Banned for payment fraud (045) - Thanks NCSoft!

Hello all ,

on May 2nd 2010 I bought my 9th character slot via Paypal, and shortly after the transaction Paypal limited my Account, in fear of a 3rd party intrusion. After restoring my account to normal again by changing password/security questions and transferring money from my bank account to my paypal account (thus proving that I am the rightful owner), I logged into my Guild Wars account and was greeted with payment fraud/permanent ban, which not only is very wrong but also downright sad.

First things first. I bought the slot, paid with paypal, paypal mails back and states possible 3rd party intrusion. I mail NCsoft and ask if there was an security issue. They say they'll contact me about it (see below for GM Mario) but instead ban me. I write them back (see below again for GM Thomas).

My Paypal Account shows -8,99€, meaning that the money I paid for this character slot is NOT in my hands. A payment fraud/scam would mean that I would still have the money and also the product - aka scam.

Where in this world do you see a scammer/fraud where the scammer/thief actually PAYS for it? I invested lots of money on this account and thousands of hours (as most of you) playing my toons. And now NCSoft tells me I cheated them.

It might sound strange but I am more angry about the fact that I am considered a thief/bandit than my account having been banned.

I emailed the support but all these incompetent people say is that my payment has been paid back. Thanks for that. Why actually? Because Paypal considered the transaction very insecure you ban ME?

regards

P.S.: Please don't consider this as a rant, I just don't know what to do now. I want my account back. As you can see it's 5 years old by now. This is a long time. Yes, I can get over it, life goes on etc. but would you get over it still knowing that you have been banned for nothing you committed? Would you?

Looks like you're in for a long battle of emails back and forth between NCShit Support and Paypal. Have fun.

Hi Theocrat,

what should I actually tell Paypal besides that they can check the transaction history and see that I bought other things from the NCSoft store like

a) other character slots
b) those /bonus items (rhino etc..)
c) Eye of the North for two accounts (mine and my now ex-girlfriend's )

without any problem?

I explained the whole situation to NCSoft yet they come up with following answers. Sorry, they are in German even though I am writing all my support issues both in English and German. Yes, I write in two languages so that anyone over there can understand the issue.

That Senior Account Support Representative never contacted me. Never. Instead he obviously banned me. Nice move, Super Mario!

Then yesterday night a wrote a new support ticket because I can't log into my NCSoft Account anymore and what I got was:

Thanks for the payback Thomas! And thanks for telling me I should not hesitate to contact support regarding this issue. Much appreciated. What the hell?

I've never had this particular issue before, but I can give you a rough idea of what I think is the proper course of action at this point. Ignore NCSoft Support, they have always been and always will be trash. Personally, I would tell Paypal that NCSoft was trying to dupe me, and to reverse the charges if possible. If Paypal tells you to bugger off, go to your bank and see what they can do about it. Beyond that, I dunno.

Theocrat,

I don't care about the money. I don't want it back. Money is not a problem to me. I want the account restored but much much more important not be considered a thief again by a lousy company whose support is beyond flawed.

I wish Regina or somebody else would read this but I am sure they don't care. It's just one customer and since there are no monthly fees there's no benefit if I play or not.

I thought about the following.

a) Contact Paypal and refer to transaction history and tell them that NCSoft is secure and trustable. Yes, pretty ironic.

b) Retell NCSoft the process that caused all this until Super Mario and Thomas become twin parrots. After Paypal enables whatever channel they blocked towards NCSoft, NCSoft might probably understand.

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/User_...Support_Issues

Not sure how much good it'll do, but try posting your issue there and Gaile might take a look at it.

Call NCSoft.

Same thing happened to one of my guildies. Verdict overturned in a day.

If someone hacks to inactive account on pay 2 play scheme, he usually reactivates with with stolen credit card or paypal account.

CC company/paypal/original owner then notice this stuff happening, they attempt to change back and mmo account gets banned because that is what they do when changebacks happen.

Every so often, some kid learns about chargbacks and tries to get stuff for free. MMO companies do not really like that and they ban people who try it.

Chances are, paypal tried to changeback ncsoft because it thought something shady was going on and ncsoft thought you are some kid that thought that if he gets charslot and then changebacks, he will get free charslot.

As for money missing. Paypal has tendencies withhold money that were used in shady operations. You are out of buck, ncsoft is out of buck too (and unlikely to unban you) and paypal has buck extra they can use for investment or just to generate interest.

Just ... do not use paypal. Anymore. Ever. Get proper CC at proper bank that has to follow at least some laws.

I dont use paypal so im only guessing - could be when paypal gave the alert to you it also contacted ncsoft with a warning to which they acted upon.
Being banned for a short while whilst things are sorted shouldnt be a real issue - would you rather nc did nothing and say for eg it was a fraud attempt to which you had no idea of and you lose the money and possibly your paypal details and maybe even your gw account via a hacker.
Yes it may be OTT what happened but some security measures are not always flawless - we moan when theres no security and moan more when the security goes a bit haywire.

How about this for an idea

Everyone who has been banned perma banned threatened with banning or is just bored, gets together and starts a class action suit against ncsoft.

If they win they go off and lead happy lives, if they lose they spend the next 30 years paying off their legal costs.

Either way they don't bother us.

Look its not that I am unsympathetic but there just isn't anything worthwhile in all this for any of us.
All it does is cause paranoia where we all think we are next or we think your all lying.

We can never know the truth of the matter or do anything useful to help.]
There is also nothing useful to be learned from this post or all the others about account banning, since our information is too limited to form an opinion.

there are 3 choices really appeal to ncsoft, sue them or walk away.

@ Gremlin, my example perfectly example that anyone CAN be next. Anet/NCSoft can, and apperently will ban people at random.

Be it because their GM's have nothing better to do, or because they're frustrated they're not capable of doing anything about real issues, or maybe even because they get a one day learning course prior to starting on that job teaching them how to squeeze more money out of customers..

The intire point of a public forum is for everyone to do it's say. If only stuff of "value" was to be posted, this forum would shrink by 99%.

He made a thread explaining NCSoft banned him, for what he says, a bs reason. It's not a question of him telling the truth or not, it's a question of discussing the information that's available for us at this time.

Knowing Anet did this before (I remember a handfull of other threads about people getting perma banned for this shit, aswell as a personal friend, but he managed to get his account back), it's pretty safe to assume he isn't lying.

I agree with you and yes people should be made aware if there is a problem but is the place to do it here.

Ncsoft and anet do not post any replies here and do not put their side of the argument, all we ever get is a continuous stream of examples where innocent players have been punished for accidentally breaking the rules or just being wrongly accused.

We then get a pile of replies all following the same format.
1 you lied
2 they did it to me too
3 so what we cannot do anything about it.

Never once has anyone come up with anything resembling a solution, we are all being asked to form an opinion or take action based on one side of a story.
To that end I ask does the posting of these messages here do anything productive, other than to make us distrust the people running the game.

Distrusting them without any real evidence I might add, please don't now post hundreds of screen-shots and recordings to prove your point because it doesn't help or prove anything.

Personally I wouldn't ban anyone because it achieves nothing they can always get a new account for a few pounds using another net id.

Just delete all the characters and storage effectively rolling them back to day one and let them play.

Please admins do we have to have yet another whine about NCsoft banned me for no legitmate reason thread again? Please close...thank you. He should deal with NCsoft as Guru and us can't do a damn thing about it.

It happened to me when I paid using my card through the GWShop, not the ANet Shop. I paid, got the item, used the item, and then a day later it was banned. I contacted support and they basically ended up telling me that they accidentally flagged me for fraud, that my account CD-keys were lost and that my account didn't exist any more. Fortunately they did manage to get it going again by linking it to new CD-Keys, however the fact that I didn't get anything besides a "sorry, please contact us if anything else happens" really pissed me off.

Although, every time I buy makeover credits they are not automatically sent to my account, instead I have to go through support each time I do to actually get them, which takes about 2 or 3 days anyway.

Hey guys,

I just came here for advice and I got it. That's all. I don't want to read anything about me possibly being a liar or whiney little brat that probably deserved it because it's very wrong. There were plenty of people last year that got banned wrongly by buying through the NCSoft store, and this year due to Aion, so keep any accusations to yourself.

Thanks for the link, lemming. I'll contact her tonight.

@zwei2stein

Yes, I know about chargeback losers that hurt companies who deal with virtual items like cd-keys, pin codes for PSN/Xbox Live etc. Actually this same kind of thing happened to a friend who bought a key on g2play and when paypal froze the amount and did not give it to g2play they accused him of fraud. I never cared much by this as I have premium membership there. Well, now this happened to me too.

Anyway, I'll be careful with paypal and pay with CC the next time. Also just because my bank support is way better.

I've contacted NCSoft again with full transaction details and this GM Thomas seems to understand now.

There are tons of other threads for you to read you troll.

Thread can be closed. Thanks again everybody.