Originally posted by Vynt

Funcom did that to my friend in AO. Only thing is, they kept doing it each month for about 4 months. He was put through such a hassle. He told his cc after first the time they did it, to block them, but kept getting emails saying they were trying to bill him each month. (He only had a per month subscription, so no it wasn't a 3 or 6 month one they were trying to bill him for if anyone thinks that to.)

So, OP, I'd make sure you check your next month statement too, lol. it might just be on there again.

That is exactly what I am worried about Vynt.  I plan to keep checking them.  Either way, I didn't mean for this to turn into a 3 or 4 page thread, I just wanted to let people know so they could watch their own CC statements.

Its a bad situation you ended up in OP, but to be honest I don't think there was any intentional effort by Funcom to steal your money.  I doubt theft is part of the corporate strategy.

As many have already said the system is most certainly totally automated and either because of the time zone difference or a delay in automated processing you were billed for the first month.  Typically whenever you are dealing with anykind of automated credit billing you should give at least three business days for anything to take effect.  Its just safer.  It took a full day for my credit card to even be processed to play the game.  It happens sometimes. 

Your explaination that you didn't cancle until the last minute because you wanted to give the game every chance, doesn't hold up.  You still could have cancled days if not a week or more in advance and still could have continued to play for your entire free month.  If you ended up deciding you liked the game it would have been a simple matter to resub and there would have been zero chance you would have been billed for another month if you didn't want to be.

I also find the title of your thread to be a bit bizzare.  You wrote "exactly as expected, funcom tried to steal my money."   That's a bit of an odd title.  After all if you expected this sort of thing from funcom then how foolish are you for not having cancled earlier?  Your like a guy who walks around in a bad area with a nice watch on his wrist and an ipod in his hand, and then he's suprised when he gets robbed.  I understand from your point of view you feel victmized, but if you saw if commeing you should have avoided it. 

Yes most of the blame should land on funcom as you did technically cancle in time, but some of the blame lands on you as well.  You could have taken more proactive steps to avoid the situation. 

I also may I ask why did you post here in the first place?  Were you expecting total agreement with your point of view?  When a whole lot of people see the other guys side of the argument and not yours then maybe you aren't as 100% in the right as you think you are and you probably shouldn't attack anyone who doesn't share your view point.

Originally posted by -Ellessar-

Its a bad situation you ended up in OP, but to be honest I don't think there was any intentional effort by Funcom to steal your money.  I doubt theft is part of the corporate strategy.

As many have already said the system is most certainly totally automated and either because of the time zone difference or a delay in automated processing you were billed for the first month.  Typically whenever you are dealing with anykind of automated credit billing you should give at least three business days for anything to take effect.  Its just safer.  It took a full day for my credit card to even be processed to play the game.  It happens sometimes. 

Your explaination that you didn't cancle until the last minute because you wanted to give the game every chance, doesn't hold up.  You still could have cancled days if not a week or more in advance and still could have continued to play for your entire free month.  If you ended up deciding you liked the game it would have been a simple matter to resub and there would have been zero chance you would have been billed for another month if you didn't want to be.

I also find the title of your thread to be a bit bizzare.  You wrote "exactly as expected, funcom tried to steal my money."   That's a bit of an odd title.  After all if you expected this sort of thing from funcom then how foolish are you for not having cancled earlier?  Your like a guy who walks around in a bad area with a nice watch on his wrist and an ipod in his hand, and then he's suprised when he gets robbed.  I understand from your point of view you feel victmized, but if you saw if commeing you should have avoided it. 

Yes most of the blame should land on funcom as you did technically cancle in time, but some of the blame lands on you as well.  You could have taken more proactive steps to avoid the situation. 

I also may I ask why did you post here in the first place?  Were you expecting total agreement with your point of view?  When a whole lot of people see the other guys side of the argument and not yours then maybe you aren't as 100% in the right as you think you are and you probably shouldn't attack anyone who doesn't share your view point.

 

There is no "technically cancelled in time" here.  I DID cancel in time.  The fact that they continued to bill me is completely on their bad.  Again nothing says to cancel 10 days ahead, 3 days ahead or whatnot.  Other games I have played have not had this issue.  And yes, after reading a lot here and other places as well as seeing how Funcom cheated all of us who tried this game by giving us a complete unfinished product and not answering posts on the official forum, I expected this.  I wish people would quit standing up for a company that in all honesty is terrible.

 Funcom is only responsible of cancelling the order when a verification is sent from the Credit card company. If they relay it slowly to Funcom due to day or time you are responsible due to the agreement you signed with the Credit Company upon the issuing of the Credit card. Which clearly stated that processing is limited by time and day of the week. Mind you some companies such as Turbine will cancel before the termination processing is sent back to them from the CC. Thats not necessarily the most legal of operations.

Tech, yes that's what I"m waiting on.  I'm sure when my CC company calls them they will retract the charge.  That really isn't what my issue with Funcom is.  The issue is why did they charge me before my 30 days were even up?  They actually billed me on my 29th day.  Also, as I said before, the solution is not to bill until the morning of the 31st day thus problem avoided.

Originally posted by rawidema

Account was created on 5/23/08, account cancelled on 6/22/08.  Billed for 30 days even though the account is frozen.  Everybody keep an eye on what they do to you for billing.  Credit card company has it in dispute and is issuing me a credit.  Obviously, all Funcom is trying to do is bilk 14.99 out of customers who owe them nothing. 

5/23 - 5/31 is 8 days.....+ 22 days in June you didn't cancel = 30 days.   Sounds like you probably attempted to cancel right at the cutoff or else you happened to cancel after the billing went through.  It very well could have been a billing system error but given the dates you posted, I'm inclined to believe you screwed up before believing funcom was really intending to "steal your money".

First of all, I am absolutely no Funcom defender.

Saying that, two things you need to keep in mind:

1) Funcom probably uses their Norway main office as the billing date. You could be as much as half a day behind them in your time zone.

2) Remember it's 30 days, not "one full month." May 23 to June 22 is 30 days.

Originally posted by rawidema

Tech, yes that's what I"m waiting on.  I'm sure when my CC company calls them they will retract the charge.  That really isn't what my issue with Funcom is.  The issue is why did they charge me before my 30 days were even up?  They actually billed me on my 29th day.  Also, as I said before, the solution is not to bill until the morning of the 31st day thus problem avoided.

I apologize for asking this again, but is June 22 really within 30 days if you count May 23 as day 1?

May 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 June 1 (10 days)

June 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 (20 days)

June 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 (30 days)

Again, I think it would have been best if you cancelled a day ahead of time. :(

Originally posted by curiindi 

I apologize for asking this again, but is June 22 really within 30 days if you count May 23 as day 1?

May 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 June 1 (10 days)

June 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 (20 days)

June 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 (30 days)

 

Right, so the 22nd would be billing day, and it's 6 or 7 hours "earlier" in Norway than east coast USA.

Edit: Meaning the billing comes "earlier;" the clock itself reads "later."

Originally posted by Jokerkaaos

Originally posted by curiindi 

I apologize for asking this again, but is June 22 really within 30 days if you count May 23 as day 1?

May 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 June 1 (10 days)

June 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 (20 days)

June 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 (30 days)

 

Right, so the 22nd would be billing day, and it's 6 or 7 hours "earlier" in Norway than east coast USA.

 

Edit: Meaning the billing comes "earlier;" the clock itself reads "later."

So we can sum it all up by saying the OP made a mistake, didn't cancel in time, and is now bitterly complaining about it. 

All over 15 bucks too.... go figure.

Yes, funcom is not based in USA, so if your "30 days math" is correct then it is still possible that their timing was passed the trial period.

Also when you cancel your account, you will get the time you paid for or signed up for until it runs out. So even if you bought the game and there was no free 30 days, and you put in your credit info for the first month, and immedialtey cancelled, then you would get to play until the next subscription period.

So to everyone scared of this happeneing to them do that to any MMO you play if you go with 1 month renewal periods.

But yea it sucks that it happened to you. Doubt it was purpose on Funcom.

No im not defending them, I could care less if they are a evil company or gods gift to the MMO genre.

Originally posted by Psiho246

Originally posted by Aragon100

Originally posted by LondonMagus

Originally posted by rawidema

Account was created on 5/23/08, account cancelled on 6/22/08.  Billed for 30 days even though the account is frozen.  Everybody keep an eye on what they do to you for billing.  Credit card company has it in dispute and is issuing me a credit.  Obviously, all Funcom is trying to do is bilk 14.99 out of customers who owe them nothing. 

 

Yes I agree they shouldn't have charged you, but it's probably down to incompetent accounting database management rather than deliberate conspiracy.

This sort of stuff happens in the real world all the time, which is why as a general principle you should always delete your credit card details when you cancel a service for anything, be it MMOs, Cable, DVD Rental etc, etc, etc.

Not sure how the law works in the US, but in the UK you just report it to your credit card company & they refund it straight away. The company who made the disputed charge then have to justify why they did it if they want the money back. I did this recently over a false 'Travel Company Charge' I noticed on my credit card bill & it took no time at all.