SE's policy circle :(

[biscuitsngravy]

I'm not sure if any of you remember me, but not too long ago I was here talking about how SE refuses to return my account and such. Anyway I just thought this was alittle too much to not share.

This is one of the first email's received from SE after sending in my notary form

Dear Customer,

We appreciate your patience while we continued to investigate your compromised account claim. At this time, due to the information you have provided us, we are able to verify that you are the original registrant of the account in question. Currently, the account in question is set to a ?Banned? status and will remain that way because the last login date provided surpasses the timeframe we are able to review any sort of login hist
me: ory. We apologize for the continued length of time of our investigation and would like to assure you that we did everything possible to resolve this situation for you as quick as possible. Thank you for your understanding in this matter.

As you can see it states they were able to verify me as the original owner of the account. However it was set to a banned status and they were unable to review logs to prove I was compromised.

After that I went through horrific effort to find some way to prove that my account was compromised. Finally I gave up and just decided to contact the BBB and see what they would do. I filled out my complaint which went something like this (didn't save it and don't feel like going to find it)

"I have been with this company for 4 years now and my account was compromised. SE has refused to properly investigate my account due to the time frame of being compromised. I feel if they were to properly investigate they would find sufficient evidence to prove my account was compromised by a third party"

Basically what happened was SE said they couldn't investigate my account because of the date provided. However it usually takes more than a month or so for SE to contact someone whose account was compromised. After I sent in my notary form I received an email saying they were unable to prove it was compromised just after 3 days. This is because they saw the date and said "Oh well can't do anything bai" and threw it away. Which isn't a proper investigation. Even if they couldn't investigate it to my specific date I think something else should have been done.

So after a week the BBB contacted me and told me that SE would contact me directly. Four days later I receive this email from the BBB forwarded from SE.

Unfortunately we are unable to discuss the specifics of any investigation however we do everything we can to verify the ownership of an account. The time frame of when a user last logged in is not an issue to verify ownership however. This customer is invited to contact PlayOnline and discuss this policy further, but in order to discuss account details we will not be able to proceed without proper verification. We highly recommend this customer contact us at the PlayOnline information center between the hours of 9am and 6pm (PST). This matter can be handled via phone or chat. Management has been alerted of this issue, and our deepest apologies go to this customer for any frustration they have experienced.
Initial Response Summary
Unfortunately we are unable to discuss the specifics of any investigation however we do everything we can to verify the ownership of an account.

I just don't know what to make out of this. It honestly is just a big slap in the face for me. I've heard stories about other people's customer service they've worked for and how they continuously hassle the customer to get out of doing what they should have done from the start.

For anyone who doesn't understand. SE told me in the beginning I was verified as the original owner. In the end they told me they did everything possible to verify I was the original owner and that I should contact them via POL center and start the whole process over again. The only good thing I see in this is that they have notified management of this problem and MAYBE they'll be abit more helpful considering the BBB got involved.

I was told directly by the POL support center's manager to not call back anymore about my account as it has been banned and will not be lifted for any reason. The direct quote was

A notification will be placed on your account informing all representatives that you have been informed of the results of this issue and that there is nothing else to be done.

[Lampoon]

I think you misconstrued what they were trying to tell you. From what I read it seems they found out that account was banned prior to your hack claim. Meaning, it was banned while in you were controlling it.

Still, the way it was handled, they could have taken more time to explain the situation. My current asignment with the company I work with, is customer service analyst and more and more I see evidence that no matter which company hires us, no matter the stance on "treating cutomer right" people behind the actual phones are complete and utter miserable people who'd rather tell you to go fuck yourself than take a minute and help you with your issue (managers and supervisors included).

[biscuitsngravy]

The account was banned while it was compromised. However it was compromised before the Compromised Account policy was active. This policy basically enabled them to store your IP log each time you log on. Since my account was gone before this policy they have no record of my IP on file. So in the eyes of SE only 1 person has been playing the account since the policy was enabled and therefor only 1 IP is on file which is the third party.

The way SE proves your account was compromised is very stupid I have documents of a representative telling me how but I don't feel like posting. I hope you will just trust me and if not I will bring them out.

They look at the IP logs of the account that was 'compromised' Each time you log on your account your IP is logged. So when SE 'investigates' they just look at the IP logs. If IP A logs on every day for a year and then suddenly IP B logs on and then IP A isn't seen since then they say "oh well that must be a third party"

[Seibar]

lol thats an awesome way to investigate! too bad my account gets logged in from california and maryland on the regular... so i guess i already look hacked!

I guess it makes sense though and thats the easiest thing to do though, for most people it would work fine. You just got hacked abit too early for the new rules >.<
Good luck to you.

[Linktri]

Nothing new here. Squeenix's customer service is fucking atrocious. I can only hope that they get the plague.

[Melios]

Nothing new here. Squeenix's customer service is fucking atrocious. I can only hope that they get the plague.

I've heard similar arguments about virtually every other MMO game company.

[Halon50]

Don't tell anyone, but Square-Enix's NA customer support center is actually hosted by SOE here in San Diego.


Shhhh!

[Silenka]

Nothing new here. Squeenix's customer service is fucking atrocious. I can only hope that they get the plague.

I have it on good faith that 90% of the employees at SE are lazy and don't do their jobs right anyway so yeah, it's no surprise. I wonder if any of them have trouble sleeping at night knowing how they're dicking people out of years of hard work though.

[Jotaru]

Blizzard customer service is actually quite amazing, I had a compromised account issue I took up with them for WoW, and had the account back in about 10 minutes. Characters / items were missing, and we went on an emailing spree back and forth for about a week clarifying details and sorting things out- they actually read my emails, and send out an actual email in return... its kinda comforting knowing that someone ACTUALLY UNDERSTANDS your specific situation, and is doing whatever they can to fix that particular problem, rather than looking through a textbook and finding the appropriate answer (which, with SE, is usually 'Sorry, we can't do anything')... Customer service that can't actually SERVICE THEIR CUSTOMERS is pointless.

For reference, a response to one of my emails:

Thank you for your follow-up email.

I have looked over some of these previous emails and I'm a bit confused as to the account issue. The characters appear to be on the Archimonde realm on your ***** account, not another account. Unfortunately it appears that our Account Administration Department was unable to move them back to their previous realm of Dunemaul, but you are welcome to utilize a paid character transfer to move them back from Archimonde on your account to Dunemaul on your account. If they aren't visible on Archimonde for some reason please try creating a level 1 character on Archimonde and logging into them and back out, this should refresh the page manually. Also keep in mind it may not show (2) on Archimonde on your realm selection screen, you may need to just visit that realm page to see the characters.

Should you require further assistance, please submit another help request the next time you are online. We hope you continue to enjoy your experience in World of Warcraft!

They also mention 'hit us up!" if I need more help, and smiley faces. Bitches love smiley faces. As do I.

[Shuemue]

Doesn't that also show Blizzard suck? Looks like your compromised account got transferred and they were forcing you to pay to move it back?

Oh and another reason Blizzard suck, I tried to upgrade to WotLK online, their system is broken and said email them, so I emailed and explained that I was unable to obtain a retail box at that time, and their response? Go buy a retail box.

[Ziero]

....that's a horrible example of "good" customer service seeing as the hacker moved your character and YOU have to pay to move it back. But apparently, just because they added a little yellow happy face to their e-mail telling you to go f yourself, they're not souless money grubbing monsters like SE.

[Airenn]

....that's a horrible example of "good" customer service seeing as the hacker moved your character and YOU have to pay to move it back. But apparently, just because they added a little yellow happy face to their e-mail telling you to go f yourself, they're not souless money grubbing monsters like SE.

I'm not rich but I'd gladly pay for a quick reply and solution to SE if they got back to me in that timely a manner. -_-