Steam support doesn't work, an example.

Steam, in case you aren't familiar with it, is a content delivery network for games.  It's actually quite a great service.  You buy a game and then you can log into steam from any computer, download the game, and play it.  It's as convenient as things get in the gaming world.  I really do love it.  I can buy games for my family and friends and send them as gifts immediately or on my own schedule.  I can buy games for myself and download them right then and start playing. They have great sales.  In short, I love it.


but...

Steam support is beyond useless.  It is infuriating.  It is as bad, or worse, than attempting to explain a problem to someone who doesn't speak your language.  Steam support is broken.


I did have a time when I swore I'd never buy another game through steam.  It was because of their support.  My son came to work with me one day and I decided to let him use the new computer we got at work to play some steam games on.  The client, the thing that you use to run all of the games, would not install on the computer.  I went to their web page and started the support request procedure.  I explained that I was unable to install the client on the computer.  Their response was that I needed to provide them with a picture of me holding the game box with the game key clearly visible.  Again, if you aren't familiar with the steam product, there is no game box or key for the client.  The client is free and it allows you to not only play the games you've purchased but to purchase more games.  In the end the issue was never resolved and I swore to never buy another game from steam again.  I caved and went back to steam after a couple of years.  The convenience of the service was too much for me to pass up.

History aside, let's fast forward to this past Friday.  I decided to purchase some games for my two sons.  I wanted them to have some of the games from my own youth so I purchased two copies each of Sonic the Hedgehog and a collection of games called The Sega Collection.  I purchased each game individually and used their service to send them directly through steam.  (Steam has a feature that allows chat as well as notifications of updates and gifts that have been sent to you.)  Since the kids live in the same household as I do I told them to check their steam client for anything new.  They checked and saw no gift notification.  I waited.  I figured the steam servers were busy or something so no big deal.  I did get the emails from steam indicating that the purchases were charged to my credit card and each email indicated which game was purchased and who was to get it.

Saturday comes and they still don't see the gifts.  I took care of it and ran into several problems along the way.  I did finally get all of the games installed and running but since this had been an especially bad transaction I decided to let steam know of the issues I had with the service and inquire about how I could make the game purchases easier on all of us in the future.  I created a support ticket.

1 Message by you on Sat, 24th Sep 2011 6:49 am
Yesterday I purchased 4 games from the steam store, all gifts. It was two copies of Sonic the hedgehog and two copies of the Sega collector's edition. All were sent to my sons as gifts. First of all, neither of my sons received a steam notification that they had a game waiting even though they were sent directly through steam. Finally I went to their manage gifts and found them in each of their accounts. I also found that both copies of sonic were sent to {redacted - youngest son}'s account, my youngest son, when in the email it says there is one there for each of them, not both for the same account.
* Thank you for your recent gift purchase on Steam. Your gift has been sent to {redacted - oldest son}. Confirmation Number {redacted}
* Thank you for your recent gift purchase on Steam. Your gift has been sent to {redacted - youngest son). Confirmation Number {redacted}
I had to resend the one intended for {redacted - oldest son} after the fact. Why this happened is beyond me and if this had been for somebody outside of my household that might have already redeemed it, I wouldn't have had the opportunity to fix this.

The other issue with this gift purchase is that with the install of all 4 games I received the following message for each install:

"Gift activation failure

Invalid Gift

the gift you have attempted to redeem is no longer valid. This gift may have already been used by someone else, it may have expired, or it may have been revoked by the sender."


All of the games I have purchased have now been installed and tested and everything works. My question is: why did nothing go right with these purchases and installs and is there anything I can do for the next time to make gift purchasing any more efficient?

also, when I tried to attach an image of the error it told me "There were the following errors. Please make the necessary changes and resubmit.

The attachment is not a valid file type.

"


You might want to think about putting what file types are valid so I might know before trying to attach/upload it.

    steamInvalidGift.JPG - View Image (File Size : 174.2 KB)

Now it seems to me I laid out the problems that I had very clearly and explained everything to the best of my ability.  I didn't, as is my usual nature, get hot-headed about it.  They replied.

2 Message by Support Tech {redacted - support personnel's name} on Sun, 25th Sep 2011 1:13 pm
Hello John,

Thank you for contacting Steam Support.

Please follow the link below for information:

Title: Steam Purchase Gifts and Guest Passes
Link: http://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=6262-QXCN-0755

If you have any further questions, please let us know.

The article they linked to is their general FAQ page on how steam gifts work. I had already inspected this article before submitting the support request but it clearly doesn't mention how one could buy a game and have the confirmation email say it went to one person and yet when I found the games in their steam client, one of the boys had both copies of the Sonic the Hedgehog.  They didn't address any of the issues I had.  Thusly I replied.

3 Message by you on Sun, 25th Sep 2011 1:20 pm
Is this my response? Are you kidding?

I bought games for one person and it was delivered to another person and you send me a boilerplate link?

Every single install said the gift was invalid and you sent me a boilerplate link?

I read that link before I submitted this ticket. I did not expect what I got - absolutely no response to the questions I have posed.

I spent a good deal of time attempting to explain what had happened and I even provided confirmation numbers and a screenshot. Is there a reason I wasn't offered anything more than a standard link that answers exactly zero of my questions?

I don't expect a reply any time soon. If I recall correctly it took nearly a month before I finally gave up on my only other Steam Support Ticket, mentioned previously. It is my firm opinion that steam support is broken beyond repair. Perhaps it is because they get a large amount of bogus requests and they aren't happy with their job. The mean streak in me thinks they hire people not smart enough to make change, let alone read a question and formulate an answer. Perhaps the "Support Techs" are on some sort of commission wherein the faster they respond to their queue the more they get paid, a la a factory's incentive program. I don't know. But it doesn't work. If you do a google search for "steam support" you might see that the support page is the first result. The second result is, for me, the steam forums. The third link is one entitled "Steam Support Sucks — Elliott C. Back."  This particular blog post is from 2006.  How does a link from 2006 stay so high in the google rankings?  Truth.  Validity of content.  Even steam's own forums are filled with thread such as "Steam support sucks" because it is true.

I know, I should speak with my dollars and not spend money there.  Perhaps that's where it will end up.  I'd be sick if I calcuated how many dollars I've given steam.  There's no question it is in the thousands of dollars.  I know they don't get all of that money.  Publishers get some, developers get some, who knows who else gets a cut.  All this in mind, they are still taking money from people to be the company that delivers the games.  They provide a service.  When this service does not work as intended or delivers the games to the wrong people, they should have support that works.  Clearly this is not the case.  The teeming masses have tried to make this public in an effort to get them to up the quality of their support service.  They clearly have not improved.  Perhaps what is needed is a class action lawsuit.  Perhaps what we need is a lawyer who needs to make a name from himself/herself and wants to champion a cause worth fighting for.  There's more money in class action lawsuits for the lawyers than there is for the individual so why not, says I.  Would it even work?  Can sub-par service be punished?  I don't know.  I am not a lawyer and never hope to be.