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In which we talk about our relationship with you.

Refunds, terms of use, customer support - it's the hot button issue right now and it's been on our minds as well. We thought this might be a pretty good time to say a word or two about how we do things, recent changes, and our approach to your customer experience.









Refunds.

We've got 'em, and here are the basics you might need to know:
You have 30 days, worldwide. Hitting "Buy" doesn't waive your rights.
European Union law states that you should have 14 days to withdraw from a purchase. That's not a bad deal, but it's not always enough. We think that 30 days is more like it, and that worldwide is just nicer - within that period, we only consider your purchase final if you've already started to actually download your game. We want all of our customers to feel that our refund policy is there to give you a comfortable experience - not that we were forced into having one.


You can still get a refund for technical issues after downloading your game.
Downloading a game doesn't mean you're on your own, you still have our guarantee that it works!
If you have your game, but it doesn't work for one of the million reasons that just happen - we're here to help. We want you to be able to play your game, and if you can't, there's no reason why you should be stuck with it. We call this the Money Back Guarantee. If your game doesn't work due to technical issues, and our support team is unable to help you fix it, we'll offer you a refund - and two ways to do it. You'll have the choice of a refund in store credit, (this is almost immediate), or back to your card/PayPal account (if you're okay with waiting a few days to be cleared by your card or account issuer). You have 30 days to contact us after making your purchase, but there's no rush - your refund-timer stops ticking once you get in touch.










Customer support
We think that good customer support is one of the pillars of an awesome GOG.com experience. A hard time getting through to a living, breathing, human being can be one of the most frustrating things ever. But that's just not us.

Our support team is a cool, friendly bunch of people. Emphasis on people. They're really good at what they do, and they're here to provide you with a friendly, personal way to get in touch. We offer in-house tech support for all your problems, crashes, and other (totally not PEBKAC) issues, and we'll provide full support with no time restrictions. If that game you bought two years ago isn't working anymore, we might just be able to help. We'll take the time to walk you through any suggestions, and do our best to accommodate your non-technical needs - but that doesn't mean we can't work fast. Beginning January of this year, the waiting time for your average support ticket response was under 24 hours, and we got your problems completely resolved in under 36 hours.

Still, there's no reason why we couldn't do even better: we recently started offering support on Saturdays and Sundays, and the team just got a bit bigger. You can now write to us in English, French and German, and we plan to include more languages as we continue to expand. We're planning a significant update to our website support section, so finding information and getting in touch should be much easier. Soon, we'll also offer a much finer way to track your purchases and gifts, while all orders eligible for our Money Back Guarantee will be clearly labeled.









That's our two cents. We hope that this gives all of you a better (and much needed) inside look at customer experience and support from our perspective. If you have any questions, feel free to drop us a line in the comments section. We're here to talk!
Post edited March 26, 2015 by Konrad
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GOG.com: That's our two cents. We hope that this gives you guys* a better (and much needed) inside look at customer experience.
*We hope that gives everyone a better sense.
Please change the language to more gender nuteral since everyone can be a gamer :)
Post edited March 26, 2015 by cecil
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tinyE: Before I go, will this thread still be here a year from now when (according to my math) I no longer have enough rep to post links or pics because of that fucking bot or script, because at that time I actually am going to be pissed.
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stg83: This was a real problem last year as well when I went all the way to -100 at one point after which it became normal for sometime but for over a month now it has been affecting quite a few members here yet again. My only experience with the support has been regarding this specific issue and back when I was knee deep in the negatives (soon to happen again in a little over two months according to my calculations) I was told that my case was thoroughly investigated and no evidence of bots or scripts was found. Though I didn't really contact them specifically for my personal situation but as a problem that was really affecting others a lot more as well.

Furthermore I was reassured by support that they were considering restructuring the forum and possibly getting rid of the rep levels but could not guarantee whether it would actually happen. Naturally I was disappointed by the lack of commitment and implored the support personnel to take this issue under serious consideration since it resulted in many members leaving the forum and my main concern was the inability to post any links, to which I was told that a detailed response will be forthcoming later as they were going on leave for the holidays. So I contacted support again for a followup after a couple of weeks but got no response at all, this occurred back in April last year.

Since the title of this thread is "State of Customer Experience" I would just like to remind GOG that the forum as well as the website are very much part of our experience and very important to a lot of us here. So please listen and respond to the feedback in the long since dormant forum experiences thread by taking real initiative instead of ignoring all that has been highlighted there, thank you.
This....totally this.

Don't get me wrong, GOG's customer support has been among the best I've encountered out of any hardware/software company. But I felt like this was a red herring. For the most part, customer support is arguably not a significant problem with GOG.

What is a significant problem, arguably, is the forum. For many of us, this is just as much a core part of our experience as GOG customers as our interactions with customer support.

From the rep system to spam control to the search function, the forums are in dire need of serious overhaul.
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tinyE: That happens to everyone. Can you imagine what would happen if GOG offered the discount to everyone who just missed it? I paid full price for Settlers 3 literally a couple of hours before it went 50% off, and yeah I was mad...at myself. I feel for your loss but I have to side with GOG on this one and I gotta think most people here would too.
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Hicham: I don't know if everyone would side with ou or not, I don't know either if that is meaningful at all for that matter, unless this thread is just meant to sing together how GOG is awesome and all. The basic idea was to confirm that GOG's customer service is better than elsewhere but a little humility wouldn't hurt because of issues like the one I had and that made me really angry,not because I felt ripped, but because I didn't feel any sympathy from the customer service, not one "geste commercial" as they say in french.
Dang it! I can't believe you're making me publicly agree with tinyE. This is painful...

But, yeah, he's right. That's how sales go. There are few retailers that do it differently. There is one unbeatable method for preventing this from happening, and that is to wait to buy any game until it is on sale. It's what I do. That said, there's always a better sale around the corner. What you bought for 75% off could be 80 or 90% off next time. With all the sales they have here, the only reason I can see to not buy something on sale is that you absolutely, positively cannot wait. And, if you really can't wait, well then, your true discount was satiating your uncontrollable desire.
Yes I enjoyed how one customer service member almost gave me a heart attack until I realised that GOG.com staff actually have a sense of humour :D

'Hello, yes, you will be banned, and all your belongings confiscated :)'

Good times. Never change, GOG.
Post edited March 25, 2015 by micktiegs_8
Speaking of languages and support, when can we hope for a proper, backbone configuration of the language for the website and such ?

I now receive just about every newsletters in my mother tongue, which I never asked for, as my set language on gog.com is english.

That's unbelievably infuriating and produces a couple comments:
- People developing websites that force you on a language based on your IP/ISP/whatever without implementing a clean and solid way to allow visitors/members to choose *any* language and stick to it globally should have their kneecaps removed with a rusty teaspoon that has previously been dipped in Tabasco and a cocktail of various roadkill fluids,
- From the ticket I made I gathered that such a system is supposedly being worked on, but not ETA/advancement status was provided... any news ?

[Edit] Just in case: I haven't toyed with the "My Location" setting to see if it gives english all-around when set to "UK" or somesuch, as possible side-effects are unknown, and that's irrelevant anyway.
Post edited March 25, 2015 by Karboxyd
Without Thiev I would have never been able to finish The Witcher: Enhanced Edition because of the well known, game breaking bug with a certain NPC in Chapter 2. Thiev not only solved my issue but did it after they'd left the office for the day. Within a day of sending Thiev my save file I had it returned to me, fixed, and I was able to enjoy the rest of the game.

Where the fuck else do you get customer service like that? Where the fuck else do you get people that actually care about the games they sell? It isn't Valve's Steam.

But I have two bones to pick.

One is the continued existence of Omerta: City of Gangsters, even though I was one of the group that got it as a free promotion many months ago. I looked into what the bugs were and that some were legitimately game breaking, how Kalypso simply refused to give GOG the patch while other vendors (like Steam) received the patch, and how, for some reason, GOG continued to sell the game knowing that the base game was broken. The new GOG-made patch, from what I read, still does not address all of those game breaking and I don't know what to make of that. The Omerta: City of Gangsters issue isn't one of 'well, this doesn't work with X configuration', it's a matter of game breaking issues like in The Witcher: Enhanced Edition.

The other is being unable to receive a refund after discovering that Inquisitor has a remarkably bad mechanic that is nowhere explained in the game's manuals (and they're huge) and isn't explained adequately in the very beginning of the game. It's the Stamina mechanic and it's a deal-breaker. If I knew that Stamina worked in such a way there would be no way I would have purchased the game, not a chance in hell, and when I asked about a refund for the game I was told that I couldn't have one. I can understand GOG's stance but, all things considered, that mechanic is objectively bad rather than subjectively bad, viz. it's something that is bad and detrimental to the game irrespective of whether or not someone likes or dislikes it, it's not a matter of taste.

Inquisitor is the only purchase I regret and, yes, I'd still like I refund because, after downloading and then attempting to play the game over a year ago, I uninstalled it and never touched it again.

Downloading a title doesn't mean that we are all immediately going to play it and the 30 day window, while nice, isn't really effective. I understand that there is some give-and-take when it comes to DRM-Free because of the potential for any user to start down the line of illegal activity (no, I won't get into what or how here), but something needs to be said for bad titles or titles that have a impactful mechanic that is objectively bad (Stamina in Inquisitor) that can't be worked around in the game. No one wants to get stuck with a game that they loathe, they want to be able to do a 'good faith return' and that's a policy that needs to be created.

I critically support GOG/CDPG and I can't rave about them enough. But Omerta: City of Gangsters has never been addressed and Inquisitor is a game that I have no intention of playing because of a glaringly bad game mechanic, a game I cannot get a refund for. GOG/CDPG is still a phenomenal company doing a phenomenal job but those two titles/incidents are real sticking points for me.
Post edited March 25, 2015 by TheBitterness
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To my experience GOG support is not good or bad, but it's sporadic. When the customer support reply to you they are generally fast in dealing with the issue. However, sometimes there's no follow up on the matter, something promised does not happens, so issue is left unheard and others simply disappear in the void. I suspect that part of the problem is the categorization made on support tickets, that gives priority to the issue to address. But I think that some issue are simply left unsolved because they are not considered important. One for instance is the one about issue with games folders, i never saw one solved in years. Another is about incomplete information on some game pages: who does know that the comics you get preordering The Witcher 3 have DRM? On GOG? They don't mention it and they cannot even gives support about them. That's a thing I think must be improved.

On the other hand I wish GOG start to give much more importance on the forum. All the critical issue GOG fails to address, are already discussed and partially fixed by the community. While I believe it shouldn't be community responsability to fix them, this is also one of the great thing about GOG and its community.

That said, it always concerns me when a PR post like this appear on GOG. People now know that usually when GOG go full PR, something bad is coming.
I would like GOG to talk to the community in a more direct manner, without boast itself so much, to get rid of the feeling of someone sneaking behind your back.
I hope that GOG can hire more people to handle the customer service load. In the past, I would get a response from Support usually within a day and that was fine. But now I've seen it take up to 3+ days to get a response. I really hope GOG can fix that!
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Hicham: I remember when I bought Anesia a Machine for Pigs one day before it went on sale and I wrote an email about how I felt bad about paying double the price just for buying a game one day too early and without any means to know it would be on sale.
And that's GOG's fault?

I'm no GOG apologist, but you're not really making yourself look good here.
I am sorry that I have to drag "old news" back into the sunlight, but:

Censorship is way worse than DRM or regional pricing. You have really pissed off a lot of people who previously praised and supported you due to the morally correct "no DRM" decison. As long as you (as a polish company) censor yourself for grown-up German customers, I will not spend any single cent or dollar.

If that means "no German UI"..... so be it. I could not care less.
If you wish, open a second censored shop under gog.de or somewhere else. Implementing global Censorship based on IP geolocation and attempting to sell this as positive PR for German customers is however still absolutely disgusting.

Please fix this instead of praising customer support that I will hopefully never need.
I will keep reminding you about this issue again again and again until you either give in or ban me from your forum or service. I hope you understand my position.

Thank you !
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dc6jgk: I am sorry that I have to drag "old news" back into the sunlight, but:

Censorship is way worse than DRM or regional pricing. You have really pissed off a lot of people who previously praised and supported you due to the morally correct "no DRM" decison. As long as you (as a polish company) censor yourself for grown-up German customers, I will not spend any single cent or dollar.

If that means "no German UI"..... so be it. I could not care less.
If you wish, open a second censored shop under gog.de or somewhere else. Implementing global Censorship based on IP geolocation and attempting to sell this as positive PR for German customers is however still absolutely disgusting.

Please fix this instead of praising customer support that I will hopefully never need.
I will keep reminding you about this issue again again and again until you either give in or ban me from your forum or service. I hope you understand my position.

Thank you !
Errr no one's going to ban you if you have an issue with something :)
Sick burn!
How is this for praise, GOG is definitely better than Steam support. :)
I still wish GOG Support could have fixed the Prince of Persia 2008 soundtrack issue. Here is the original post. It's been about 2 years, but unfortunately it never got resolved. It's a shame too, because the soundtrack was the main reason why I bought PoP 2008.
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qwixter: How is this for praise, GOG is definitely better than Steam support. :)
Well that's kind of like saying "He sees better than Stevie Wonder." :P