My niece bought a film on my Vita

From NeoGAF:

I'd gotten in from work yesterday with the Vita and a few other things in my hand. I couldn't put them all away at once so I left the Vita on a counter, and when I came back i saw it was on the table in a different room and a purchase had been made for a film. My sister and 2 year old niece were visiting and in the 2 minutes i was gone someone must have given the Vita to her and the purchase was made. It hadn't been downloaded and it was asking me If I wanted to which I declined.

First thing I did was find out the Customer Service number to but they were out of hours (Close at 8:30PM in the UK which is ridiculously early). I called them today wanting a refund explaining the problem. They agent said he'd send a refund request through to the department, but in his experience he expects it to be declined. I mean what? I never downloaded the film, have an account that stretches back to 2008 in which I've made a good amount of purchases over the years and never needed to call customer service or ask for a refund before, and a purchase that the agent agreed was clearly made in error can't be refunded because that's their policy.

The agent accused me of lax security on my end as well and said I should have had password on checkout. Now I can accept that my niece getting into her hands was on my end (even if I left it on a high counter for 2 mins), but the extra security is something I've always wanted. I have it so a password is required on checkout for all my online purchases, be they digital on stuff like Google Play, or retailers like Amazon. It's something I've wanted to set up on the Vita for ages but could never find the option. When I asked the agent how to do it, of all things he then says he's not sure if it's possible on Vita and shows me how to do it on PS4 instead.

Again, Sony says that it is the customer's responsibility to keep the account secure, but don't give them the tools to do it.

I’m amazed that you think I’d still have a PS4 after all this

Shortly before the Watchdog piece aired, John Lappin (featured on the programme, whose story was featured here) received an email from Sony.

Dear Mr Lappin,

As you are aware, BBC Watchdog has brought your case to our attention.

We constantly strive to improve our Customer Service offering but unfortunately we sometimes get it wrong, and on this occasion, our internal processes have not met the high standards we set ourselves.  I would like to take this opportunity to apologise for the experience you had.  This is not the experience we want our customers to have.  As a result of this case, we are conducting a review of our process for reviewing and responding to Unauthorised Transaction complaints to ensure other users are not similarly affected in the future.

Having re-examined this case, I can assure you that neither PlayStation Network nor Sony Entertainment Network services were compromised to obtain access to your account.  In this instance, available evidence suggests that your account was accessed by attackers using usernames and passwords that were obtained outside of our Network. 

Sadly, criminal activity like this is an unfortunate element of modern, online life, which underlines the need for everyone to take precautions to protect their personal details online.  We recommend that our players create complex unique passwords that they have not used before, use different username/password combinations than those used for other online services, and keep a close eye on their accounts for unusual activity. 

Your SEN account Wallet has now been credited with the funds that were used to make this purchase.  If you haven't already done so, please make sure that you change your SEN account password to ensure that your account is kept secure.

We hope that the above goes someway in restoring your confidence in PlayStation.

Yours faithfully,

Jon Budden
Head of Consumer Services
Sony Computer Entertainment Europe Limited

It's a good job the BBC brought John's case to their attention, since the months of emails, calls and contact he had gone through didn't seem to.  A few things to note here:

• Sony are still implying it was John's fault that his account was stolen.  Constantly telling basic security advice like 'complex unique passwords' implies that they are assuming he wasn't.
• They have credited funds back to his account, which is useless as he no longer has a Playstation.
• John did keep a close eye on his account.  As soon as he noticed an email about the purchase he contacted Sony.

John has posted his reply to RLLMUK:

Unfortunately, no it doesn’t come anywhere near restoring my confidence. You have begrudgingly refunded me after 6 months, multiple calls and emails, tweets to various executives at Sony and a BBC investigation. I suspect had the latter not happened you’d still be ignoring me. Whilst I appreciate that my situation could well have been someone trying to trick you, you just assumed that was what I was doing. The fact that this is even possible is a flaw in your systems, not something your customers should suffer for. You cannot assume all your customers are potential fraudsters and refuse to refund them as ‘punishment’ for a crime just because your lax processes mean it’s remotely possible they may have committed it.

As you say, sadly criminal activity like this is an unfortunate element of modern online life. Perhaps then, you should provide tighter security for your customers like two factor authentication. If you don’t want to pay the cost of fraud, protect against it, don’t force your customers to pay for it.

Almost everyone I spoke to in your customer service centres, after 30 minute waits each time, was friendly and tried what they could to help but were ultimately powerless to do so thanks to your policies. Only one agent, the last I contacted was rude and told me Sony were keeping my money as a punishment.

The only person at Sony who gave me any faith in your company was the first guy I called who is in the recording you may have heard. He did what he could and clearly understood the issue and what was wrong about how it was being dealt with.

Whilst I appreciate the fact that you have refunded me, it’s useless to me now as I no longer own the machine and frankly I’m amazed that you think I’d still have a PS4 after all this. (The one in the Watchdog piece was provided by them which I reluctantly agreed to use for the show). I’d ask for it to refunded into my bank but we both know that’s not going to happen.

Thanks for emailing and good luck improving your services for others.

John

That would be a great place to leave it, but there's more.  A little investigation from a new user at RLLMUK shows that Sony (or at least its people) still don't quite get Internet security.

Sony's argument for no refunds is that all users are responsible for everything that happens to their account; and liable for any costs incurred.

This is despite the fact we still don't have adequate measures for protection - notably, two-factor authentication (that is, when you get texted a code to log in after entering your password). Steam, Origin, Google Play, iTunes, and even Xbox all do this.

However, after looking at Jon Budden's twitter (the guy who emailed Pockets and is Head of Consumer Services SCEE) - he complained a couple of months ago, on April 21st, to PayPal after his account got hacked and money spent! Unbelievable.

Maybe he should've had a stronger password. I guess it's do what we say and not as we do?

Note that this Twitter account has now been deleted.  As has his Facebook complaints about having to make five phone calls to chase something up.

Imagine making five phone calls, and sending countless emails, and complaining for six months and then still being told that a company is assuming you're a thief?  I think that may be worse.

I most certainly did not want Outlast

From AaronionRings on Eurogamer:

They essentially stole money from me by charging me for a game without my consent. My account hadn't been compromised, I'm the only one with access to both it and my console. I got an email receipt as soon as they did this and I contacted customer support within minutes to get them to refund me because I most certainly did not want Outlast and I was not willing to let them just pocket the £16.

I had to guide one person to do her job and she became rude and unwilling to help after disappearing for 10 minutes, I got someone higher up in customer support to phone me and he was rude and yelled down the phone about how PSN is infallible and how no issues of any sort can occur because they're all accounted for. He didn't let me get a word in until I insisted on being able to speak and then he outright called me a liar without using the direct words before hanging up on me. I've nothing to gain by being rude and customer support tends to only go well if you're nice so I was polite throughout. I don't get how a company like this can have such hostile customer support.

They only offered any type of compensation when they realised I wasn't going away after contacting the director of public relations (or something like that). Their apology was not to offer me a refund it was ... sending me a code for 1 month of PS Plus. Oh and they sent me a used code. Brilliant. When I sent an email about that ... no reply. My 2 follow ups, a week or so apart likewise received no reply.

About 8 months or so later I receive an email from customer support offering £10 credit as a goodwill gesture for what I had to put up with and the person who sent it just needed to phone me to confirm my details. She phoned me and surprised me by being very polite and actually putting the credit on my account. I'm convinced she was an intern made to go through old emails noone else wanted to touch.

This took around a year total to get anything sorted and I didn't even get the desired result. Simply the best one I was able to get in the end. That's unacceptable. They're an awful company if your issue isn't directly covered by a warranty and will avoid responsibility if they think they can get away with it. It's not just the UK support either, I've read a heck of a lot of similar stories from the US.

As an extra note, the only reason I didn't issue a chargeback is because I knew they'd ban my PSN account and I'd lose access to my other purchases.

We all had issues with Sony's customer service (a compilation post)

With the increased exposure due to the Watchdog programme, people all over the Internet have been commenting on the stories, adding to the initial stories from RLLMUK.  These comments generally fall into four categories:

• I got a refund so I'm all right Jack
• Something irrelevant since they haven't read the situation properly
• Backing up Sony because of some sense of company loyalty
• Other horror stories

Here are some examples of the last of these.

Agent_Llama on Eurogamer:

My other half bought a game from PSN and, somehow, they managed to charge him 12 times for it. Refused to refund it, even though it's technically impossible to buy a game more than once on PSN. Eventually managed to wrangle vouchers out of them to use on PSN, but they flat refused to refund the excess charges.

wibbl on Eurogamer:

I have been trying to chase up 10 quid that I am owed for a PayPal promotion they were running throughout March that has never been honoured. PayPal actually refunded the money I was owed, but Sony then responded to this by banning my account.

I'm now embroiled in a tedious support saga trying to both get my account re-enabled and my tenner back.

All because two multinational corporations are incapable of running a simple promotion, and both are more interested in pointing the finger at each other than actually protecting their customers.

CliffPromise:

I was the victim of fraud on PSN. £34 in FIFA points that had been bought abroad. I had to chase them for months to get it back.

loadstone007:

I bought a DLC on the wrong store, which doesn't match the version of the game I have. This means I can't use that DLC - and Sony refused to refund me. I don't get it - I'm unable to use the DLC and it was made in error. They can block the license for that DLC on my system, so why not give me my money back? I spent $10 in vain.

redcrayon

Back in October, I used the 'add £50 via paypal and we'll give you £10 extra credit' promotion. After adding the money, PSN didn't credit me. I then contacted Paypal, who blamed Sony, and then Sony, who first claimed the promotion wasn't valid (it was, it had been emailed to me earlier that week) and then blamed Paypal. It took me a total of 9 emails to five different people to get the bottom of it, and even then only after I forwarded them a copy of their own promotional email, then the receipt from my paypal transaction. It was only a tenner, but even so, their immediate answer being 'not pur fault!' when I've just given them £50 and spent hundreds with them on my PSN account over the years was disgusting. My advice is to avoid any Sony/Paypal promotions like the plague.

berelain

Sony have terrible customer service; I was on the receiving end of it after my original 'fat' PS3 had the yellow light of death, and the refurbished one they replaced it with had the same yellow light within 24 hours of me receiving it, and the refurbished one the replaced that one with also yellow lighted within another week. It took a few hours of phone calls and a lot of frustration before they eventually agreed to send me a newer model PS3 instead of another refurbished 'fat' one, which clearly had a problem. That replacement is still going strong.

psaunder

Had similar issue here in Australia. Accidently purchased a PS Vita game on the master account, instead of my kids account , so had to purchase it again (not sure which way around) , either way I asked for a refund of the game I couldn't use. After a few emails, they stopped responding to me. Pathetic customer service.

beck1110

I bought the monthly plus games through the PS Plus section of the PlayStation website and was charged for one of the games due to a mistake of their pricing. I spent weeks getting in contact with Sony and got nowhere, it was only after I contacted several gaming journalist websites and watchdogs that I very suddenly and randomly got a refund.

I was appalled at Sony's lack of customer service and lack of process for complaints. Each member of staff had a different answer and method to deal with my complaint. It took on average 4 days for an email to be responded to and nearly an hour to get through to a real person on the phone. Every one of their staff admitted the problem was with their website but would not issue a refund or even a credit voucher as it was against their policy.

Rpt81

Back when they gave out the 10% code for the Christmas outage, I accidentally ordered (via the web store) PS3 DLC where I actually wanted the PS4 version. Rang up, not expecting any joy, and was told that there was nothing that could be done about it, even though I hadn't actually downloaded the content at all.

PoliteElliot on Gamespot

In my experience Sony customer service was terrible! Purchases were made on my account fraudulently and I contacted Sony via their website. I reside in Norway and I had to email 3 different customer support addresses, all supplied by Sony, and each time I was asked to try another address! Eventually, unbelievably, I was asked to contact a Film company!!??

"Thank you for contacting Nordisk Film Distribution AS – Official distributor for Sony Computer Entertainment Europe. We will return with more information to you as soon as we receive it from SCEE."

And I never heard anything from them after this ...

Eventually I just gave up - congratulations Sony, cutting down your support costs by making it so ineffective your dissatisfied customers give up. If it was as difficult to make purchases as it is to get customer service Sony would make very little money.

I took Sony to the Small Claims Court and they settled before the court date

Taken from NeoGAF at http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=938443 ...

My PSN account got hijacked yesterday. They bought GTA5 on my account and then changed the log in details. I didn't notice this had happened till today, at which point £500 had already left my account! All on PSN games by the looks of it. I've just got off the phone to my bank and cancelled my card to prevent any more charges. Tomorrow I'm going to call Sony and get my account back using the three serial numbers I have for my PS3, PS4 and Vita ...

First update:

Thanks for your recent contact regarding your Sony Entertainment Network (SEN) account.

I understand from our contact that you did not recognise some transactions on your account, and you reported these transactions as unauthorised. As these transactions were made via our online webstore, we're unable to take action against any consoles for processing this purchase. We will however investigate any devices involved where possible and take action where appropriate, however we will be unable to share details of this.

Unfortunately, as the account holder you are responsible for all use of your SEN account, including all purchases, and agree to pay for all orders placed using your SEN account. For this reason, we cannot offer a refund for these transactions - this is outlined in our Terms of Service.

As PlayStation Network has not been compromised, I can assure you that any information stored on our servers is secure. We would highly recommend that you change your account password to re-secure your account. The billing details have already been removed from your account.

For your reference, our Terms of Service can be found here.

I hope this helps, but if you have any other questions please contact PlayStation Support using the contact details below or by replying to this e-mail. Quote reference 141127-005538 and one of our team will be happy to help.

Thank you,

Called them up and they said my only option is to get my bank to do a chargeback, which will probably lead to my account being banned and maybe my consoles too.

Looks like I'm seeking legal action; I can't let £598 slide.

Second update:

I sent a lengthy formal complaint letter to Sony a couple of weeks later explaining my issue. They finally got back to me (via phone as well); they explained how I must have misunderstood their previous contact with me (in a really condescending way) and reiterated their EULA saying how it's my responsibility to keep my account secure; as there hasn't been a breach of PSN the access of my account was my responsibility. They also stated that after goods have been transferred I am not entitled to a refund after said transaction has taken place. They also insisted that they comply 100% with trading standards regulations. I had them email me to confirm they had received my complaint.

I want to take this further if I'm honest; I'll probably evaluate my options and see what I can do through the legal system.

Third update:

Good News Everyone!

I went through the small claims court and they settled before it went to court. 

I got my money back! its ridiculous that it took 6 months to get it sorted however...

My account was blocked because I blocked a fraudulent payment

In a rare move, a proper news website has run a piece on Sony's awful customer service: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/04/02/sony_holds_gun_to_gamers_heads_over_fraud_charges/

"I was advised on the telephone by Sony support that all use, including fraudulent activities committed by an unknown third party, is my responsibility. He advised me that Sony takes no responsibility for fraudulent use of my credit card details and security rests solely with me."

A couple of points here:

• The third party is not unknown to Sony.  They will have records of the IP address used to make the purchase and the console that the game was downloaded to.
• Security cannot rest solely with the consumer since they need not be involved in any fraud - it could be the (known) third party calling Sony and asking for a password reset, and there's nothing that the consumer can do about that.

 Later in the article Sony respond, showing complete idiocy about how digital marketplaces work and consumer goodwill can be retained.

To do otherwise would create an opportunity for consumers to claim that they were not responsible for a purchase on their account, receive a refund and yet retain the content.

You could just remove the licence for that content from the account, and ban the console that was used to buy it. Then the content would not be retained, unless the fraudster wanted to only play offline for ever more.

If the reported unauthorised transactions were made on a console other than the one owned by the account holder, the person responsible must have had details of the account sign-in ID and password.

 Again, wrong.  There have been stories of people regaining access to their account by just calling Sony customer services and asking for their passwords to be reset, to a different email address.  The security breach could be entirely on Sony's side.

the nature of digital content, in that it is made available immediately and cannot be returned

It can be returned.

whether the account holder willingly gave their details to a friend/acquaintance or were tricked into providing them via phishing sites or similar, the responsibility for keeping this information secure does lie with the account holder

If Sony offered two-factor authentication on their accounts, they may be right to insist on this.  But they don't, and they have suffered multiple security breaches themselves.  Do they really need the odd £50 that is reclaimed from fraudsters instead of having a happy customer base?

I have no PS4 but I now have an expensive copy of AC: Unity

Taken from NeoGAF at http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=151818581&postcount=422 ...

My PSN account was also hacked and in the end I got the exact same formletter as shown at this post.  Thankfully I managed to go in and change my password and remove my credit card before the hijacker changed it and lock me out.

The hijacker had attached his PS4 to my account, removing my PS3, and bought the digital collectors edition of Assassins Creed Unity.  My account is Swedish and I was in the US at the time so I sent an email to them rather than calling, I could not find a number to call anyway.  After several days I got a reply stating I needed to call in because they could not handle this via email.  After more than an hour in the telephone queue on an international call very early in the morning I finally got a person to explain my situation to.

Since I did not have a PS4 at the time the guy on the phone said this was obvious fraud and they would refund me and remove the PS4 which made me happy.  After a couple of more days I got an email that I needed to send them my PS3 serial number. Not very easy to get since my PS3 was in Sweden and I was still in California.

I did send them my serial number once I'd got it and got a new reply with the formletter that they would not refund me the money.  I obviously complained but got a new mail back informing that this was a final decision and there was nothing I could do to get the money back!

I still have no PS4 but I do have very expensive version of Assassins Creed.

Sony PSN support and theft protection is absolutely horrible and I would strongly advice everyone to not have a credit card in their account.  I wonder how many of these cases happen every year.  Sony obviously gets a percentage on everything sold so they even earn money on these thefts, perhaps they care more about that then their reputation.  You would think that with the recent couple of years of Sony hacks they would be more sensitive about more bad will about their online services but apparently no.

I accidently bought PS3 DLC instead of PS4 DLC, and Sony won't swap the licences over

More of the stunning customer service we've all come to expect from Sony here.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1009180

In a nutshell: bloke's daughter buys DLC, but acidentally buys the PS3 version instead of the PS4 one on Sony's awful web store. Asks Sony if they can swap it the right one - 'Computer says no!'

Now I know that this is customer error, but any right thinking company would just revoke the license to the PS3 DLC and give them the PS4 license instead (given that they're the same price). A tiny gesture of goodwill that would cost them nothing and help prevent driving customers into the hands of competitors. But this is Sony.

A hacker stole $600 from my credit card, and Sony told me they will refund $150 at most

From Reddit:

On the morning of the 26th of February, I received an e-mail saying that the e-mail address associated with my PSN account has been changed. Having requested no such change, I began to panic and checked to see what was up. Sure enough, I could not log in to my account. It seems that someone else had managed to get in and lock the door behind them. I immediately hopped over to my bank account website and found that a total of $570 had been spent on FIFA points in FIFA '15.

I called up Sony customer support and requested that control of my account be returned to me, which they did. Sony was quite helpful, and the process was painless. I asked about having the fraudulent purchases revoked, and the Sony representative said that the charges could not be cancelled on his end, but I could cancel the charges at my bank by filing a fraudulent purchase claim and I should not be charged for those purchases.

Fair enough. I did as I was instructed and the total amount was returned to my bank account. I was hoping that would be the end of the story.

Today I found that my PSN account had been blocked or temporarily suspended. Upon calling customer support and speaking with two different people, I found that Sony is locking me out of my account until the full amount, $570, has been paid.

I explained that this was a fraudulent purchase made by someone who had hacked into my account. I had never given my username or password to anyone. They did not budge on their position, though. Sony is holding my account hostage until I pay their ransom.

I have been a member of PlayStation Network for years, and I have made hundreds of dollars of purchases over the PlayStation Network, and Sony is locking me out of all of the digital content that I have earned. The only other option I have is to start a new account, which essentially mean surrendering all of the digital content (including 300+ full games) that I have paid for over the years, not to mention my still-active PS+ membership. On top of that, opening a new account means resetting all of my save games, trophies, DLC.

I don't know what to do anymore. I have tried elevating this issue as high as I can, but Sony is still denying me access to the content that I have purchased from them. I just wanted to share my experience in case anyone else has been similarly extorted by one of the major corporations.
I am a graduate student who doesn't have an extra $600 to throw at this problem to make it go away. My PlayStation systems have been great comforts during my times of stress. I am devastated that these have been taken away from me by a company that I have supported for years.

[Note: being Reddit, this has been picked up by a couple of other website - see http://consumerist.com/2015/03/12/playstation-network-users-report-hacked-accounts-terrible-options-from-sony/ and http://www.bitterwallet.com/playstation-doesnt-do-much-for-you-if-youve-been-hacked/84008. The user got it resolved in the end, after weeks of complaining and discussions with the legal teams.  This is not something paying customers should have to go through!]

Someone else preordered a game and I can't cancel it

I don't even own a Playstation, I have a Sony TV and my 9 year old son has a PSVita on child account under my parent account.

In October last, I receive an email thanking me for my Purchase of Middle-Earth™: Shadow of Mordor™ Legion Edition (Full Game) £54.99 for the PlayStation, a game that is not even out, it's was not released for another 6 weeks, so a pre-order, I obviously did not make this purchase, so I logged straight into SEN, removed my payment details and update my password, then I immediately contacted SEN, by both email and telephone, I was told it would be sorted within 5 days, it took them almost 6 weeks to come back to tell me to go take a jump as they don't do refunds, case closed.

I then spent days and days trying to speak to someone who was able to communicate without the assistance of scripts, I tried social media, I even tried Sony UK but they completely disown SEN, not wanting to know. Eventually I was left with no choice but to contact my Bank and the upshot was that after investigating Visa confirmed I was protected as UK Consumer and they refunded me.

Fast forward to last week, account banned! At first I was not bothered as I only have the TV and I am content that after being treated like this I will never buy another Sony Product again, however I have now discovered that my Son has no access to the games he had downloaded via (Codes from Amazon) etc. So I telephone them (yet again) to basically be told Pay Up the £54.99 or lose the lot, talk about Blackmail and Bullying, I was calm and polite and asked the guy to transfer me to a someone who could hopefully help me, he refused and simply read from his script. I then said I was not satisfied and I wanted assistance to which he said he was then terminating the call, which he did.

I just can't fathom Sony's Business Plan, we are middle earning household, we've bought a number of Sony Products over the years, one being a new TV just a few months ago, I was genuinely going to buy another, I know it's easy to say that to add gravity to it but we were actually in Curry's last November looking at replacing our Main TV with a Sony and my wife said lets wait until this current issue with SEN is resolved at the time I was disappointed but now obviously not, what kind of business has a plan that alienates customers like this, with Bully Boy Tactics! No one wins!

Someone else bought a game on my account

On 5th December I had a friend round and we were playing Mario Kart on the Wii U, a fantastic and underrated console. In between races I checked my email and found a message from Sony thanking me for my purchase of Shadow of Mordor on the PS3. That’s strange, I thought, I don’t own a PS3, and I hate Lord of the Rings. After a 30 minute wait I eventually spoke to someone at Sony who told me that they’d look into it. Okay, I said, what about this PS3 that’s connected to my account, should I worry about that? No, no, I was told, I needed to leave that there so they could investigate it. I was asked for my PS4’s serial number and was told that IP addresses would be checked. The illicit purchase was made with funds I had in my account from prepaid cards rather than through my bank so I wasn’t too worried and felt confident it would all be resolved soon.

A week later I’d heard nothing so called Sony to ask how things were going. I was told they were looking into it and I should hear back soon. Not the most dynamic response to fraud, I thought, but never mind, no bank cards were involved and there was no more stored credit to steal so I wasn’t too concerned. A few days after this I received an email about my enquiry. It all started off fairly well, confirming the transactions had taken place on a different console and that appropriate action had been taken, but then it went on to say that unfortunately they can only offer refunds for faulty software. That can’t be right, I thought, that would mean that as long as the game the hacker bought worked okay, Sony were fine with it.

I called again and spoke to a helpful representative who seemed to agree with me that it was all a little odd and put me on hold, sounding confident it was a simple mistake that he’d put right. A few moments later he returned with a defeated tone to his voice and pointed out to me, in a roundabout way, that Sony will not refund me because I might be lying. He explained that I could have provided my log in details to a friend so that they could buy the game and then I’d call to get the money back resulting in a free game. It’s true, that’s certainly possible, but why do that when the offending console gets banned? It seems a little pointless. I pointed out now that the PS3 was actually showing as still active on my account but was assured it’s not. All its privileges had been revoked, apparently and access to any downloaded games would be denied. As I write, I can still see it as active on my account.

Okay, I said, I can understand your point. The scenario Sony describe is certainly a possibility but it’s not the case here. What can I do to prove it? I provided my serial number and they said they’d check IPs, neither of which prove my innocence but if they were always going to assume I was lying why bother with the charade of an investigation and ask for those details anyway? What more can I do I asked? Well, nothing came the reply. This is a problem with Sony’s set-up, not any fault of mine. If their system is open to such abuse that’s their problem, not one that we as customers should have to pay for, let alone be effectively accused of fraud over when we are in fact the victims. If you’re finding any of this hard to believe, I recorded the call. You can listen here

https://soundcloud.com/john-lappin/sony-fraud-call

The guy on the phone clearly couldn’t believe what he was being made to say to me so I let him go, there was nothing he could do. The only route open to me now was an official complaint, which I made. I got this back, I’m sure you’ll agree, it fully explains the reasons behind their actions.

Thanks for your recent email regarding your PlayStaition (sic) Network Account.

Whilst I understand that this is not the outcome you had sought, I can confirm that this is our final position on this matter.

Thank you,

Tyree
Playstation Support”

No, thank you Tyree, you’ve been most helpful. What’s important to understand here is that Sony say they have banned the offending console and revoked access to the game. It was a digital download, no physical product was involved so they have not lost anything. What has happened to the £40? The fraudster no longer has the game, I no longer have my money. Sony are still £40 up on the deal and they refuse to give it back. The saga continues. Be aware.

I bought a PS4 game while playing on my PS3

OK, most of you will find this funny (I know I would), I'm fuming.

Playing Dark Souls 2 on the PS3 with my PS4 controller, I leave my PS4 on as it's downloading updates.  Turns out the controller can control both at the same time.  So my inputs on Dark Souls buy me FIFA on PS4 (a game I already own) and British Cop skin pack (I don't even know what this is). Get an email on my tablet telling me so.

Ring PSN and straight away the guy is just saying "terms of use", "no refunds" and so on. £56.68 has been charged to my card.  Ask to speak to his superior and they won't come on the phone. He then tells me support staff have said it's not possible to control two devices at once. He doesn't seem to believe me.

Half of me wants to trade this in for an Xbox with Titanfall right now.

16/3/2104

Having spoken to a manager of a support team, as well as sending an email that only got a stock response, I was offered the following info by a helpful forum member:

Well Mr Andy Barker is the current Director of Sony PlayStation Customer Services. His e-mail, which will in all likelihood just go to his pa, but its worth a shot is andy_barker@scee.net.

You have my sympathies, Timmo, dealing with Sony customer support. It took me over a month to get them to replace my Dualshock 4 because it just refused to charge any way I tried. I was at the point of emailing this chap when I finally got one through the post from them. So yeah, you will probably need to keep at them a while.

So I wrote to Andy Barker yesterday:

Hi Andy,

I'm writing to you directly hoping you can help me here. I've used Sony for many years and as an early adopter of PS4 I have generally found your service outstanding.  However in the last couple of days I have become very disappointed and even angered with the treatment I've received. It has left me disillusioned with Sony.

Last night I set my PS4 to download some updates, before plugging the new controller into my PS3 to play Dark Souls 2 on it.  Twenty minutes later I receive an email on my tablet thanking me for paying £56.68 for two items. One some DLC for a game I don't own, the other FIFA 14, a game I already own on disc!  Shocked, I switched my TV over to my PS4 to discover the controller had been active on both consoles simultaneously, and my inputs had caused it to make the purchases without my knowing!

I instantly called your support line but frankly, although I wasn't called a liar directly, I was told that what had just happened is impossible and the controller cannot control both devices. This was obviously very upsetting for me as I do not appreciate the implication attached to this.  Furthermore I was told that I would not be getting a refund!

This morning I had a call from another member of your support staff (I had requested an escalation) and he also told me a refund wouldn't be coming. He went on to say that such refunds are in fact impossible for digital content. I asked for it to be escalated again but my request was dismissed.

Following the call I looked online to easily find examples of refunds Sony had given for online purchases, showing that either the support manager was misinformed or not being truthful with me.  This is why I write to you now, as I feel Sony have let me down hugely here. Considering the years of loyalty I have had with your company I find the way I have been treated extremely disappointing and disrespectful.

17/3/2014

Reply to my Andy Barker email - can't tell if automated or not, we'll see what happens anyway.

Hi Tim,

Thanks for your e-mail regarding your Sony Entertainment Network account which has been received in our Head Office.

I can advise that the transactions in question are being looked into by the appropriate team and we will provide you with any updates as soon as we can. Thanks for your patience in this matter.

Should you have any further queries, please contact PlayStation Support on 0844 736 0595 quoting reference NNNNNNNNNN where a member of our team will be happy to help.

20/3/2014

Official response:

Tim,

Thanks for you e-mail regarding purchases made on your PlayStation 4 (PS4).

The Dualshock 4 controller will work with Dark Souls 2 for the PlayStation 3 but officially it is designed for use with PS4 so it does remain remotely connected to the PS4 if the device is switched on.

In accordance with our Terms of Service customers have no right to cancel or to a cooling off period for purchases of Sony Entertainment Network wallet funds or Services. Digital services cannot be returned to us (and, in some cases, can be accessed even if the purchase is refunded) and therefore we are unable to offer refunds for PlayStation Store or other SEN commerce interfaces transactions unless the content is faulty or incorrectly advertised.

For your reference, our Terms of Service can be found here.

Therefore I regret that we are unable to provide you with a refund for the content that has been purchased. Should you have any further queries, please call PlayStation Support on 0844 736 0595, quoting reference *********, where one of our team will be happy to help you. Youll find our opening times below, however you might find it easier to speak to our team during our quieter period between 11:00 and 15:00. Calls to PlayStation Support cost 4p per minute from a BT land line however calls from other providers and mobile operators may vary.

So this is their official response. Which I think is terrible. What next?

Thing is, I'm starting to lose the will now. I've already spent hours of energy on this, more than it's worth. I'll probably write one great big email containing everything and send it to all the major gaming sites, and if any run with it, great. If they don't I can't be bothered anymore, life's too short. You win, Sony. You've made my decision on whether to get a 3DS or a Vita a lot easier, anyway. Enjoy your £56.