BS - (resolved)

[bongodriver]

Originally Posted by banned

Oh Christ, he's back.

You going to throw another jealous rage?

[Bokononist]

Originally Posted by ATAG_Snapper

A simple "Here ya go" from Disastersoft would've bought them incredible good will. Sure, they're under no obligation to replace a lost product, so they didn't. Good for them. But it's already cost them more than the 5 minutes it would take to pull up an account, verify the purchase, and simply send a link to download.

Yes, I've got "Wick vs Dundas"; it's an excellent product. But I'm done with future purchases from them. They clearly have enough customers as it is.

Yes indeed, I think they've lost more revenue in lost sales due to this little episode than they ever would from offering repeat downloads for legitimate customers. Shame really as I was intending to buy this myself.
Not to mention reproducing the ops email to try to defend themselves.
Poor show all round.

[Matt255]

Originally Posted by DarkKiller

I hardly belive that. Lets take for example a game like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (I don't like the game but it's okay for my example). I guess the game is 7 gb large. Lets say in my whole life time I would download it 10 times which generates 70 gb of traffic. 30% of 49.99€ is 15€. So you say that steam pays 0.21€ per gb of traffic? Either the managment of Steam is very stupid or I am pretty bad informed about very high traffic prices in the US or you don't have any idea what you are talking about.

Well, the 30% seems to be commonly spread around. Wether or not it's true is probably a different thing, but it's probably a good average.

You might download MW3 10 times, i highly doubt it's the average. I don't think i downloaded any game i have on steam more than 5 times, most games probably just once or twice. And very few were in the ~5 GB range.

And i don't think that Valve pays the same for a GB of traffic as the average user does.

But even if 30% would be too low for Steam to make profit, as you are suggesting, it shows relatively clearly that Desastersoft has a point in not supplying re-downloads for free. Which kind of proves, that he does know what he's talking about.

Yes indeed, I think they've lost more revenue in lost sales due to this little episode than they ever would from offering repeat downloads for legitimate customers.

Actually, this topic made me visit Desastersofts website for the first time. And i'm a bit tempted to order now, to be honest (and make a backup ).

If i wouldn't order anything from a developer that shows lacking customer support or has a bad reputation, i don't think i would've ordered anything at all in the past few years. Certainly not this flightsim.

[icarus]

I sent a nice polite email requesting one extra download in order to make a backup with my receipt of purchase, because I was not aware that there would be only one download allowed. I will report back on the results.

[svend]

I cant se why anyone interested in their software shouldnt buy from them. Yes some of us forgot to do a backup and so what I mailed them politely and explained to see if there where any light at the end of the tunnel (it aint their fault). If you dont try you will never know. I can accept the loss, lol and no rant from me - if I fail ok so what They could change their mind, who knowa

[Madfish]

Originally Posted by desastersoft

Sie mutmaßen ziemlich viel ohne den Sachverhalt auch nur im entferntesten zu kennen. Da Sie ja Deutsch sprechen einmal klipp und klar: Wir bieten keinen Steam Service an. Das bedeutet, das der Kunde ab Auslieferung des Downloads selbst für den Verbleib und Umgang verantwortlich ist. Sollte so ein Service gewünscht werden, sprich die ständige Wiederabrufbarkeit, dann wäre das, genau wie bei Steam und anderen Anbietern, kostenpflichtig. Falls Sie nun argumentieren, Steam würde nichts kosten, so täuschen Sie sich gewaltig. Dieser Service macht bei Steam etwa 30 % der Kosten für die Anbieter aus. Der Kunde zahlt das über den Preis bei Steam mit beim Kauf von Software.
Die Downloads die wir für andere Kunden wieder freigeschaltet haben, waren unmittelbar nach dem Kauf, nicht 4 Monate später.

Gruß
Thomas

You are kidding right? Do you even know anything about game distribution? 30% of what? Costs for the publishers? Nonsense. 25% at max and I already am an enemy of steam because that's WAY too much for the service.
If you can't handle your traffic you could've just asked. I would have even went so far and helped you. Not anymore though.

On top of that most Steam games deliver 10x their size in updates alone. How many updates are you pushing out? And if you do - would that count as an re-download or do your clients have to purchase again just to be able to access a patch?

What's even more scary: all this rubbish you're saying isn't even part of your TOS (AGB). I couldn't even find any TOS on english either although your shop clearly has an english frontend for international customers AND you ship to them.
Yet you expect everyone to be professional while you and your service clearly aren't...?

Even more sad: I just went to your page and checked the downloadable editions and there is NO word about the one time download policy! There's just a box about shipping although it's not even boxed content! Very professional... So basically 90% of your customers don't even know they only get one single download... Or do you expect them to crawl through your german (and useless) AGB with a translator?


Instead of finding excuses you could've just said: whatever, we'll let him re-download and we will work on our shop to make clear that every purchase needs to be backed up as it is just a single download and the link will not work anymore when accessed once.
You could've also said that you will work on your content platform in general and eventually even just try to evaluate if PATCHES and RE-DOWNLOADS can be offered to your CLIENTS.
I am certain that even if you would've said it costs like 50c or a € to re-download the stuff people would've understood. But this? This is just insane. It's worthless bits and bytes - and traffic costs pennies, not diamonds.


Your logic is just poor. I won't even begin to discuss the countless possibilities and eventualities why your model can and will go wrong for many honest customers. But I guarantee you, I will never ever recommend buying from you to anyone in my whole life. Because the way you handled this incident is alarming and it reeks of excuses instead of business attitude.


And on a sidenote: Yes, I'm german. But this is an international community and your shop is also partly english. My english certainly isn't perfect but it's a matter of respect (and board rules) to talk English on an international board even if it's not your major language.

[skarden]

Yeah I too think that they've handled this quiet poorly , don't get me wrong I have one of their products and love it, although I've only played it a little due to being away on work most of the year.

Before my current job I worked in retail for a family owned music shop ( guitars, recording gear etc. ) and they definitely didn't work on a "the customer is always right" policy, rather they worked on a customer by customer basis and they trusted and allowed the employees to do what we felt was best in each case, this single rule earned the shop a very good reputation amongst its customer base, it wasn't uncommon to have someone come in with say a newish guitar lead that had stopped working, if they brought in a receipt and presented themselves in a polite manner, we would normally give them a new lead at no cost even if we couldn't recoup the cost from the supplier, as I said before this kind of thing earned us a very loyal fan base that often brought in friends n such into the shop to buy gear as a result.

As has been stated by a few here this kind of behavior by Desastersoft would have earned them a very loyal customer, it sounds like the first few emails the OP polite and courteous and he gave them no real reason to say no since he was prepared to offer a receipt to prove his purchase, a little going out of your way to help your customers goes a LONG way in their eye's, I know this for a fact.

Those who give the old " if you lost your CD back in the day could you just go in and get a new one for free" or "if I lost my car can I just get another "are not being realistic in any way, this IS NOT a car or a tangible product and this IS NOT "back in the day" , this is the day of digital downloads and all the benefits that it brings, including but definitely not limited to being able to download another copy if something happened to your copy, this is the only time I've heard of a digital download service not offering this, and I've downloaded a butt load of games and add-ons, and especially considering the relative small size of the Desastersoft download I find it more then a little silly that they wont help him out.

Fairly poor form on their behalf , I honestly hope they come to their senses on this as unfortunately I think it'll cost them quiet a lot as far as their reputation goes here and maybe else where, which is a shame as they do do an excellent top notch product in a very small niche market that needs all the products like this it can get.

[TynMahn]

I do own this product and have to say, this incident of apparently poor decision on customer service side, the product is very well done and worth the purchase.

[icarus]

Originally Posted by icarus

I sent a nice polite email requesting one extra download in order to make a backup with my receipt of purchase, because I was not aware that there would be only one download allowed. I will report back on the results.

The reply:

Please hit the Link of the Original Download E-Mail. You can Download two times again.



Cheers

Thomas

[svend]

Originally Posted by icarus

The reply:

Please hit the Link of the Original Download E-Mail. You can Download two times again.



Cheers

Thomas

Glad you made it I have not gotten any reply from them yet.