Got raped by Steam

You would have thought that they would have just banned you from trading (though I know its not your fault just trying to be devils advocate) instead of taking your games aswell.

£2000 worth of games is well out of order. Hope you get them back.
 
RedDanDoc said:
You would have thought that they would have just banned you from trading (though I know its not your fault just trying to be devils advocate) instead of taking your games aswell.

£2000 worth of games is well out of order. Hope you get them back.
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They haven't taken any games mate. I can still use my account normally aside from trading. It's £2,000 worth of in-game items which I very have little use for that they have blocked me from trading, as well a great many Steam Gifts. I've given quite a few away but I've got too many to give them all though. Besides, I need to get the money back from them. I can still gift those, but with a trade ban I can't list them at any trading sites worth mentioning.

We should co-op Sniper Elite Nazi Zombie Army soon by the way, like old times. :)
 
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ChrisJSY said:
Don't be an idiot. Seriously, listen to yourself.
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If you all think this is a cut and dry case you are completely wrong. Using the defence "how am I supposed to know it was stolen goods" does not hold up with physical items, nor does it hold up on steam with "digital" goods.

If the police found that you were repeatedly selling stolen good from a shop I'm sure just shrugging and saying "how am I supposed to know" would totally cut it.

I'm not saying there is a foolproof way or even a way to verify these people you are dealing with or the goods they are trading to you but that doesn't give you carte blanche to ignore Valve's warnings that this was happening and continue to trade in items of which you have no idea of the legality.

People are also seeing this from a consumer point of view, if he was just an innocent consumer who had been sent one or two dodgy games then yes this would be ridiculous. But to set up a business or service to trade these items in bulk is totally different. It is entirely normal for shops receiving goods from customers to take customer details.

I hope, assuming that you are legit, that you get this sorted but the only way I can see this working going ahead is if they set up some way to let you know what is illegal or not so you can possibly avoid trading with the same people more than once.

Further, please consider that in the same way you have alleged you have no way to know the items are illegal or stolen. How can Valve know that you are not deliberately dealing in these goods? The same defence you are using to get out of this the exact same reasoning for Valve to shut you down.

There is no malicious intent in this post or my first one, I am sorry this has happened to you, but as you felt the need to inform us of your plight I felt the need to present a counter argument and a bit of sense.
 
Skyfall said:
If you all think this is a cut and dry case you are completely wrong. Using the defence "how am I supposed to know it was stolen goods" does not hold up with physical items, nor does it hold up on steam with "digital" goods.

If the police found that you were repeatedly selling stolen good from a shop I'm sure just shrugging and saying "how am I supposed to know" would totally cut it.

I'm not saying there is a foolproof way or even a way to verify these people you are dealing with or the goods they are trading to you but that doesn't give you carte blanche to ignore Valve's warnings that this was happening and continue to trade in items of which you have no idea of the legality.

People are also seeing this from a consumer point of view, if he was just an innocent consumer who had been sent one or two dodgy games then yes this would be ridiculous. But to set up a business or service to trade these items in bulk is totally different. It is entirely normal for shops receiving goods from customers to take customer details.

I hope, assuming that you are legit, that you get this sorted but the only way I can see this working going ahead is if they set up some way to let you know what is illegal or not so you can possibly avoid trading with the same people more than once.

Further, please consider that in the same way you have alleged you have no way to know the items are illegal or stolen. How can Valve know that you are not deliberately dealing in these goods? The same defence you are using to get out of this the exact same reasoning for Valve to shut you down.

There is no malicious intent in this post or my first one, I am sorry this has happened to you, but as you felt the need to inform us of your plight I felt the need to present a counter argument and a bit of sense.
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I didn't ignore the warning though. I asked them about what it was and what I could do to avoid repeating the mistake and they wouldn't provide me with any information. As stated before, I wasn't even sure if their warning was legitimate considering the circumstances. I'm dead certain that the vast majority of my trades have been trouble-free. If I was deliberately stealing/fencing throughout my near 7,000 trades, I'm sure Valve would have taken action a long time ago. As it is, I've gone straight from a clean account to a permanent trade ban.
 
Skyfall said:
If you all think this is a cut and dry case you are completely wrong. Using the defence "how am I supposed to know it was stolen goods" does not hold up with physical items, nor does it hold up on steam with "digital" goods.
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The ignorance, it's untrue.

They built a system that should have failsafes, to allow trading of certain digital goods. Good restricted to within their system. The end user or the buyer cannot, will not, ever, in this life or the next, this universe or a parallel universe know if a digital item is stolen or not. All you see is that a game is for sale or trade, there aren't physical markings to check, pictures, serial numbers (not to be confused with serial keys) and such.

So, you say how can Valve know that he is not deliberately dealing in these goods? That's a good question, how can they? Why would they ban and not simple use support staff to investigate and enquire.
Why is the go to method to simply just ban that person and forget about it, innocent or not? Even when said person tries to contact them and clear up the situation.

Sorry but, some cases are quite cut and dry and corporations simply have the ability to not care for the odd loss of customer, this is a problem because people like you and I could be next.

(It's late, probably lots of grammar mistakes)
 
I understand that Valve could be more helpful but the problem is that as far as I'm aware they're under no obligation to do so. But as has been said above, the items in question could have come from compromised accounts in which case it's difficult for them do do anything until after the fact which will be no use at all most of the time.

It may be the only thing they can do is to stop those traders known to have dealt in such goods. What would happen to those goods were they not going through you is another matter.
 
ChrisJSY said:
The ignorance, it's untrue.

They built a system that should have failsafes, to allow trading of certain digital goods. Good restricted to within their system. The end user or the buyer cannot, will not, ever, in this life or the next, this universe or a parallel universe know if a digital item is stolen or not. All you see is that a game is for sale or trade, there aren't physical markings to check, pictures, serial numbers (not to be confused with serial keys) and such.

So, you say how can Valve know that he is not deliberately dealing in these goods? That's a good question, how can they? Why would they ban and not simple use support staff to investigate and enquire.
Why is the go to method to simply just ban that person and forget about it, innocent or not? Even when said person tries to contact them and clear up the situation.

Sorry but, some cases are quite cut and dry and corporations simply have the ability to not care for the odd loss of customer, this is a problem because people like you and I could be next.

(It's late, probably lots of grammar mistakes)
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i agree with this, Value should have safeguards in place that are easy to check.
 
Skyfall said:
It may be the only thing they can do is to stop those traders known to have dealt in such goods. What would happen to those goods were they not going through you is another matter.
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If they weren't going through me, then it would be through one of the other traders, of which there are many, many thousands - if not millions.

It works like this:

* You list an item on a trading site, stating what you want in return.

* Someone either meets your asking price or makes you a counter-offer.

* If you agree a deal then you proceed to exchange items.

The system is supposed to be reliable. If you risk buying items with cash, then Steam won't help you out if you get scammed (though hopefully will ban the scammer). But any trade items sent through the system are supposed to be safe deals. If an item turned out to be hijacked I could understand them reversing the deal. But simply banning someone from ever trading again seems ludicrous to me, as well as to every other trader I've spoken with. Many are now scared to use the trading system at all anymore. I know I'll be trading away my items and quitting too if I'm lucky enough to get unbanned.
 
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Skyfall said:
I understand that Valve could be more helpful but the problem is that as far as I'm aware they're under no obligation to do so. But as has been said above, the items in question could have come from compromised accounts in which case it's difficult for them do do anything until after the fact which will be no use at all most of the time.

It may be the only thing they can do is to stop those traders known to have dealt in such goods. What would happen to those goods were they not going through you is another matter.
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I assume you are working on your proposal of how he OP is supposed to vet accounts he trades with, what with it being his responsibility and all.
 
The worst part of it is that only two items worth £20 could have been compromised items while the other £1980 worth of items could be legit. Surely they'll know what items have been stolen or whatever and then remove/return them items rather than just ban the account from trading completely.

I'd still like to know how he's supposed to know if items have been stolen or not, Skyfall.
 
kohlditz said:
You are an edge case, 99.99% of people don't use Steam like you do. They are a very open company, it would take 5 or 10 minutes checking to get the email address of someone that could help you out.

Go read http://www.valvesoftware.com/company/people.html and figure out who might be interested; the email addresses are all there.
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I'm not saying that most people trade as much as I do. But that shouldn't mean I get screwed over in this way.

I already emailed 2 Valve employees I was told might be able to help (though this may have been incorrect information). I've also now emailed Gabe. I'm more than willing to try contacting other staff members also. But I find it hard to ally with Steam's handling of this matter.

Even despite my personal treatment, I don't hold a grudge against Valve or Steam. I love their games (on the whole) and I would never have purchased so many games if I didn't likewise love the Steam platform. I just wish they'd handled the situation differently and don't think they've dealt with me fairly at all. My trust in their trading system however, has been shattered.
 
Moothead2 said:
The worst part of it is that only two items worth £20 could have been compromised items while the other £1980 worth of items could be legit. Surely they'll know what items have been stolen or whatever and then remove/return them items rather than just ban the account from trading completely.

I'd still like to know how he's supposed to know if items have been stolen or not, Skyfall.
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To me, that's exactly how the situation is. They're closing down the mine because the miner was sold a fenced pickaxe.
 
Dont put all your eggs in one basket. People have got to stop idolising Steam, they dont care about you, they care about getting your money.

chaparral said:
Can you just open another steam account and send all your gifts to it and start trading again from the new account ??
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Yes, thats a great idea. Unfortunately 'being banned from trading' probably means 'being banned from trading'. Being banned from trading. Banned.
 
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