Signed up for an account four days ago, and already have been banned for something my son didn't do. Many false reports are submitted and in this case, the account is being locked to get my membership fee amount with out providing the service I paid for.
A few days after signing up as a paying customer on RuneScape online game, I received a threatening, nonspecific and aggressively worded email claiming I had been caught breaking the rules (Trying to sell my online account), which I had not done. I just registered my account with my credit card — why would I want to sell it and risk having more charges against my account. Customer service is unresponsive and I will be telling all my friends about what is happenning so they don't keep their memberships.
They banned my account, into which I had invested both time and money.
Also, customer service was inadequate. I was unable to submit a detailed complaint because the only procedure available was a 400-character-limit online form. Since the messages I was sent by Jagex were longer than this, I could not reply word-for-word, and I was also unable to explain specifics of my position, which include psychological/learning difficulties which are relevant to the issue in question. Some of the customer service emails were phrased in an aggressive and hostile way.
Jagex is therefore guilty of the following:
1) misrepresentation (by enforcing rules in ways which are not contained in their wording, and by promising good customer support which is in fact nonexistent),
2) slander/libel (accusing me of breaking one and maybe two rules I did not break),
3) threatening retaliation against a customer for complaining,
4) victimising a paying customer on petty grounds,
5) causing me considerable trauma and distress. (Makers of online games and the like should realise that users may become extremely attached to their products, and that these products are likely to attract people with obsessive personalities etc., so that shoddy treatment of customers and petty enforcement and/or rule-making cause psychological damage and other knock-on effects as a predictable consequence),
6) repeated failure to resolve complaint or to apologise for false accusation,
7) non-availability of adequate means of complaint (through artificial restriction of the number of characters used and web-based instead of written or email complaint system).
If Jagex routinely treat customers in this way, then no doubt there are also many users who have had accounts suspended and have actually lost money as a result, but who are substantively innocent of whatever accusations are made.
I have cancelled my membership and am hoping a class action suit can be filed against this company. I am also filing more complaints with other sources, contacting my credit card company and working on looking into fraud laws to combat this type of business.
0 comments