Bank Account Being Charged?

silvestru_liviueb17_ESO

7 days already for your stupid "verification", no money returned yet! HOW LONG ZOS??? Already loosing patience with this idiot system...

gorathffeb17_ESO

mechsoldiersalvatorenub18_ESO wrote: »

The issue entirely isn't Zenimax's to blame. The reason accounts are having withheld and withdrawn money is because the financial businesses believe they're trying to charge them. That being said, they ARE trying to get the issues resolved.

Last time i checked, it was Zenimax demand to pay the subscription fee.
So basically i dont give a fudge how Zenimax deals with their buisness partners. I deal with Zenimax directly and i want them to return the subscription fees they took.

ZOS_JessicaFolsom

We recently released a statement about the different payment methods we offer, including specifics about non-recurring options. You can read the full statement here: http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/discussion/78460/official-statement-on-payment-methods

Thank you, and please let us know if you have any questions.

Zheke32174b14_ESO

I was hacked twice in less than 24 hours then suspended afterwards, now I realize Zeni max are doing what they can, but I didn't do a single thing that violates the TOS, maybe someone that hacked the account did, but that's someone else that shouldn't have been on the account to begin with and got onto it using questionable means.

At this point, I've filed a claim with paypal, and will continue to do so until I'm either refunded or the problem is fixed and their 'appeals department' is done with its investigation. I'm not paying for something that may as well not exist, that's how I see it.

saradonzieb16_ESO

I only recharged my card the exact amount to pay for the key online... And surprise, the authorization is the full price of a month subscription?!?
Why not charge us 1$/€ for the authorization?? Honestly, I TRIED talking with the support. It's like talking to a wall.

saradonzieb16_ESO

mechsoldiersalvatorenub18_ESO wrote: »

After a week of going back and forth with customer support, Richard of the Support team provided me with an entertaining response and a 1-day code to activate my free 30 days. Below is a bit of information to the situation and I hope you guys get your's resolved soon, too.

Hello Christian,

This is Richard from the Elder Scrolls Online Support team. I completely understand your frustration with the pre-authorization holds. We aren't charging or pre-billing for the subscriptions, but the subscription service contacts the payment service to verify that the billing information is correct and that no fraud is taking place. This causes a hold because the banks and credit companies think we are requesting a payment at that time. Our billing and technology departments are working with payment vendors to try to make that process more congenial and less painful to our customers. It's not necessarily our fault that holds are being applied as it has to do with financial companies protecting themselves from the Thieves' Guild and the Dark Brotherhood, but we are accepting some of the responsibility and have some powerful mages working on wards to clean up this process.

With that being said I do have a one-day subscription code for you that you can apply to your account after you apply your game registration code. Applying this will then start your 30-day free subscription.

(deleted this line for obvious reasons)

Again, I do understand and I apologize for the inconvenience that this has caused you.


Thank you for your support of our game. I really hope that this billing issue doesn't detract from your enjoyment.

May all your hits be Critical,

Richard--*Critical Flail*--


This was my message before that:

To whom this may concern,

As it stands, there are over 2,200 posts in your forums by users who have experienced issues with their accounts having withheld money, or in some cases having their money withdrawn. This entire situation has stemmed directly from this "preauthorization check". However, there are two major flaws to this system.

These being what payment method customers are aiming for. A considerable portion of the customer base falls into a category that simply cannot set up an electronic transaction to "verify" their payment method. This can stem from multiple reasons itself which are all completely reasonable. This can range from a customer not being old enough to obtain a credit card, debit card, or a e-payment method (such as paypal) to those with banks that have either extended holds on their money or the money has been actually charged to their accounts. Even in the case in which they are able to obtain these a large portion of these customers cannot afford to have an entity pre-charge for something as customers tend to plan around their paycheck. A good number of these customers would then be relying on prepaid cards. That leads on to the next problem. Retailers have yet to even adopt the wholesale purchase of these prepaid cards yet, which has put people such as myself between a rock and a hard place.

The practice of preauthorization on a payment method is archaic at best and is the cause of the problem itself and some action should be taken to change said system. What customers simply want, and I highly doubt they are being unreasonable, is access to the free 30 days that were marketed with the purchase of the full game without this roadblock. It simply isn't needed. The NORMAL business practice would be to attempt to charge at the end of the free 30 days they were promised on purchase. In the event that a payment method is invalid then game time would simply be denied to them. I hope this has been taken into consideration. That said, ESO is a fantastic game, and I hope these issues get resolved soon so that users, like myself, can go back to exploring Tamriel.

THIS.

mechsoldiersalvatorenub18_ESO

saradonzieb16_ESO wrote: »

mechsoldiersalvatorenub18_ESO wrote: »

After a week of going back and forth with customer support, Richard of the Support team provided me with an entertaining response and a 1-day code to activate my free 30 days. Below is a bit of information to the situation and I hope you guys get your's resolved soon, too.

Hello Christian,

This is Richard from the Elder Scrolls Online Support team. I completely understand your frustration with the pre-authorization holds. We aren't charging or pre-billing for the subscriptions, but the subscription service contacts the payment service to verify that the billing information is correct and that no fraud is taking place. This causes a hold because the banks and credit companies think we are requesting a payment at that time. Our billing and technology departments are working with payment vendors to try to make that process more congenial and less painful to our customers. It's not necessarily our fault that holds are being applied as it has to do with financial companies protecting themselves from the Thieves' Guild and the Dark Brotherhood, but we are accepting some of the responsibility and have some powerful mages working on wards to clean up this process.

With that being said I do have a one-day subscription code for you that you can apply to your account after you apply your game registration code. Applying this will then start your 30-day free subscription.

(deleted this line for obvious reasons)

Again, I do understand and I apologize for the inconvenience that this has caused you.


Thank you for your support of our game. I really hope that this billing issue doesn't detract from your enjoyment.

May all your hits be Critical,

Richard--*Critical Flail*--


This was my message before that:

To whom this may concern,

As it stands, there are over 2,200 posts in your forums by users who have experienced issues with their accounts having withheld money, or in some cases having their money withdrawn. This entire situation has stemmed directly from this "preauthorization check". However, there are two major flaws to this system.

These being what payment method customers are aiming for. A considerable portion of the customer base falls into a category that simply cannot set up an electronic transaction to "verify" their payment method. This can stem from multiple reasons itself which are all completely reasonable. This can range from a customer not being old enough to obtain a credit card, debit card, or a e-payment method (such as paypal) to those with banks that have either extended holds on their money or the money has been actually charged to their accounts. Even in the case in which they are able to obtain these a large portion of these customers cannot afford to have an entity pre-charge for something as customers tend to plan around their paycheck. A good number of these customers would then be relying on prepaid cards. That leads on to the next problem. Retailers have yet to even adopt the wholesale purchase of these prepaid cards yet, which has put people such as myself between a rock and a hard place.

The practice of preauthorization on a payment method is archaic at best and is the cause of the problem itself and some action should be taken to change said system. What customers simply want, and I highly doubt they are being unreasonable, is access to the free 30 days that were marketed with the purchase of the full game without this roadblock. It simply isn't needed. The NORMAL business practice would be to attempt to charge at the end of the free 30 days they were promised on purchase. In the event that a payment method is invalid then game time would simply be denied to them. I hope this has been taken into consideration. That said, ESO is a fantastic game, and I hope these issues get resolved soon so that users, like myself, can go back to exploring Tamriel.

THIS.

._." I can't tell if that was a positive response or not

mechsoldiersalvatorenub18_ESO

gorathffeb17_ESO wrote: »

mechsoldiersalvatorenub18_ESO wrote: »

The issue entirely isn't Zenimax's to blame. The reason accounts are having withheld and withdrawn money is because the financial businesses believe they're trying to charge them. That being said, they ARE trying to get the issues resolved.

Last time i checked, it was Zenimax demand to pay the subscription fee.
So basically i dont give a fudge how Zenimax deals with their buisness partners. I deal with Zenimax directly and i want them to return the subscription fees they took.

It wouldn't be much of a problem if everybody got the same memo. Sadly, not every bank, creditor, or financial system is on the same page as Zenimax. Do I endorse the pre-authorization? Hell no! I fully intend on choosing the alternate method of prepaid cards for a matter of simplicity. As I quoted above by a member of the support team. "This causes a hold because the banks and credit companies think we are requesting a payment at that time." Their intentions were to authorize that the user had the money to verify that they were legitimate. There have been fraudulent accounts (mainly those spamming gold selling sites) and I am still seeing them now. But I do see the frustration and understand it entirely. This is a problem that never should've happened in the first place. I'm just seeing it from both perspectives at this point.

Evilmog

Reading this, I'm baffled. I set up my subscription (cancelled for well...obvious reasons) with my debit card Zenimax never billed me a penny.

Was this like a random security check at the air port?

mechsoldiersalvatorenub18_ESO

Evilmog wrote: »

Reading this, I'm baffled. I set up my subscription (cancelled for well...obvious reasons) with my debit card Zenimax never billed me a penny.

Was this like a random security check at the air port?

Authorization holds have varied depending on the system. You, my friend, are one of the lucky ones that either had a very quick and painless temporary hold and didn't notice it, or slipped under the radar entirely.

GREEN_SEVEN

Vladish wrote: »

GREEN_SEVEN wrote: »

I pre-ordered through store and after the early access period I activated a 30 day subscription plan selected my preferred subscription plan. Ten minutes later I cancelled that subscription. Now that we all have a better understanding of the situation and according to the interpretations of the wordings, where does that place me if my money is not returned within the 30 days? Can ZOS then be able to help me?

Lawsuit for theft and/or getting your banks involved for fraud. Some of my friends are doing that as thier bank stated (like so many people here reported as well), that the money isn't being held by them, they are not being released by ZeniMax. If they try to hold your funds until next month and using it towards subscription, that's breach of contract/fraud and is grounds for a lawsuit. If that's the road they are planning on going, even their silly anti-lawsuit ToS policy wont protect their ass.

Day seven and my money has not been returned. ZOS, I do not want that transaction to auto-trigger a 30 day subscription. I want my money back so I can make the decision.

If you can not look up the banks phone number, I can provide it.

/waves customer flag

ZaegaZ

Alphashado wrote: »

ZaegaZ wrote: »

Bought a Game Time Card so can play atlast

From who? Was the code delivered via email?

No got it in my mailbox from a store

ZaegaZ

Nebthet78 wrote: »

ZaegaZ wrote: »

Bought a Game Time Card so can play atlast

Did you have to put your DOB in in order to redeem the code on it so you could play?

Nope

saradonzieb16_ESO

mechsoldiersalvatorenub18_ESO wrote: »

saradonzieb16_ESO wrote: »

mechsoldiersalvatorenub18_ESO wrote: »

After a week of going back and forth with customer support, Richard of the Support team provided me with an entertaining response and a 1-day code to activate my free 30 days. Below is a bit of information to the situation and I hope you guys get your's resolved soon, too.

Hello Christian,

This is Richard from the Elder Scrolls Online Support team. I completely understand your frustration with the pre-authorization holds. We aren't charging or pre-billing for the subscriptions, but the subscription service contacts the payment service to verify that the billing information is correct and that no fraud is taking place. This causes a hold because the banks and credit companies think we are requesting a payment at that time. Our billing and technology departments are working with payment vendors to try to make that process more congenial and less painful to our customers. It's not necessarily our fault that holds are being applied as it has to do with financial companies protecting themselves from the Thieves' Guild and the Dark Brotherhood, but we are accepting some of the responsibility and have some powerful mages working on wards to clean up this process.

With that being said I do have a one-day subscription code for you that you can apply to your account after you apply your game registration code. Applying this will then start your 30-day free subscription.

(deleted this line for obvious reasons)

Again, I do understand and I apologize for the inconvenience that this has caused you.


Thank you for your support of our game. I really hope that this billing issue doesn't detract from your enjoyment.

May all your hits be Critical,

Richard--*Critical Flail*--


This was my message before that:

To whom this may concern,

As it stands, there are over 2,200 posts in your forums by users who have experienced issues with their accounts having withheld money, or in some cases having their money withdrawn. This entire situation has stemmed directly from this "preauthorization check". However, there are two major flaws to this system.

These being what payment method customers are aiming for. A considerable portion of the customer base falls into a category that simply cannot set up an electronic transaction to "verify" their payment method. This can stem from multiple reasons itself which are all completely reasonable. This can range from a customer not being old enough to obtain a credit card, debit card, or a e-payment method (such as paypal) to those with banks that have either extended holds on their money or the money has been actually charged to their accounts. Even in the case in which they are able to obtain these a large portion of these customers cannot afford to have an entity pre-charge for something as customers tend to plan around their paycheck. A good number of these customers would then be relying on prepaid cards. That leads on to the next problem. Retailers have yet to even adopt the wholesale purchase of these prepaid cards yet, which has put people such as myself between a rock and a hard place.

The practice of preauthorization on a payment method is archaic at best and is the cause of the problem itself and some action should be taken to change said system. What customers simply want, and I highly doubt they are being unreasonable, is access to the free 30 days that were marketed with the purchase of the full game without this roadblock. It simply isn't needed. The NORMAL business practice would be to attempt to charge at the end of the free 30 days they were promised on purchase. In the event that a payment method is invalid then game time would simply be denied to them. I hope this has been taken into consideration. That said, ESO is a fantastic game, and I hope these issues get resolved soon so that users, like myself, can go back to exploring Tamriel.

THIS.

._." I can't tell if that was a positive response or not

Sorry I was agreeing with you. Honestly what happened to you would be the solution to my problem.

damien.vandermeulenrwb17_ESO

Tawara wrote: »

I played WoW on release, Everquest 2 on release, Aion on release, SWTOR on release (and other games I really cbf mentioning), and EVERY SINGLE ONE of those games required me to enter in credit card details and authorisation of said credit card prior to claiming free time included with the game (or a game card). EVERY SINGLE ONE.

Why cant you just stop spreading this wrong information. Only because you did not verify what actually happened all this years back, that doesnt mean, that your memory is the truth.

You could always and still can, start setting up a subscription in WoW and before finalizing it (doing the authorization), cancel the Set Up and start playing without having a credit card attached to the account. And if you set up the Sub fully, it is attached to the account but not charged, not even one cent before the end of the free time.

Same for SWToR, Rift and Tera, none of them charged/got hold of my bank account for the full amount before the 30 days went off.

Setting up the sub is okay and a valid method, charging/holding the full amount directly is not.

Sigh. Please read the post before you try and quote me on it and accuse me of spreading misinformation. And I actually have an exceptional memory, which is as much a curse as it is a blessing (try re-reading a book when you can remember every detail about the story... years after you first read it... it's quite frustrating...).

I said in my post, it is silly to authorise the full amount for the subscription. But all of the MMOs that I mentioned, on release (and as stated in my post: before they were f2p or had trial accounts) did authorisations on the credit card when activating your game code. The authorisations were usually in the vicinity of $1, and were refunded within a few days. On release, World of Warcraft required you to enter a valid game time code, or a credit card to activate your free time, same with SWTOR, EQ2, Aion, et. al.

In WoW now, you can create an account and start playing without entering those details, as you can also do in the other games due to trial accounts, and F2P games that due to the fact that they are free, don't require any subscription fee at all.

You are right about one thing and I'll requote it:

Same for SWToR, Rift and Tera, none of them charged/got hold of my bank account for the full amount before the 30 days went off.

They don't put the full amount for authorisation. Like I said, usually $1.

Yikes

this issue resolved?

xondk

nope, they still haven't released the money for me.

nearing 2 weeks now of 'authorization' check, its getting.....yeah, dunno if there's a word for it. And their statement is just ignoring this issue.

Guess there's nothing that can be done except starting a fraud case. Like my bank suggests to me, since I can provide proof that

1) they state they will withdraw 0 and first charge my account 30 days after, this is written plainly on the receipt

2) my subscription is cancelled, have receipt for this as well. And was cancelled shortly after being made, so they shouldn't even hold money now.

Frozztie

oh bloody hell its been 3 damn Days and my Money is still onhold!
im between paydays and I NEED THAT DAMN MONEY FOR FOOD!
3 damn Days is not a "temporary" thing!
i refuse to pay for 30 Days befor my 30 free Days are over.
i have NEVER EVER seen this in ANY mmo EVER and ive been in them since the late 90's!
entering my card number is understandable but you taking my Money and keeping them befor you are supposed to is akin to stealing!

xondk

Frozztie wrote: »

is akin to stealing!

Yes, yes it is. But personally I'm now on day 12, and according to my bank if Zenimax does not cancel the reservation/authorization, then the money won't be available to me before 25. may. Sooo yeah, it seems to be 'mostly' related to debit cards and european's from what I've read some american's and/or none debit credit cards have gotten their money back after 7 days.

PinkOrk

Sad to see this is STILL going… not poking the nest who to blame and neither will state that I don't have any problems (this is true as i decided to give this game some time to sort it problems before subbing).

I just want to toss empathy to those who are still struggling with this problem that effects their normal life! Game experiences should be fun, not this…

Renoaku_ESO

Well I dunno I still can't play the game because every time I try to enter my code it is asking for payment information which I don't want to have to waste my time filling out at the moment and no reason I should be charged when entering payment information after just buying the game.

Frozztie

well ive cancled my subscription now and im not sure if ill acctually go back once my 30 Days free time is over. i Think this is outrageous and disgusting. im geussing that the Money will be put on hold indefenetely till your 30 Days are over and they "use" the Money theyve "locked" to pay for the next 30 Days...

neill1973

I have bought many mmo's and sometimes they ask for my credit card info when first subbing and sometimes they don't. This fact does not bother me. What does bother me is that my bank account was used immediately. I now don't have access to some of my money for several days due to the hold of $15. This is not a good thing for someone on a budget. Shady business practices like this leave a bad taste in my mouth.

Auric_ESO

neill1973 wrote: »

I have bought many mmo's and sometimes they ask for my credit card info when first subbing and sometimes they don't. This fact does not bother me. What does bother me is that my bank account was used immediately. I now don't have access to some of my money for several days due to the hold of $15. This is not a good thing for someone on a budget. Shady business practices like this leave a bad taste in my mouth.

I agree I would have preferred the $1 or some other minuscule amount. But its far from a shady business practice. You post was so....reasonable compared to most until you added that last sentence. You are implying some kinda of underhandedness or near lawbreaking and it just isnt.

Justaneebeb17_ESO

It's been 14 days and I still haven't received my 12.99€. I'm about to cancel my sub, that should do it.

EDIT: Looks like even cancelling didn't help. I will have to talk with my bank about this "scam"

DLAROC_ESO

I bought the game 5 days ago and there is a 15.99 charge from them on my Netspend card. I think my card is charging the extra dollar but shouldn't I have that money back by now? I also have more money still on my card, well over another month of the game. I hope they release that money back to me soon. It's like they're trying to hold the first month until it's time to pay, when they'll take it. I read that the money will be put back into my account but how long? I read 3 days.

Leeta

Auric_ESO wrote: »

neill1973 wrote: »

I have bought many mmo's and sometimes they ask for my credit card info when first subbing and sometimes they don't. This fact does not bother me. What does bother me is that my bank account was used immediately. I now don't have access to some of my money for several days due to the hold of $15. This is not a good thing for someone on a budget. Shady business practices like this leave a bad taste in my mouth.

I agree I would have preferred the $1 or some other minuscule amount. But its far from a shady business practice. You post was so....reasonable compared to most until you added that last sentence. You are implying some kinda of underhandedness or near lawbreaking and it just isnt.

Actually its very close to breaking the law since when you are entering your cc info it says they will charge you NOTHING, nothing at all. And it also says that when the 30 days is over THEN the sub fee will be drawn. So yes it is shady and really do leave a bad taste... I got my money back after 9 days! And i subbed for 6 months so yea there was a lot of money missing from my account for a week...

kozakb16_ESO

zbcole wrote: »

Acceptable or unacceptable. I am still waiting for a game announcement for any game in any genre where the community as a whole doesn't bring out their pitch forks and head out to stomp a troll in the ground.

Guys, this is not Zenimax Online doing it, it is their merchant who is doing it.

And first and foremost, this game is of the international sort. There are a number of banks that will deny transactions as potential fraud if the destination purchase is in another country. So some merchants require this. Some gas stations will do this and you never know it.

I haven't seen anything indicating that they are reserving the full subscription fee. Only that you may see an initial transaction. Most processes that operate in this way do reserve .01 or 1.00 for the reservation.

What would be helpful is if Zenimax would indicate the actual amount of the reservation to take the guess work out on players. 99% of you having problems with this go away if the amount is .01 or 1.00.

Honestly , we bought the game with 30 days free playing time , and dude , that mean no amount of Money should be reserved on anyone bank account until thous 30 days have run out , and by forcing people to make subscriptions or make them pay with paypal upfront , they are breaking a number of laws in EU.
And my bank manager says its not the bank that has to release the Money , but they Company that made the holding on the account , so there for its against the Law. i have this from my bank and i have lawyer friend that told me this is not allowed with in EU Laws to high Jack peoples Money when the Company clearly said , there was 30 days free playing time when you bought the game , and now They are trying to get more Money upfront becouse they know people will leave the game , becouse it was release way before it should have been. thats call highjacking , and if a normal person tryd this , he be going to jail 3-5 year for trying to cheat people out of there Money. so yes i clearly understand why people is angry , im very angry about this my self and on top on that , they claim they are doing something to fix the issues with gold sellers and spammers , and still there is alot of thease around even thou we report them , the dont seem to get thrown out more than a few hours. and they desided to run maintaince in the prime time , what is that about , it should be run when people actualy is in Work / school or sleeping, so yes there is alot of issues , with the game and the way the Company handles thease Things .

rayvn03b14_ESO

Renoaku_ESO wrote: »

I got a simple solution and fix for Zenimax it sounds like a great idea.

You know how on World OF Warcraft all you have to do is buy the game at the store make an account put the key into a redeem key box and there you got 30 days download and play, of course this is before they changed it to 10 day free trial and such and I have 5 wow accounts btw but no longer play wow quit years ago.

Why don't you just do the same thing that they did and put a redeem key on your the website, don't require players enter any credit-card information and in 30 days if they want to keep subscribed they can pay for a subscription of what they choose to same thing that they did how it should have been to begin with?

Like Imagine what would have happened if I used PayPal to put the transaction through and they billed $14.95 to my Bank Account, I use a prepaid debit card, and when PayPal charges my account they charge it as a check therefore I would have owned over $100 USD for $14.95 that Zenimax Charged, I am lucky I didn't do this because I only deposit the money I use to buy things online with into the prepaid account because I don't trust banking too many hackers but that is beyond the point.

So I am guessing I have to file a support ticket or wait about 10 more days or so before I can play again I have never experienced a MMO Launch like this before.

I have said this many times. Their silence on this tells me they aren't interested in the idea. this is just really stupid, because any company with any business sense at all would say "Hey, those other big MMORPGs like WoW etc. do it like this, and we'd really be stupid and upset a lot of people and lose subs if we went against the flow on this..."

So they went ahead and were really stupid and upset a bunch of people.

Justaneebeb17_ESO

About to hit the 3rd week and money has still not been returned to me. I did read the policy, which told that the charge would be cleared within a few days. Pretty sure I won't get it back at all, so I have basically been charged for the extra month in advance, which means there never was a free month since they will charge me again when my 30 days expire. Sad thing is I'm on a tight budget and I have to plan everything really carefully, even thought 13 euros might not be important to some people, it is to me so I can actually eat.

But then again, I have cancelled my sub and I will never play this game again, you know what, keep the 13 euros even tho I already cancelled the sub. Amazing customer support by the way.