's. Its why I only buy physical on consoles.

MS has refunded me 3 games With no questions asked, never had an issue.

Sony is so anti consumer lately, shit is straight cancer

Skeevy

@sealionact: @KBFloYd: Ah ok... It was a few years ago. They said it was a one time refund back then. Guess now it's none at all.

Owning a physical copy, you own it for life. Can that be the same for digital copies?

My concern with digital copies is whether I can sell my digital copies or whether the digital copies will work decades from now with new technology that has yet to be introduced.

Lol, what's the point then? Sounds ridiculous.

Anyway, Xbox is the same I think. They used to do refunds in certain circumstances... for example, I received a refund over the phone for Walking Dead Final Season (I had the season pass) when Telltale went bust because I thought I wouldn't get all the episodes. But recently they've introduced some system where you have to submit a form online only (you can't ring up anymore) and they'll determine whether you're eligible (I tried to get a refund for a game that kept crashing and ran like sh*t - and the devs were taking forever to fix it - and was rejected).

But I think it would be awesome if they all had a refund policy for "change of mind"... say, give you a day or two to try it (or a couple of hours of gameplay or something), and if you don't like it, you can get a refund (even if it's just XBL, PSN or eShop credit). I think it would encourage people to try games more and would probably increase sales. Anyway, wishful thinking.

They do? They use to do refunds in certain circumstances, but not anymore. They have some online refund system now.

Sounds like the same thing they had before tbh and I never need a refund from Sony because I research games before I buy them so I know what to expect anyways.

And people say all digital is the future, its a slippery slope that for me that only goes downhill.

I will never go digital and will stay physical to the bitter end.

@davillain-: They didnt have a refund policy before. There were no refunds. Period.

Exception was if the game is faulty.

Their new policy has to be compared to Xbox, PC and Switch, and even though it's better than Nintendo's, refunds given in the form of store credit instead of the real world currency you paid with is extremely crappy.

Even if you personally never regret a purchase - which puts you firmly in the minority - you should know that if ever you're a victim of fraud, and someone purchases content using your account, you will only get store credit back.

@i_p_daily: This applies to Sony's ps store and not digital as a whole. Xbox allows you to download the game, keep it for 14 days and ask for a refund if you played it for 2 hours or less.....that's better than physical. If a console maker developed a digital marketplace where you could sell your games at whatever price you want, I'd jump on it. As it is, I mix physical and digital purchases.

I don't think you get what i'm saying, Sony's store is ONLY digital, and if physical was to die then Sony's store would be the ONLY place where you could buy games for your PS console which makes it a monopoly, same as it would be on the Xbox store and thus you would be screwed when it comes to refunds and indeed pricing.

@i_p_daily: I get what you're saying. What I'm saying is what Sony are offering is bad compared to xbox and PC. A digital store that let's you get your money back after deciding you dont like the game is already better than what you get if you buy a physical copy.....Sony dont allow that, xbox and PC does.

I don't know if this is true... like I said in my earlier post, I tried to get refunds on games before that were either sh*t or had technical problems, and they refused. They used to be more lenient, but they've changed their policy recently and are a lot more strict. I'm sceptical whether you'd get a refund for a game for "changed my mind" reasons.

Really? I did remember Sony offer a refund on "No Man's Sky" launch due to the poor reception but Sony was open and admit it wasn't the best game, so they offer gamers a refund if you bought the digital version. I personally love the game myself and never took Sony's offering.

@davillain-: Yup, but that changed as of the new policies yesterday, which coincided with Sony no longer selling vouchers by 3rd parties.

You wouldn't get a refund on nms now because it wasn't faulty....it didnt live up to promises made by the devs, but it ran fine.

@hrt_rulz01: Its Microsofts policy. The refund after 2 hours play is not there to be abused though, so they can refuse if you're continually downloading games then demanding refunds after 2 hours.

@sealionact: Hmmm ok. Not my experience but ok.

Well Sony are arseholes and most people know this and they are far from "for the players" but in the end none of this bothers me as I don't own a Sony product and don't have to put up with their shit. I guess this is another case of

Sounds bad. But not researching a game before you buy it is more bad.

@i_p_daily said:

@sealionact said:

@i_p_daily: I get what you're saying. What I'm saying is what Sony are offering is bad compared to xbox and PC. A digital store that let's you get your money back after deciding you dont like the game is already better than what you get if you buy a physical copy.....Sony dont allow that, xbox and PC does.

Well Sony are arseholes and most people know this and they are far from "for the players" but in the end none of this bothers me as I don't own a Sony product and don't have to put up with their shit. I guess this is another case of

Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha

If you download a game, you should have to pay for it.. it's that simple. Once you agree to buy something.. that's it. If you weren't sure you wanted it or not, then you should have waited for more reviews, video, etc. I don't think refunds should go out to those who agreed to pay. It's not like it happens on accident.

Their return policy and customer service is shit.

My kid ordered a DLC character in SFV on accident bc she’s only 4 and I called to get a refund as I only had an hour in the game and barely play it.

They said that there is a one time customer return but with stipulations and that one return would be used to return this $8 DLC character.

I was like ok..that sounds shit.

Anyway I put the password on there now but still, they dicks when it comes to returns. MS and Nintendo are much better and forgiving.

Only if you buy on the PS Store, lol. GOG is universally beneficial. For gamer and developer.