Bans for no reason, then loss of all gear on reinstatement???

[Owyn]

This past weekend we had two guild members accounts show up as banned. There was no customer support available to them through the weekend, so there was no way they could get the accounts reinstated right away. No reason was given. To ban when the company knew the people in question would have no recourse for days was negligent.


This morning (Tuesday) both accounts were reinstated. However, their inventory was removed, to the tune of ALL quest items lost, ALL drop gear lost, ALL money removed, ALL stigmas lost, and most other items missing. No reason for the banning was forthcoming (and to my knowledge, neither individual had done anything against he TOS or EULA). As yet, no reply has been given about the lost items.


This is COMPLETELY UNACCEPTABLE!


As a guildleader, I am writing to request that this be addressed immediately. I am aware our two folks were not the only ones hit by this. NCSoft needs to address the matter swiftly, correct their errors, and FIX what they have taken from people.


If this is not resolved in a swift manner, I will be asking our members to cancel their accounts and speak to their respective banks to reverse all charges due to fraudulent and negligent business practices. I would encourage others who have this issue to take a similar stand. If they can ban anyone for no reason, no cause - AND, when they discover their mistake, take everything they have earned in the game anyway! - then it could happen to me tomorrow. Or to you.


Completely unacceptable behavior from an MMO company.


Posting this publicly and also CCing it to every pertinent NCSoft address I can. This needs to be fixed. Now.



Owyn

Commander, Defenders of Order

[Dashel]

But NCSoft never makes a mistake and bans people for no reason. Take your urban legends and go chase Bigfoot.

[Satanist Hobo]

Satanisthobo

Troller of d-bags who sign their post and RP in posts.

[Adoniel]

didn't read all of it, but I would have each person affected contact NCSoft via their support website, maybe by phone, and maybe in game. Even if they were botting/gold selling NCSoft needs to be forthcoming and tell them what they did wrong. Also, if reinstated and they (NC) admit if it was a mistake they need to return everything taken.

[Paladuck]

This would probably be more appropriately addressed by going through the proper avenues, not spamming every forum and NCSoft email address you can find.

Also NCsoft could probably care less about you recommending to your legion members that they cancel their accounts. This is so far removed from a threat. Not that NCsoft entertains threats anyway.

[Charmille]

More plausible explanation: Members bought a powerlevel service, got their accounts stripped by the service "provider" and are now making excuses to cover their asses.

[Devin]

Saw Fry's avatar. That was pretty cool.

[Abyssina]

Posted in another thread, but put here because this is EXACTLY what happened to me.

On Friday, myself and a guildie were banned without warning and without any reason. We have not cheated in any form or fashion.

We both sent emails asking what reason there is for this, and got autoreplies. Calling NCSoft led persistent busy signals, and eventually an answer that this "will have to be handled via email due to the overwhelming number of calls." Today, the ban is lifted on both of us...and logging in reveals our items, kinah, gear, stigmas, everything, is stripped. Including CE items, abyss items, warehouse, even all of my low level mules (lol?), nude and helpless.

Here's the kicker. The ban was lifted, but neither of us got any correspondence telling us why it was placed in the first place, nor did we get an email telling us that it was lifted, or the customer service claim we filed replied to, or anything. We were, on a personal level, utterly ignored, and our accounts savaged without any reasoning given.

Oh, I left out the best part. We got banned on the same damn day as we got billed. So, take our money, THEN ban us and plunder our accounts. Thanks NCSoft.

ALSO:

We were not account plundered. I checked my character sheet after being banned because I was told someone had left a QQ on my page after I killed them, so I looked...all my gear was still there on Sunday, AFTER the ban. When I get unbanned, stuff is gone.

I have not received one single response that was not automated email. I have called NCSoft, as has my guildie; usually the line was busy, when you do get through you're told that this will have to be handled by email because they are too busy to do this over the phone.

[Owyn]

Support tickets have been attempted, as have phone calls. Neither is getting a reply, yet.

This whole thing is a little ridiculous... These are folks I have known for years, and our guild has always had a no-tolerance rule for cheating or TOS violations. I am very confident these folks have not bought gold.

They've been reinstated; but lost everything. No explanation, nothing from NCSoft at all. If NCSoft's policy is going to be to blanket ban people on a whim, then reinstate people they realize were banned in error but STILL take all their stuff and not return it anyway, is this game worth playing at all? I certainly don't want to reach level fifty, get all my cool orange gear, and get "accidentally" banned and have everything stripped away. =P

The whole thing is insanely bad customer service.

[Zoj]

Hey look NC messed up again, that's a first!

[IVIadness]

Why would you post this here? This is a fan forum not the forum owned by NCsoft

[Mungyun]

Originally Posted by Charmille

More plausible explanation: Members bought a powerlevel service, got their accounts stripped by the service "provider" and are now making excuses to cover their asses.

Thats kinda what i was thinking. I havent heard of a situation that they give you back your completely empty toon after a wrongful ban. They dont even do anything with your account other than lock it. My question is are all of the items that cant be sold still with them?

[Killer]

If they bought gold or a power leveling service the GM have all the right to strip the accounts of the items. This was post by Icham on Siel server after they got banned for 72 hours because they bought gold.

I have never ever used any bot..... and..GM banned me 72hours because I bought some kinah with real money. NC took all my gears that I was wearing and items in my inventory. They also took all my kinah as well. Purchasing kinah was my mistake. I regret that. I will never ever make a mistake again.

That can be found here on their Character file. Icham had full gold abyss gear with abyss gold rings, earrings and belt.

Aion™ Online :: Character & Legion

To me it doesn't sound like you are telling the full reason. Maybe they did buy gold and didn't tell you.

[khariste]

I'd say it's a lot more likely that they are not being forthcoming with you, from what I've seen and heard from these bannings.

I'd say its highly probable that they engaged in some form of activity which is bannable, and were probably told as much. It's better for them now, to maintain their credibility, to simply say they received no notification why and it was totally the big corporations fault. Far easier to play on the sympathy of others and hope for donations than to raise doubts about their credibility by saying they were banned for botting/gold selling/buying.

I see this happen a lot, and you don't have to look far around the boards to find it. Lying as a customer, there is no accountability. Lying as a corporation, there's quite a bit of accountability. I'm not saying they are infallible, but when it's a "He Said / She Said" type situation, I'm going to place my money on the party with the most accountability.

[Cocowoushi]

You know it's probably more work for a GM to "strip" your character via their Tool than someone logging into your account and doing it themself?

Sorry, I just find this very hard to swallow. If you were banned you should have gotten something saying why, and you should NOT have been unbanned before then.
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