Thank You SE and Good-bye

[Alhanelem]

Most all US based prepaid cards have a monthly fee

All the ones I've seen only have a fee when you buy them, and a fee when they have a balance and have been inactive for a period of time. None of the ones I've seen have a monthly fee.

[RAIST]

eh.. it varies from company to company, and region to region...that's why you really need to look into their TOS when you are shopping around. Fortunately, you avoid a lot of fees if you do stuff with them online, but when you do things through a store or ATM, it gets kinda intimidating with the US based cards:

http://www.creditcards.com/prepaid.php

Fee schedule from one of the Wal-Mart cards through Green Dot:

Standard Fees
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Reload Personalized Card at Walmart (No Check Cashing) $3.00
Family Walmart MoneyCard $3.00

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Reload Card at Green Dot Location (other than Walmart store) Varies by Retailer

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Additional Personalized Card Fee
- Standard Walmart MoneyCard $3.00
- Student Edition Walmart MoneyCard $0.00
- Family Walmart MoneyCard $0.00

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- ATM Cash Transaction - Domestic $2.00
- ATM Cash Transaction - International $2.00

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ATM Balance Inquiry $1.00

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Monthly Maintenance Fee $3.00

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Teller Cash Transaction $2.00

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Lost/Stolen Replacement Personalized Card $3.00

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Rush Delivery of Personalized Card $20.00

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Foreign Transactions (see section 18) 2%

If you load or reload at least $1,000 to your Walmart MoneyCard during a calendar month (not including a transfer from your Temporary Card to your Personalized Card), we will waive the Monthly Maintenance Fee for your Walmart MoneyCard the next calendar month.

[Delsus]

@OP link me to 3 websites by government watchdogs saying they have investigated and taken action against clickandbuy, if they were out to cause problems they will have been prosicuted time and time again. All I have found are people on forums that they have been scammed, there is no evidence that these people have just not read the terms of using clickandbuy, or replying to emails from an email address similar to clickandbuy, these are the biggest forms of complaints against companies, and they can look like a company has taken money without your permission.

As I say link me to 3 websites about an official inquiry, news or a government page doesnt matter.

http://www.jimkarpen.com/paypalfraud1.html

Oh look I found somone that had money taken from his paypal omg paypal are fraudsters too.

No matter what you look at you always have people who have thier accounts hacked and get thier accounts wiped, it doesnt matter if its paypal, clickandbuy or any company that holds financial details I could set an email account up which could be accounts@paypal.co.ca and get a program to scan ebay.ca for any sellers that use paypal and have an email on thier profile, and send an email saying they need to log into a website that resembles paypal, I would then have thier login info and could wipe thier accounts clean. People would think they have done nothing wrong and blame paypal for taking thier money, this can be done with any company.

tl;dr its easy to get login info off somone, unless I am linked to 3 websites that say clickandbuy have been prosicuted for taking money without consent you have no proof that they do it. If it was as bad as forums make out this information will be available.

[Korpg]

@RAIST, you don't have to get the card from the same country you reside. That is the whole point of getting an international card outside your country. But then again, only .001% of players would need to take this route, and I highly doubt you are one of them.

[Hashmalum]

I, too, am leaving as soon as Square-Enix refuses to continue billing my debit card. I simply refuse to go through a shady, paranoid middleman with bad customer service that will result in me being charged international banking fees. I also refuse to make Square-Enix an interest-free loan in the form of purchases of company scrip, part of which I will lose next time I stop playing.

It's unfortunate, as the dev team was starting to improve and become more player-friendly. But the business side of Square-Enix has only gotten worse with time. Verified by Visa was bad enough--besides being inconvenient and unavailable to many customers, it was a stealth assault on consumer rights*. I only played as long as I could evade VbV requirements. But this billing system change-over is just too much. I'm being asked to pay more money and go to more trouble to play a game at the same time that it is excruciatingly obvious that SE is investing less in the game to begin with--endlessly recycled zones, snail's pace of WotG roll-out, etc.--and all under a blatantly false premise of "improving security". I'm not going to take it. Give me a billing option that doesn't require purchases of funny money, isn't handled through an international vendor or one of ill repute, and doesn't require me to change bank or use VbV and I'll stick around (or come back). Otherwise, I'm gone.

*If you use a normal card and the information is stolen, you can always dispute the charges and get your money back. If you use VbV, it is assumed (incorrectly!) that the information cannot be stolen and you are responsible for any and all charges no matter what. If you use VbV and one of the merchants you use is hacked, or you are hacked, then you can potentially have thousands of dollars stolen from you with no way of even knowing what happened or of obtaining legal recourse. This is simply unacceptable.

[RAIST]

@RAIST, you don't have to get the card from the same country you reside. That is the whole point of getting an international card outside your country. But then again, only .001% of players would need to take this route, and I highly doubt you are one of them.

Didn't say you had to get it from the country you reside in. Did you even read the previous posts--especially the one about the company you linked? I thought I made it very clear that you can't readily get at the details of the cards at that site you linked--they are intentionally vague about it because (by their very own admission) it varies according to where you live.

I gave the US reference to show the variety of just what happens within ONE specific region. In case you didn't even bother to pull up that review of the US vendors, the cards on that list can have monthly fees as high as $9.95--some of which can be waived if you meet certain conditions (ie: $1000 transferred to the account for one card, and next month's fee is waived). There was only ONE card in that entire round-up (on page 3) that didn't list a potential monthly fee--$4.95 activation, get charged fees if you use a PIN/Signature to buy things (ie: use in a store) and other various fees (basically, if you only use it for online stuff, charge it by direct deposit, etc., you won't get bombarded with fees unless there is a currency exchange, which gets handled by Visa and has a 2.95% fee).

The POINT was you need to do the legwork and really go over the agreement before you sign up for any prepaid (or even a regular credit card for that matter) or you might wind up getting hit by fees you aren't expecting. That is what we are seeing from a lot of people who signed up with C&B--they weren't fully aware of what will be going on when they use the service, and are getting hit by additional costs to use them. That US review is just a convenient example to show just how much the terms can vary, as that information was readily available--unlike that site you linked where you have to contact them directly to get the terms instead of simply clicking a link to pull it up online.

And again...either way, it is still a manual process just like buying Crysta. You still have to make sure the money is sitting there in advance before the billing takes place. Which, kinda defeats one of the primary reasons behind signing up with a Credit Card in the first place--to automate the process. All of this would be virtually unnecessary for the existing client base as of July/2011 if they would just extend the direct bill with a 3DS card option through SE just like they have continued to do for just the JP region.

[Korpg]

RAIST, why are you comparing US prepaid cards when I'm talking about INTERNATIONAL prepaid cards?

Yeah, most of them will have a fee, generally a one-time charge to buy the card, but other than that, it is still a way to pay for this game. It is as simple as that, but you have to try to complicate things by putting your tinfoil hat on and ramble on about SE and them trying to take away this game from all non-JP players (as stated by your last paragraph above).

But you would just accuse me of not reading. I'm sorry if I ignore the posts that you put on your tinted glasses on just so you can see only one shade of color, instead of immersing yourself into possibilities. You like to shoot down anything that can be a solution, because you want to go back to the old system. Well, tough nuts, it isn't going back, and staying in the past will make you be left behind (pun intended).

[RAIST]

RAIST, why are you comparing US prepaid cards when I'm talking about INTERNATIONAL prepaid cards?

As I stated in those posts that you seem to not have read fully---the company you referenced provided no means to pull up the credit card agreement. You have to contact them seperately to get that information--not exactly a convenient way to shop for a payment solution.

The US site I referenced DOES give you a quick and easy way to look at the terms. It was done to illustrate the variances that can exist for prepaid cards within the same region.

Yeah, most of them will have a fee, generally a one-time charge to buy the card, but other than that, it is still a way to pay for this game. It is as simple as that, but you have to try to complicate things by putting your tinfoil hat on and ramble on about SE and them trying to take away this game from all non-JP players (as stated by your last paragraph above).

I never stated SE is "trying to take away this game from all non-JP players "--that's your conspiracy there. The fact is though, that this move IS preventing SOME players from being able to pay (can't use C&B, can't use Crysta, can't pay directly through SE anymore...so no way to play). Regardless of why it was done--the result is that this move may very well force some users out of the game because they are left with no way to pay under their exisitng circumstances, which IS easily remedied by simple extending the directpay option to all regions and not just the JP region--as it would restore their CURRENT payment method.

Post a link to a site that allows us to view the the terms of use for some international cards so people can actually see what they are getting into if they opt to go that route so people can make an informed decision. All I'm saying, is do the research first before siging up.

Just because in your particular case it may not be costing you any fees, that may not hold true for everyone, based on A.) where they live (as evidenced by the disclaimer on their own site) and B.) the exact way they may have to use it may differ from you and it may trip up fees for them. Without the FACTS (as in being able to see the agreement), you can't declare absolutely how that line of cards will work for others--much less if the particular card you have is even available to these players having issues getting a card to work (again, as evidenced by their own disclaimer, some cards may not be available in some regions).

And what of the issue of having to keep the card pre-loaded to pay your account--it's not automated at all. It's just like using Crysta--have to make sure the currency is there for each cycle, unlike using a real credit card that will process automatically each month. Based on various factors (again, unkown without seeing an actual agreement), keeping that card active and loaded MIGHT cause fees for other users because of where they live. You seem to be ignoring this fact that IS a real possibility. Without knowing the facts because there is no way to review an agreement, this is an UNKNOWN VARIABLE, and is thus something to be concerned about. Which leads us to the rest of your post....

But you would just accuse me of not reading. I'm sorry if I ignore the posts that you put on your tinted glasses on just so you can see only one shade of color, instead of immersing yourself into possibilities. You like to shoot down anything that can be a solution, because you want to go back to the old system. Well, tough nuts, it isn't going back, and staying in the past will make you be left behind (pun intended).

So... you think it's all conspiratory, and will make up your own conspiracy theories to justify glossing over/ignoring details clearly stated, based on facts found under research (or the lack of evidence, as I can't find any of the details on any of the credit cards from that site other than vague references to fees being "reasonable" and needing to contact them directly to get the details). I'm looking for facts to compare the payment options. you have provided no facts other than "It works for me". That means nothing as we know nothing about how your particular card works in regards to the options currently being compared as an option for payment to SE in each of our individual circumstances. That's not conspiratorial--it's questioning the facts in the case that have yet to be presented by you are any company you've refrerenced. Facts are facts. Lack of facts, leaves things open to speculation based on the facts that are known (reference how much agreements can vary with the cards offered in the US).

I've seen enough people get hit by unexpected fees over the years, and I have been involved with setting up these payment systems and had to double/triple check the web pages to make sure everything was disclosed to a customer before they click the "Submit" button. I've been involved with researching payment processors before putting together proposals for companies we were selling our applications to--had to take into account expected traffic flow and such to negotiate discount rates, variances in fees for handling debit vs. actual credit cards--all that jazz. Forgive me if it makes me a little bit cautious when getting into any kind of credit card agreement. I simply like to know what I'm getting into before I commit to a CONTRACT that makes me LIABLE for costs incurred to use a payment instrument before I sign that contract. So, I believe in doing a little research first rather than just blindly applying for something simply because a stranger says "It worked for me".

It's not conspiracy theory....it's experience that has taught me the meaning of "Buyer Beware".



Edit:
after a little digging, it appears the company Korpg referenced is (or was) actually US based, just happens to have a footprint in the UK as well. Company profile as published Sept. 2010:
http://www.gcoupon.com/view/internet...alebanking.com

and their WHOIS lookup at Godaddy also places them in California as of Jan. 2011:
http://who.godaddy.com/whois.aspx?do...rog_id=GoDaddy

So, it looks like Korpg infact got a prepaid CC through a US company that has a branch in the UK as well. I would hazard a guess you may find similar options with many major financial institutions. So if someone wants to look into this they might be able to do something with their own bank if it's a big chain--just make sure to get all the details up front in regards to how you intend to use it. Pay special attention to using it online with a UK based company, and just exactly what fees you might expect--won't likely be an exchange fee, but make sure to get clarification on international transaction fees in regards to C&B. Some of these cards can still trip a transaction fee depending on how the Point of Sale (POS) is set up.

[Maevia]

Hello. I live in Thailand & as of end of this month will be unable to play FFXI. Click & Buy do not accept payments from people living in South East Asia, regardless of where the bank is based. I have a UK Debit card at a UK bank, a UK residence, alll of which I typed into Click and Buy, whereupon they logged my IP as Thailand and told me "C&B products are not available in your country."

This is actually xenophobic bordering on racist. Crysta bought by anny means is not for sale in Thailand or SEA. C&B do not allow Mastercards , Visa Debit, or any other card registered in Europe etc. to be used, if they log your computer IP as being in south east asia you are blocked. I am half English/half Thai and I have a home in both countries, and bank cards in England & Thai too.

I have been paying for Final Fantasy EVERY MONTH SINCE 2003 using my Credit Cards which are registered in England at Barclays Bank. Now, Click and Buy reject my CC because my current nation of residence is Thailand.

Square Enix. I publically accuse you of racism/ xenophobia. Your long-time customer, with a job and several valid credit cards is being kicked from Final Fantasy next week because they live in South East Asia.

I dont even want to hear about 10000s of posts re: C&B and people leaving, people are posting becauuse this Click and Buy policy is utterly outrageous. If you dont want to read posts by other FFXI fans, dont go on the forum community page.

Im speaking on behalf of the many many gamers who , as of this month, are NOT ALLOWED TO PAY for Ffxi because OF THEIR HOME NATION. Thats just bigotry . /

[Korpg]

It is not SE who is being xenophobia, but you should talk to them about a different method of payment though. They still have the direct method open for JP players, I bet you if you get a JP bank account and transfer funds over there, you can pay directly to SE. But that method would be a lot of work, so I don't suggest that, unless you happen to have an alien registration card on hand, which is near impossible to get.

But instead of calling SE names and falsely accusing them of being xenophobes, you should actually contact customer service. I doubt anyone here has done that at all, they rather gripe instead.

Click and Buy doesn't accept certain countries because of banking regulations in those countries, not because they hate those countries. It is to protect the international community due to certain countries inability to check their own people for fraud and, in some cases, actually encourage theft of the international community (see: Nigeria). But that is a different topic altogether.

You really should talk to SE instead of accusing them of being racist/xenophobic. Doesn't make you look any better tbh.