Star Citizen 3.0 - Refusing Refunds

rpmcmurphy

With the push of 3.0 to evocatis it appears CIG have taken the stance of denying people refunds, up until now they have been pretty decent with granting refunds to those not satisfied with the progress of the project, the direction of it or whatever.

They are claiming that the requests are outside of the statutory refund period but according to UK and EU law the statutory period is 30 days, and that timeframe starts once the product has been delivered in a manner that it can be used by the customer. This applies to digital goods including in-game items.

I'm curious what may have prompted this CS change when it clearly flouts what is required of them in the UK and EU (perhaps AUS as well).

The actual response in question:

Thank you for your patience with this request.

As the activity on this account is outside of the statutory refund timeframe (https://robertsspaceindustries.com/tos Section VII, Fundraising & Pledges), it takes us time to look into its details. In addition to this, the whole team has been hard at work supporting the release of Star Citizen Alpha 3.0 to the Evocati Test Flight group with positive feedback.

Since Thursday October 5th, we’ve released frequent follow-on version updates to 3.0 in the test environment. This fast turnaround and more frequent publishing schedule is made possible by our new Delta Patcher and a number of changes to our back-end server technology. These back-end systems are in full production now for the Alpha development phase, while the 3.0 game version itself will continue to be polished over the coming weeks. (https://robertsspaceindustries.com/schedule-report)

Since the beginning of the project, development of the Game has proceeded unabated and RSI is delivering content on a continuing basis. RSI has applied your pledges to the development cost of the Game, and in accordance with the Terms of Service, to which you expressly agreed, you are no longer entitled to a refund. These terms are consistent with the specific nature of crowdfunding. (https://robertsspaceindustries.com/tos)

We consider each request on a case by case basis and will work with you to find the best solution. Given the focus on the release of Star Citizen Alpha 3.0 right now, it will be a few weeks before we can give this request the detailed attention it requires.

A very strange response in itself to be honest.

Kefo

rpmcmurphy said:

With the push of 3.0 to evocatis it appears CIG have taken the stance of denying people refunds, up until now they have been pretty decent with granting refunds to those not satisfied with the progress of the project, the direction of it or whatever.

They are claiming that the requests are outside of the statutory refund period but according to UK and EU law the statutory period is 30 days, and that timeframe starts once the product has been delivered in a manner that it can be used by the customer. This applies to digital goods including in-game items.

I'm curious what may have prompted this CS change when it clearly flouts what is required of them in the UK and EU (perhaps AUS as well).

The actual response in question:

Thank you for your patience with this request.

As the activity on this account is outside of the statutory refund timeframe (https://robertsspaceindustries.com/tos Section VII, Fundraising & Pledges), it takes us time to look into its details. In addition to this, the whole team has been hard at work supporting the release of Star Citizen Alpha 3.0 to the Evocati Test Flight group with positive feedback.

Since Thursday October 5th, we’ve released frequent follow-on version updates to 3.0 in the test environment. This fast turnaround and more frequent publishing schedule is made possible by our new Delta Patcher and a number of changes to our back-end server technology. These back-end systems are in full production now for the Alpha development phase, while the 3.0 game version itself will continue to be polished over the coming weeks. (https://robertsspaceindustries.com/schedule-report)

Since the beginning of the project, development of the Game has proceeded unabated and RSI is delivering content on a continuing basis. RSI has applied your pledges to the development cost of the Game, and in accordance with the Terms of Service, to which you expressly agreed, you are no longer entitled to a refund. These terms are consistent with the specific nature of crowdfunding. (https://robertsspaceindustries.com/tos)

We consider each request on a case by case basis and will work with you to find the best solution. Given the focus on the release of Star Citizen Alpha 3.0 right now, it will be a few weeks before we can give this request the detailed attention it requires.

A very strange response in itself to be honest.

It's a little funny they bring up the 3.0 release when most backers can't actually play 3.0 since it's only available to a select few.

It looks like their standard reply when asking for a refund with a few points changed but that last paragraph is odd. Why would CS be that tied up with the release of 3.0 that they can't look at your account about a refund? Or are they just hoping that you forget about it and don't ask for your money back?

Erillion

Sounds to me like they expect some people to change their minds once those wanting a refund get their hands on 3.0

Until then CIG may want to play the waiting and delaying game.

My personal guess would be that 3.0 may be available to all backers at the time of CitizenCon at the end of October, maybe as one of the announcements during that event.


Have fun

rpmcmurphy

Kefo said:

It's a little funny they bring up the 3.0 release when most backers can't actually play 3.0 since it's only available to a select few.

It looks like their standard reply when asking for a refund with a few points changed but that last paragraph is odd. Why would CS be that tied up with the release of 3.0 that they can't look at your account about a refund? Or are they just hoping that you forget about it and don't ask for your money back?

Agreed, it's like they're saying "Look we've delivered something even if it isn't to you yet so nope, you can't have your money back."

None of it makes much sense to me, the bit where they say it takes time to look into the details makes it sound like they addressed the request after it had left their statutory period and therefore they are exempt from issuing a refund. I'm not sure that's the case but it's what it reads like.

And why are they telling this person inconsequential things completely unrelated to his request? Next they'll be saying "The CS team made 14 twitter posts today and I had a latte with grated belgian chocolate on top this morning..." Who the fuck cares about any of that bullcrap when you're trying to get your money back?

That last paragraph is really odd. They flat out refuse a refund and then say they want to work with the customer but it'll take a few weeks before they can do so, WTH? It feels like a stall tactic.

rpmcmurphy

Erillion said:

Sounds to me like they expect some people to change their minds once those wanting a refund get their hands on 3.0

Until then CIG may want to play the waiting and delaying game.

My personal guess would be that 3.0 may be available to all backers at the time of CitizenCon at the end of October, maybe as one of the announcements during that event.


Have fun

It does sound like that but if the law is on the customer's side then they have to abide by the law, not stall people in the hope of changing their mind.

I do hope they manage to get the release for CitizenCon, I'm not sure I can see it going live but hopefully PTU with access to all at that point.

IceAge

Wait! Do people still have hope to play SC anytime "soon" ? 

Kyleran

Erillion said:

Sounds to me like they expect some people to change their minds once those wanting a refund get their hands on 3.0

Until then CIG may want to play the waiting and delaying game.

My personal guess would be that 3.0 may be available to all backers at the time of CitizenCon at the end of October, maybe as one of the announcements during that event.


Have fun

I suspect they feel once 3.0 gets delivered they'll have met the legal requirements that the product is in a usable state.

Assuming there is such legal requirements on pledges and donations which I'm suspecting there might not be.

People keep treating this as if they've "bought" something which is clearly not the case.

Yes, a court might disagree,  but courts and lawyers cost money which is to RIs advantage.

All the progress reports are stalls to get people to wait as 3.0 is "almost here" and they as they are telling people their requests are still under consideration, they haven't formally denied the refund yet.

Probably still time to do a chargeback though....

Eldrach

Can't fathom why people would demand a refund for slow delivery knowing the fact that they've supported a game development which involves maybe the largest game ever created, with no publisher on top of that -And then act all entitled afterwards.  I would not be surprised if a game of this scale, from a new studio, which has to spend half it's time begging for money with "concept sales" - Will take 8-9 years to finish.

rpmcmurphy

Eldrach said:

Can't fathom why people would demand a refund for slow delivery knowing the fact that they've supported a game development which involves maybe the largest game ever created, with no publisher on top of that -And then act all entitled afterwards.  I would not be surprised if a game of this scale, from a new studio, which has to spend half it's time begging for money with "concept sales" - Will take 8-9 years to finish.

It doesn't really matter how long we now expect it to take. It's what people originally thought when they laid down their money. If you hand over money under the impression it'll be done in 3 years and then 6 years later it's still years away from completion, you might feel you're not getting what you paid for, perhaps at that pace you might never get it....

And the thing is, back in 2015 CR said people are entitled to refunds, a couple of times they've tried to walk back on that and it seems that's what they're doing here.

sgel

Eldrach said:

Can't fathom why people would demand a refund for slow delivery knowing the fact that they've supported a game development which involves maybe the largest game ever created, with no publisher on top of that -And then act all entitled afterwards.  I would not be surprised if a game of this scale, from a new studio, which has to spend half it's time begging for money with "concept sales" - Will take 8-9 years to finish.

How dare they want the game in 2017 when it was promised in 2014!
Entitled brats!!!111

Could you guys also make up your mind if publishers are bad or good? You keep on changing the narrative from "No publisher = full freedom = 4x the cash = 4x development speed"  to "No publisher = slow development expected"

Kyleran

rpmcmurphy said:

Eldrach said:

Can't fathom why people would demand a refund for slow delivery knowing the fact that they've supported a game development which involves maybe the largest game ever created, with no publisher on top of that -And then act all entitled afterwards.  I would not be surprised if a game of this scale, from a new studio, which has to spend half it's time begging for money with "concept sales" - Will take 8-9 years to finish.

It doesn't really matter how long we now expect it to take. It's what people originally thought when they laid down their money. If you hand over money under the impression it'll be done in 3 years and then 6 years later it's still years away from completion, you might feel you're not getting what you paid for, perhaps at that pace you might never get it....

And the thing is, back in 2015 CR said people are entitled to refunds, a couple of times they've tried to walk back on that and it seems that's what they're doing here.

I believe at some point they modified the rules, telling previous backers to get their refund requests in by a certain date and setting limitations on refunds for future backers.

Kyleran

IceAge said:

Wait! Do people still have hope to play SC anytime "soon" ?

Define what "play" means first and for that matter, what exactly should be playable?

There are backers today "playing" some subset of the game afterall.

Wizardry

I would like to know how much actual pve gameplay,the fanbois THINK they are going to get after all this waiting?25 hours....35 hours?
There is only so much this game is going to do,the ground areas will be auto generated with a few repeated assets scattered about.I still remember one of the first videos that Chris thought was showing off some nice stuff but all it was looked like 1 days work by one guy lol.Then there was that game convention where they were showing a fly by of again auto generated terrain and had the crowd clapping and shouting,it was pathetic.

I would say the ship interiors look good, beyond that i see very little this game will offer.I expect some missions,mostly inside ships,perhaps a few running across barren terrain,mostly pew pew gunfire combat,i seriously do not see an end product with much to get excited about.

Oh and after the limited pve,you will spend all your time in a small cockpit looking at a hud into stars 24/7.How long will players stay interested in the actual game,this is why i assume so much spending on ships,that is the real fun for these gamer's ,just spending,buying more ships.End result...Eve online all over again,could have just ported Eve onto a better engine,better graphics like those fans wanted years ago.

Gdemami

rpmcmurphy said:
If you hand over money under the impression it'll be done in 3 years and then 6 years later it's still years away from completion, you might feel you're not getting what you paid for, perhaps at that pace you might never get it....

That is why it is called a pledge...you are not paying for anything, you are pledging.

Wizardry

Oh btw,we should look back at Chris's career,he is known for taking too long and over spending,his track record alone should have meant he should have been claiming 2-3 years longer than expected and a game more costly than expected and not promised otherwise.

Erillion

<>>>

They are claiming that the requests are outside of the statutory refund period but according to UK and EU law the statutory period is 30 days, and that timeframe starts once the product has been delivered in a manner that it can be used by the customer. This applies to digital goods including in-game items.
>>>>

I am not a lawyer.

My personal opinion: i am not sure if a crowdfunding pledge falls under the UK/EU law you mentioned above. If this counts as a sale of a digital good, to which this law applies.

I suspect this is a grey area which has not been fully defined yet. Lawmakers seems to be unsure about crowdfunding projects and how to treat them legally (at least here in Austria). There is a lot of debate here in Austria, because a private person essentially had a banking business based on a crowdfunding idea ... with great success i might add ... until he was stopped by an injunction. 

So may not be as clear cut as it sounds that a 30 day statutory period applies here.

Have fun

Erillion

Wizardry said:

I would like to know how much actual pve gameplay,the fanbois THINK they are going to get after all this waiting?25 hours....35 hours?

Around 10 years (like SWG) or 13 years (like EVE). Maybe more.


Have fun

rpmcmurphy

Gdemami said:

rpmcmurphy said:
If you hand over money under the impression it'll be done in 3 years and then 6 years later it's still years away from completion, you might feel you're not getting what you paid for, perhaps at that pace you might never get it....

That is why it is called a pledge...you are not paying for anything, you are pledging.

During the kickstarter it would count as a pledge, ie you are promising to pay $60 if they reach their funding goal but after the kickstarter it's not a pledge.

Gdemami

rpmcmurphy said:

During the kickstarter it would count as a pledge, ie you are promising to pay $60 if they reach their funding goal but after the kickstarter it's not a pledge.

You can count it as you want, does not make it so tho.

Whether you are fundraising via 3rd party platform or directly makes no difference, pay attention to TOS.

https://robertsspaceindustries.com/tos/20

rpmcmurphy

Kyleran said:

I believe at some point they modified the rules, telling previous backers to get their refund requests in by a certain date and setting limitations on refunds for future backers.

Yeah they did modify it but they didn't tell people to get their refunds before a certain date. The ToS changes came out of nowhere and it was everyone else that was saying not to accept the new ToS if you wanted to seek a refund at any point.

From the eurogamer article:
In the old TOS you could claim a refund if, after 18 months, the "relevant pledge items and/or the game" hadn't been delivered. But in the new TOS you can only claim a refund if "[Roberts Space Industries] has ceased development" of Star Citizen and failed to deliver what you pledged for.

Then there was that guy who I think was called Streetroller who set the ball rolling after they brought the new ToS into practice, from then until now it's been a straightforward process with nobody getting refused afaik.

rpmcmurphy

Gdemami said:

rpmcmurphy said:

During the kickstarter it would count as a pledge, ie you are promising to pay $60 if they reach their funding goal but after the kickstarter it's not a pledge.

You can count it as you want, does not make it so tho.

Whether you are fundraising via 3rd party platform or direcently makes no difference, read TOS.

https://robertsspaceindustries.com/tos/20

Why doesn't make it so?
After kickstarter it is CIG who are making pledges not the customer. They are the ones saying "Give us $400 now and we promise to deliver the Carrack some time in the future."
A customer cannot make a pledge if they are fulfilling their end of the bargain straight away.

The TOS doesn't really mean much though, they can write whatever they want but if it attempts to break consumer law then it has no bearing. It's more of a scare tactic than anything. Obviously companies rely on people not being able to take them to court over such things.

Excession

Gdemami said:

rpmcmurphy said:
If you hand over money under the impression it'll be done in 3 years and then 6 years later it's still years away from completion, you might feel you're not getting what you paid for, perhaps at that pace you might never get it....

That is why it is called a pledge...you are not paying for anything, you are pledging.

You are paying for something, which is why VAT is added (in the UK at least).

rodarin

Like I said I suspect 3.0 is going to end up being the infamous "MVP". And whether there are any marked 'improvements' beyond that will be for dreamers.

Excession

rpmcmurphy said:

Kefo said:

It's a little funny they bring up the 3.0 release when most backers can't actually play 3.0 since it's only available to a select few.

It looks like their standard reply when asking for a refund with a few points changed but that last paragraph is odd. Why would CS be that tied up with the release of 3.0 that they can't look at your account about a refund? Or are they just hoping that you forget about it and don't ask for your money back?

Agreed, it's like they're saying "Look we've delivered something even if it isn't to you yet so nope, you can't have your money back."

None of it makes much sense to me, the bit where they say it takes time to look into the details makes it sound like they addressed the request after it had left their statutory period and therefore they are exempt from issuing a refund. I'm not sure that's the case but it's what it reads like.

And why are they telling this person inconsequential things completely unrelated to his request? Next they'll be saying "The CS team made 14 twitter posts today and I had a latte with grated belgian chocolate on top this morning..." Who the fuck cares about any of that bullcrap when you're trying to get your money back?

That last paragraph is really odd. They flat out refuse a refund and then say they want to work with the customer but it'll take a few weeks before they can do so, WTH? It feels like a stall tactic.

Maybe they are trying to stall refund request's, until they can get 3.0 in backer's hands fully, not just Evocati.

With CR previously making the MVP statement, and claiming 3.0 is akin to EA, they may be changing the ToS/EULA, removing refund right's, and treating it as though they have fulfilled their obligations "pledge" wise.

SlyLoK

Hopefully this gets settled and anyone wanting a refund can get it.

ConstantineMerus

Erillion said:

<>>>

They are claiming that the requests are outside of the statutory refund period but according to UK and EU law the statutory period is 30 days, and that timeframe starts once the product has been delivered in a manner that it can be used by the customer. This applies to digital goods including in-game items.
>>>>

I am not a lawyer.

My personal opinion: i am not sure if a crowdfunding pledge falls under the UK/EU law you mentioned above. If this counts as a sale of a digital good, to which this law applies.

I suspect this is a grey area which has not been fully defined yet. Lawmakers seems to be unsure about crowdfunding projects and how to treat them legally (at least here in Austria). There is a lot of debate here in Austria, because a private person essentially had a banking business based on a crowdfunding idea ... with great success i might add ... until he was stopped by an injunction. 

So may not be as clear cut as it sounds that a 30 day statutory period applies here.

Have fun

Crowdfunding is not considered as sale. If it was, it would've been taxed. You can't get one without the other. Taxing crowdfunding monies as sale would mean the end of crowdfunding.