My Battle with POL (UCS-1104, 60257, 5111)

[Shaskoru]

Hey, fuck you dude. I never blamed them for introducing this shit system, nor did I blame them for anything else, other than failing at customer support. After a week of being fed bullshit and runaround, you'd be livid too.

I can understand that you're extremely pissed at this point, and I would be too, but again, you're being a huge douche for no good reason. Hell, you're even being a douche to me now, and I'm actually trying to help you. You typed all of that out but did not bother to respond to my question of whether or not you called your bank, and this may all be the problem of a temporary hold that they placed on your card for one reason or another.

The only reason, and I mean ONLY reason they don't do manual information update, is because of internal policy at POL service desk. They HAVE the capability to do it, but instead of actually helping people with problems, they can increase ticket volume from shedding people off and never actually doing anything. More than likely, they're working off a performance-based contract, as opposed to time/materials. The company that's providing service desk functions for POL/SE is rated based on ticket volume and not necessarily problem resolution.

In simpler terms:

You call, get help, problem fixed - 1 ticket, problem resolved.

You call, get the shaft, call again, shaft again, chat session, no help - 3 tickets, problem unresolved.

For a performance-based contract, the latter scenario is better business sense. They take the amount of tickets they 'worked' and show that to POL/SE, "see we're doing lots of work hurr durr" and not "See, we've solved 95% of customers problems"

That's a shitload of assumptions about how their performance is assessed, and it would help if you did not lie about your issues when they're trying to find a solution for them. The first tier 2 guy may have very well provided the solution for you (again, no idea since I don't know if you called your bank).

So douche for no reason? I have plenty of reasons. That last chat session I was just fucking with the guy, it was the end of the day, a last ditch effort. He's probably showing those to his buddies and having a laugh himself.

I said that you were being a douche for no good reason. Not to mention, most customer service jobs are beyond miserable, and people who call up while acting like a douche, regardless if they have a legitimate issue, can be a huge pain in the ass.

[Raytheon]

My 'assumptions' are not far off. I've worked for enterprise level service support as a contractor for the Army, I know how the infrastructure works (DoD models their shit after commercial and private sector infrastructure, they don't do a good job at it, but that's another discussion). The 2 contract types I just listed are the most commonly used models.

You really think I'd rage all over them if I hadn't exhausted all suggestions or 'fix actions' they provided? Now THAT would be a douche move. I did everything they asked me to, and even did other things I thought might work. I used a friends prepaid Visa card that's used for online purchases, and that didn't work.

When they start suggesting you play the game on a different platform, that's when I lose it.

I'm being a douche to you, because you called me a douche in the first place, remember?

And I lied about not being able to get past the VerifiedByVisa page to try and force their hand at manual information update, because all their useless suggestions, provided by a flow-chart they're staring at, failed.

[Shaskoru]

So what did your bank say about:

Agent Reuel: Ask them specifically if the $1 authorization charges are being approved
Agent Reuel: And that Square-Enix is not flagged as a gaming/gambling institution or any similar flags that would prevent normal billing

The one dollar authorization charge would be prevented (and, in most cases, not show up as a hold to you through any online banking interface) by a temporary hold that the bank placed on your card. I've never had issues with or heard of the gaming/gambling thing, though. I'm asking since I'm fairly certain that SE has never accepted prepaid cards, or at least didn't when I tried to use one about 1-2 years ago. If it is a hold, then they couldn't manually charge the card anyway.

Do you actually have a console to test the card on through that interface? Or do you do any online shopping that required 3D Secure or Verified By Visa? If those transactions don't go through, it could just be an issue with the extra layer of security's verification process (or user error, such as wrong password or something).

The last thing I can think of, and this one is a stretch, is that it's a region problem. If you're still in the military, and you are currently stationed in a different region than the one than the one that the game is registered in, it may cause an issue. I've had friends in situations like this when they wanted to purchase some different things online or through xbox live.