Let Retailers lawyers do the hard work for you…

Interesting topic at the IW Forums, posted by AnonymousDoesNotForgive, regarding 'winnable reasons to get your money back'.

This is going to be long, thorough, and 100% effective, so take your time, grab a drink and read through this carefully. I can tell you this has worked on both sides of the Atlantic and will provide a couple of links for you as well, along with valid, winnable reasons to get your money back. I took a lot of time researching this, consulting a couple lawyer friends of mine, and even spoke with Dan Parsons, head of the BBB in Houston, Texas. If the post gets deleted or my account gets suspended, just chalk it up to the social communism the lurking mods are trying to maintain here. This is for people *who went out and bought a copy from a retailer*, I can not in good conscience say this will work for people who purchased through steam (as someone on another forum brought up, Steam can possibly cancel any other game attached to the same account).

I originally posted this elsewhere since IW's forum system apparently can't remember my original account even though I had it send my username/password to me via e-mail. Some of this may be obvious now, but keep in mind, some people still don't know what they've bought because they haven't given it to their kids yet.

I've been reading the IW forums for weeks now and just wanted to point out a few things :

* No parent, who pre-ordered this game back in August, had or has any clue what happened to this game. For all they know, their kids have been asking for it since the sequel announcement and were given the impression that MW2 was supposed to be a simple sequel to MW. - Now think about this; Some of these parents gave the game to their kids, some are waiting till Christmas. Some of the kids may still be ignorantly anticipating this game, still not knowing what they're about to find (rare, but it could happen). Long story short, a lot of kids and gamers in general are pissed off. A lot of kids who had their parents preorder this game are being yelled at to get their money back because in essence, they didn't get what they wanted. A lot of parents are probably pretty upset.

The boycott isn't working. The dev's are twittering because it's the only thing they can do from their new Droid phones on the beaches of Barbados sipping on Mai-Tai's and laughing it all the way to the bank. The petition signers, myself included went this route in good faith to get the attention of the developers. Clearly that isn't working, as we're being mocked by them, rather than addressed by them.

You wanted to hit IW in their pocketbooks by boycotting the game but it was only a small percentile of the total sales figures due to the console sales.

I run an internet retail company for computer parts and the like so what I'm about to tell you is probably the only feasible solution. I have done this and got my money back, EVEN though the store I purchased it from said "no returns on opened software" so take notice.

This method will not only hit IW's pocketbooks, but will ALSO get your point across to the developers. The developers do not care about the individual, so what you need to do is have the RETAILER do the complaining for you. How do you do this? Simple.

---Do a chargeback on your credit or debit card---

Let me elaborate.

If you file a chargeback, make the reason you're filing it "Defective - product does not work as described."
(i.e. bad lag, hackers, no dedi's, constant d/c's ... finding out IWNet was swapped in without your knowing)

What does this mean? It means you're stuck with a product you can't return because the store won't take it back, however it doesn't WORK the way it was intended to. Your credit card company will return the charge back to you and the place you bought it from will have to EAT the charge. So... now IW doesn't lose their money because the RETAILER bought it from them. YOU bought it from the retailer. If you do a chargeback on your credit or debit card, YOU get your money back; IW got paid by the RETAILER, and the RETAILER gets screwed. Now... how long do you think a place like Game Stop will absorb chargebacks before they SUE Infinity Ward for selling them a defective product?

Exactly. IW won't listen to you, but they WILL listen to their avenues of income; meaning their vendors. If enough retailers jump on and complain and start sueing IW for their losses on chargebacks, IW will HAVE to address THEM, ultimately addressing US.

I handle chargebacks at my store ALL the time for the past 8 years, and let me tell you. EVEN if the retailer wins the first chargeback and they recharge your card, they NEVER win the second one. I can't tell you how many times my shop has been double-chargebacked for the same scam. (When I say scam, people would buy things on my online store, then chargeback immediately, and keep the product. When I explain to the credit card company, the customer never tried a return or has never contacted me, I win the first chargeback, but the dishonest customer does a second chargeback, and no matter what I tell the credit card company, the customer gets their money back and I eat the charge. Great system huh?)

Parent's are going to do this just because their kids will complain that they don't want the game anymore; The game they preordered months before they were 'baited and switched'

That leads me to my other point. Parent's will most likely do chargebacks under the pretense of "Bait and Switch" because they changed it at the last second without notifying ANYONE. How many people do you think Game Stop called after this announcement to warn consumers who preordered and thought they had everything taken care of and only had to worry about picking up their game on delivery day? Exactly... zero. And they have grounds to win their claims. IF they lose that first claim, they can file a second one, and 99.9999999% of the time they win it, so the retailer still loses the money.

Initially it will hurt the retailers, but the retailers will eventually not stand for it and sue IW for compensation if they get enough chargeback losses. My company once sued a company called Inno3d for making really shoddy Nvidia chipset video cards. 99 out of 100 were defective and the chargebacks were endless. We ended up settling out of court with the company for a little over 3 million dollars (we're not a massive company but this was a sizable lawsuit).

If a large retailer or two ends up sueing for compensation, think of the press it would get? Since we, the people can't make a large enough noise, let's let a little negative publicity on the news mediums do it for us. Let's make the retailers use their corporate lawyers to deal with IW's corporate lawyers. Turn them against each other, not user against user; Not gamer against gamer, or platform against platform. This goes beyond this... this is simply bad business and we have the power to put an end to it, or put the world on notice with the proper means.

I'm going to wrap this up since it's getting a bit long in the tooth and I'm certain there's going to be some tl;dr's but for those who held on, I've got one more bomb to drop on IW.

So we've determined two viable reasons for successful chargebacks ( and you got to keep the discs! ) and now, the best one.

FILE a complaint to the Better Business Bureau.
http://www.bbb.org

People, you've been lied to, baited, switched and now ignored. All HUGE no-no's in the business world. Again, this is the kind of thing I have to deal with at my company on a daily basis. Remember, keep your complaints respectful when dealing with the BBB.

Oh... and one last thing about the IW forums... all the consolers jumping on the PC forums bashing us for protesting.... remind them to LEARN SOME GAME GENEOLGY. If it weren't for the PC, consoles would have never gotten Call of Duty in the first place. Never settle for less.

Now for you guys in the UK ...

The OFT is where your formal complaints will go after you make your chargeback.

A Link for the OFT : http://www.oft.gov.uk/

Please remember the OFT is not a forum, and is not a group to go into guns blazing. Be an adult about it. Keep your complaint formal, and extremely detailed to better educate them on the situation. These people aren't gamers, so help them help you by better arming them with the facts. The same goes with the BBB.