Grievances with Arenanet

Hello,

Justin here. So, you may not know me, but I've been gaming since the "you've got mail" dial-up days in the late 90's. During this stretch, I've played under several companies: Blizzard, EA, Ubisoft, Activision, Square, I mean the list truly does go on. So you can imagine my frustration, in 2018, trying to play GW2 under Arenanet. First and foremost, I had an account some time ago with Heart of Thorns on it, for some back story. Now, I changed my number since having the account and for the life of me couldn't remember the password. I had to create an account to submit a ticket, or so it would seem to a relatively new player. Oh well, I'll just create an account and purchase Heart of Thorns, I'm sure they can merge accounts like any other MMO in 2018, right? Wrong.

Hey, my fault, I didn't read your 25+ page ToS. I'm sure you'll give me a refund for the money I spent from January 1st to January 7th on said account, right? Wrong again. The only think they'll refund apparently was the expansion itself. Apparently, Black Lion purchases aren't them - it must be a different company, and the make pretend items that I purchased couldn't possibly be returned. Is this K Mart?

Whatever, fast forward to January 19th, the account that I proceeded playing on? Yeah, no, I want that refunded too. Why? Well, you see it's January 19th as i'm posting this, almost the 20th, and I still haven't even gotten the refund from my initial account purchase. Not only that, I submitted a ticket and the GM that responded wasn't even seemingly aware that I had put in a request to have it refunded - i'd assume so they could protest any refund at all, considering i'm dangerously close to thirty day window. On top of that, the GM informed me that because I purchased the deluxe POF edition, I couldn't get anything refunded because i'd spent their imaginary gems on cosmetic items, again.

So, to bring it all together, from about $120.00 USD of purchases, Arenanet just might refund me $30.00 back, if they're able to respond in time to the damned email. Oh, by the way, the first response letter from my submitted ticket on 1/1/18 was responded back to me about six business days later. The turn around time in a virtual world seems a little third world compared to the real life time of the first world, yanno? Kinda crazy.

I'd like to thank you, A-net, for introducing me to a company worse than EA. Don't worry, none of my associates for the last twenty years will be considering your company moving forward for their gaming needs.

p.s. Just so you know, dear read, it was was over forty back-and-forth responses between the staff and I to even get acknowledged the first time that they would refund the initial POF account. Nearly three weeks later and they've 'forgotten' the endless conversation of emails.

Good luck being the next laughingstock of gaming, i'm sure EA would love to ditch that crown.

If the first request for refund is within 30 days, it would not matter how long it took to receive the funds. I don't think you have to worry about that.You could have asked for assistance recovering your original HoT account, rather than purchasing a new account.You can submit a ticket to the CS Team without an account. There are instructions on the main page of 'Submit a Ticket' ("Don't have an account/can't log in? Click here to submit anonymously.")You can ask to have your issue escalated to a Senior Team Member, who may be able to assist you. Of course, honey always works better than vinegar.

Good luck.

This is one of those "always write down your password" lessons. It's not arenanet's fault if you forget all of your login details. Granted, I don't have two factor authentication (or whatever it's called) enabled. But there was probably a more tactful approach you your situation than buying a new account and thinking arenanet could merge them together. (Is this even a thing? I've been gaming for a looooong time and have never heard of any company doing this). I never read the ToS either, but I would have taken a different approach should my login info mysteriously disappear from my brain and password archive (AKA notebook {the paper kind}).

I'm not sure all those other games can merge accounts, but it's simply an assumption I wouldn't have made. What you've done is made an assumption and now you're coming here to blame this company for your assumption. Other companies have their own issues and have complaints against them as well. Seems to me, contacting support and getting your account restored is more logical. At least it seems more logical to me.

Not even blizzard can merge account they can however move games from 1 account to the other.

And if you only bought digital deluxe you should be able to get it all refunded only ultimate come with gems.

As explained by others. Support is very helpfull to reach the goal you have intended, but not always in the way you imagined. I think it is perfectly possible to contact support, get a refund for the existing account, help you recover the old one and make the purchase for that account. Same effect, but slightly different road.

Also, when it comes to merging, all those other companies, would need some proof of ownership. Which is also needed to recover the old account. Arenanet is really good and helpfull when it comes to help you proof ownership (even if you think all is lost).

Odds are you were probably being unreasonable. lol

if your emails to them came with the same tone of entitlement as the OP, i'm not surprised no one is bending over to help you.

if this is going to turn you away from this game, well i just feel sorry for you. this is a really great game and you will be the one missing out. Anet is not going to miss you. you're the only one suffering here.

I'm sure they can merge accounts like any other MMO in 2018, right? Wrong.What MMOs specifically will merge accounts without the owner being able to verify ownership of each? Wouldn't you have to prove ownership of the original account in order for a merge to happen? And if you can prove ownership of the original, why buy a new one?