How to buy gems

[Shadowen.3098]

Buying gems in Guild Wars 2 couldn't be easier.

 

1. Log in to game
2. Press O to open the Black Lion Trading Company
3. Click the blue button that says "Buy Gems"
4. Select quantity of gems.
5. Enter payment information
6. Click Next.
7. Click Next again to confirm.
8. Enjoy the non-specific error message  "Unfortunately, an error has occurred. Please try again later."
9. Repeat steps 4-8 about four or five more times.
10. Scream at your computer.
11. Open a support ticket with the details.
12. Wait an unspecified amount of time.
13. Be told to try again.
14. Cross fingers.
15. If it works, success. If it fails, go to step 11.

 

In all seriousness though, what the heck is up with the company that processes your payment information for in-game purchases?  It's like a roll of the dice to see if it is going to work or not on any given day. I use one credit card for all my online purchases and I have zero problems with it anywhere EXCEPT when trying to buy gems from ArenaNet.  I love this game so much, but this aspect reflects very poorly to me and shades an otherwise wonderful product with an incredibly frustrating customer experience.

 

 

[Sarajiel.5830]

1 hour ago, Shadowen.3098 said:

In all seriousness though, what the heck is up with the company that processes your payment information for in-game purchases?  It's like a roll of the dice to see if it is going to work or not on any given day. I use one credit card for all my online purchases and I have zero problems with it anywhere EXCEPT when trying to buy gems from ArenaNet.

I completely agree with you. I've been fiddling around with payment methods for a week now since I decided to give GW2 another try after a 2+ years break. In the end I just bought some 25€ amazon gift cards which are pretty much sold everywhere in my country and redeemed them online. Buying this way took something like 5 minutes for my gems.

Considering the amount of third parties involved in that process, ArenaNet pretty much loses out on quite a big chunk of money which in return could be used to give buyers volume discounts like any other modern game with microtransactions has nowadays.

[TheQuickFox.3826]

Usually the safest option is to buy gem cards via authorized retailers. The list at GuidWars2.com and the wiki is outdated but you can safely assume that retailers that participated in the official gem card sale have valid gem cards:

 

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/stock-up-for-spring-with-20-off-digital-gem-cards/

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/get-20-off-guild-wars-2-gem-cards-in-europe/

 

Please note that the sale is over but you still can get gem cards here without risking the issues with the in-game gem shop.

[StackMonkey.9287]

Tried to buy $35 worth of GEMS today and also tried to buy the top shelf version of the XPAC in the GEM store. Can't Gem store totally broken. Seems like Anet would want this fixed ASAP if they want a steady stream of cash flow to help finish the XPAC......just saying...

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

1 hour ago, StackMonkey.9287 said:

Tried to buy $35 worth of GEMS today and also tried to buy the top shelf version of the XPAC in the GEM store. Can't Gem store totally broken. Seems like Anet would want this fixed ASAP if they want a steady stream of cash flow to help finish the XPAC......just saying...

You can buy the expansion from the official site, or support your favorite content creator by purchasing it through their site.

 

And/or you can contact the Billing CS Team for assistance, via the 'Support' link above/below.

[JustTrogdor.7892]

As often as this problem comes up about people not being able to buy gems it makes me wonder if Anet has considered using a backup payment processor.   And if not why?   Maybe it is part of their contract with Digital River that they can't, who knows?    But it seems as chronic as this issue has been Anet is probably losing a lot of money from people that get the error and just say, "Ok forget it."   I don't know, it seems almost every day this issue comes up.   I would think this is something Anet would want to solve instead of making players go through support requests to give them their money.  

 

If I went to a store to buy a shirt and at checkout they told me,  "Sorry an error occurred.  We don't know the exact nature of the error.  You will need to contact customer service to get this sorted out.  It might take a day or up to 72 hours for customer service to solve this issue.  Once it is resolved you can pay us for the shirt,"  I'd just leave the shirt on the counter and go home.  I certainly would not jump through hoops to give them my money.

 

 

Edited August 22, 2021 by JustTrogdor.7892

[Daredevil.2745]

just buy gems for gold, not for real money. problem solved

[gkoogz.3089]

I had the same error but then it worked perfectly when I turned off my VPN. I guess Digital River automatically rejects known VPN IP addresses from some list. It's a shame they don't at least give you a proper error message why the payment failed. What a horrible payment provider.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

3 hours ago, gkoogz.3089 said:

I had the same error but then it worked perfectly when I turned off my VPN. I guess Digital River automatically rejects known VPN IP addresses from some list. It's a shame they don't at least give you a proper error message why the payment failed. What a horrible payment provider.

Digital River is no longer the payment processor for ArenaNet.

[gkoogz.3089]

On 3/14/2022 at 11:04 AM, Inculpatus cedo.9234 said:

Digital River is no longer the payment processor for ArenaNet.

Fair enough. Whoever is doing it is doing a poor job.