I’m now asking myself if play.com can still be trusted or more more precisely can Play’s PlayTrade scheme be trusted?

For example out of the last 10 purchases, 3 have been delivered, 1 was cancelled by me , 1 was a duplicate somehow, another was declined by the bank which isn’t really Play’s fault but all the rest have gone wrong.

Exhibit 1:  Bait and Switch

Tried to purchase a nice Qnap TS-509 Pro NAS as a good price, several sellers at similar price so choose one with lots of positive feedback but not the cheapest.

Listed as: “Brand new UK stock ready for immediate next day dispatch. Dispatched from: UK (estimated delivery 3-4 days) ”

So get the confirmation, all good.

Next day get another email with ”

Reason for Refund       : 6

Seller Note             : We apologise for any inconvenience but it has been necessary to cancel your order. This is generally due to items selling out. A full refund has been processed. Thank you”

So think, fair enough out of stock just bad luck  I’ll just order from someone else so I go back to play to find the same seller still selling the item but they have bumped the price up.

Also find that as the seller has cancelled the sale, there is no way to leave feedback so sellers can do that as much as like and customer cannot leave any feedback.

Exhibit 2:  Bait and cancel

So reordered from the next best playtrade seller for the same Qnap 509 model at before at around the same price.

All goes through as normal, confirmation emails etc.

A few days go by, status remains: still awaiting dispatch every day I check then suddenly I get a refund email which doesn’t honestly surprise me that much, however the reason for refund does.

“Reason for Refund: Buyer cancelled sale”

The excuse given by the seller after I queried just how I had cancelled sale as I actually wanted the items was:  “Due to higher demand than anticipated and the seller is unable to supply you with this item.”

Needless to say, when I looked the seller was still selling the item just at a  higher price. 

Exhibit 3:  Appears to just be plain fraud by the seller

Ordered a kinect 360 game back on the 14th of January, got the “Item posted” email the next day, after a week still no item so went to look how long items were suppose to take, 3 to 5 days and how to report missing items and also clicked on the seller to see if they had any feedback.  17 people had left feedback since the time I ordered my game and the general theme was “Item not received, would like refund” not a good sign.

For those who have never had need claim a refund from a playtrade seller, Play force you to contact the seller then wait 3 days before allowing you to file a claim.  So I fired off the required message to the seller and also sent one to play suggesting they look into the seller straight away and don’t release any money which really I would expect they should have systems in place to monitor and prevent release of fund where fraud is detected/suspected anyhow (ie. everyone who bought from the seller recently hasn’t actually received anything and is complaining ).

Play replied with 2 emails, one nearly straight away with the standard canned advice “Blah contact seller etc.” which was expected, the 2nd a day later  said the same thing just in longer form “You must first contact the seller” even with the very first line of my message to play saying I had already done that.  So apparently they don’t read the message before firing off the canned responses.

No response from Seller after 3 days up, play’s site finally allows me to file the claim (Extra option appears where you contact seller, should of taken a screenshot) now they expect us all to wait another 10 days for play to contact the seller before they will contact me to discuss a resolution.

Summary:

I expect I’ll get the money back eventually (there is always the chargeback / dispute transaction option) but customers shouldn’t have to put up with this run around when buying via an established internet retailer.

I also now remember how poor plays customer service can seem, should something go wrong.

Will I use play again?, maybe, but not from a playtrade seller unless they have a lot of perfect feedback.

Playtrade con artist it would seem

Update: 7th Feb

The refund email turned up today so I’m slightly happier. I warned Play.com of the suspected fraud by one of their playtrade sellers on 25th, refund authorised on the 7th so only 13 days to fix the issue assuming the refund turns up (would be surprised if it didn’t).

Refund email:  “We are sorry to hear that the seller in question has not despatched your order. A refund has been processed for you and will appear on your statement within 3-5 days. Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience this may have caused you and thank you for your patience and valued custom. Kind Regards, Customer Support Team PlayTrade “

So what is it like?
The Japanese voices are still there for the choosing so it plays as if you were in the Naruto anime which is a very nice thing, especially if you’re used to watching with subtitles.
If you liked the 1st one, the 2nd is very similar just with more polish and the Shippuden story arc.
It is still a good solid fighting game with lots of moves and skills to discover and master with some amazing to see moves and finishes.

I ended up getting the ps3 version over the xbox 360 version for 2 main reasons.
1) Its good to make use of the ps3 when possible  2) Performance is apparently slight more solid on the ps3 version than the xbox version based on some reports.

The improvements over the 1st one. (Good points)

• They have done away with 99% of the mini-game style missions such as “speed tree climbing”, “Dog chasing” and of course the annoying “hide and seek” missions.
• More variation in missions, such as some where you are flying and firing instead of just pure fighting.
• You don’t have to collect lots of scrolls for abilities.
• The village is smaller, so you’re not spending ages running from one bit to the other for your next mission.
• You can now explore outside the village, go visit the sand village, forrest etc.
• Added online play.  (not tried it yet as I need to get better before embarrassing myself online)

Bad points

• More an anoyance I suppose, but as with many fighting games you need to unlock characters, abilities throigh either Story or free play which as I tend to play through the story mode isn’t a problem but for someone just wantng to jump in they will initial only find a limited set of characters.

Two great games this month to play.
1st,  Assassins Creed 2, I never got around to getting the 1st Assassins creed but the 2nd one proved quite addictive.  I did worry that I might be scaring people a work with my talk of killing lots of people in renaissance Italy with hidden knives but it soon passed after showing them some of the youtube vids.
After 30-40 hours of gameplay I actually managed to get all 1000 GS for it which is a rarity for me.
360/ps3 version: good, PC version: Bad bad DRM

Mass Effect 2, I loved the 1st one so was hopeful for the 2nd and wasn’t disappointed.
The control system has been impoved and a cover system added (everything has a cover system these days), the new biotic powers are fun.   
I imported by old ME1 character for extra points and all the other lovely touches (Read about them at masseffect.wikia.com) that doing so brings.

Xbox360, PS3 and PC

The demo for Batman: Arkham Asylum is now out (PSN and XBL Marketplace) and seems enjoyable enough to think about buying when it finally comes out.   (Youtube Trailer)

Click here to view the embedded video.