Breach of Distance Selling Regulations Question (Long Read)

Coeco

Hi. First post here seeking some legal (and other advice) regarding a dispute I had a while back with Sony Online Entertainment. This is gonna be a long read, but for a TL;DR, look at the bottom. As maybe some of you have heard, they released a new product called Planetside 2 featuring a free-to-play basis with a purchase-able virtual currency which I dipped into just to be sorely disappointed by both balance-issues and them enabling a 3x yield from purchases just an hour after I have made mine.

I contacted their support to issue a refund and after being denied by their automatic answers and newbie support staff, i started to cite the European Union's Distance Selling Regulations along with the Swedish version (Distance and doorstep sales act) that clearly states my rights to be refunded within 7-14 days of my original purchase along with stating my right to inspect the products by purchasing (besides a few exceptions such as real-estate, lotteries and so forth) and all I got in return was "Speak with our billing manager, here's his email".

Naturally, I went and contacted him and after about 7 working days of waiting, he replied with an automatic message stating the same "Our policy this, our policy that". Being !!!!ed off at that point, I decided to contact the BBB (Better Business Bureau) and gave them all the information regarding my case. Very little time passed and after they inspected my petition, they contacted SoE which promptly gave me the same talk, "We're sorry but that's our policies" with no regards to my rights or any of the laws I supplied with them (Gave them government links and more) while exclaiming that how "Sorry" they are to not be able to grant me a retroactive grant of the 3x bonus or my money back.

After that apology, BBB promptly shut my entire petition down within the blink of an eye, prompting that a "conclusion could not be met and that the seller has shown sincere care". Further outraged, I did more research and found out that SoE has an A+ rating with BBB, which means they're giving regular payments to have a maximal rating by the bureau, even with the countless amounts of complaints and mountains of problems with their service.

Feeling betrayed since BBB helped me before, I sent a VERY long case file to the Federal Trading Commission which apparently handles things like this with a long description of what happened along with clear, legal explanations that if SoE offers a service to european customers, that service will have to abide by distance sales laws accordingly with the european union and I have neither heard nor seen the smell of a fart from anyone since then and this was months ago.

My question to you folks is what should I do at this point?


TLDR: Sony ripped me off and is conducting illegal business practices without the Better Business Bureau or the Federal Trading Commision caring. Wat do?

melbell

Electronic/virtual items are not included in the DSRs so no law has been broken

ILW

A UK site will not be much help.

Coeco

melbell wrote: »

Electronic/virtual items are not included in the DSRs so no law has been broken

I already asked two lawyers about it and the Swedish version is vague to this and only mentions a few odd exceptions, of which none of them are specifically "virtual".

Ectophile

You seem to be referring to organizations and laws in several different countries. What matters is the country of the particular subsidiary of Sony that sold you the product.

The UK DSRs have different rights for services and physical products. The 7 day cooling-off period applies to physical products, but may not apply to services depending on what you agrees to. To me, a virtual currency is a service, not a physical product.

Coeco

The issue here isn't questioning the legality itself. I know that they're currently breaking the law by denying me my swedish citizen consumer protection rights.

The question is, who should I turn to report this fallacy?

bod1467

You are in Sweden. Yes?

You bought from a retailer based where? USA? If yes then Swedish law/regulations matter not one jot - USA law takes precedence as that is where the contract was concluded. (Is my understanding).

Coeco

bod1467 wrote: »

You are in Sweden. Yes?

You bought from a retailer based where? USA? If yes then Swedish law/regulations matter not one jot - USA law takes precedence as that is where the contract was concluded. (Is my understanding).

Companies that offer a service or sell goods internationally must also have an user-agreements/refunding policies (and other legal signings) be flexible with the laws and regulations whereas the consumer of said service/good resides.

If it would be as you say to only have one's local laws apply to ones business, chaos would occur since most (if not all) major corporations, gaming companies and so forth would all reside in very law-less locations with international services, allowing severe scams and frauds to be commited with no legal consequence (Credit card theft and so forth)

Most purchase laws like these are very specific to mentioning the terms of where the protection is provided, etc, "If the purchase is made IN SWEDEN". I am not however, here to argue about it's legal validity of this but to seek on whom to contact besides the BBB/FTL.

maninthestreet

Coeco wrote: »

Companies that offer a service or sell goods internationally must also have an user-agreements/refunding policies (and other legal signings) be flexible with the laws and regulations whereas the consumer of said service/good resides.

If it would be as you say to only have one's local laws apply to ones business, chaos would occur since most (if not all) major corporations, gaming companies and so forth would all reside in very law-less locations with international services, allowing severe scams and frauds to be commited with no legal consequence (Credit card theft and so forth)

Most purchase laws like these are very specific to mentioning the terms of where the protection is provided, etc, "If the purchase is made IN SWEDEN". I am not however, here to argue about it's legal validity of this but to seek on whom to contact besides the BBB/FTL.

No one - that is the risk you take when you import products from abroad.

battleborn

You will have to swallow the loss, nothing you can do, I would advise you stop wasting your energy on a winless cause.

Coeco

Very well. I will presume that there is no other american bureau or other international agency that deals with these things unfortunely. I'd still like this thread to be open in case someone has any useful information and just to be a general warning to all who plans to do business with SoE.

Thanks for everyone's input.