The Australians are not messing around: they will take Sony to court because they believe the company doesn’t have a consumer-friendly approach.

The Australian Competition & Consumer Commission, which we will shorten to ACCC from now on, released a statement about how they think Sony made „false or misleading statements” to its Australian consumers regarding refunds. The ACCC has an issue with Sony Europe’s statement from September 2017, when they said they don’t have to refund games that have been already downloaded, or for those games that have been bought more than two weeks ago. „Sony Europe also allegedly told consumers it did not have to provide refunds unless the game developer told the consumer the game was irreparably faulty or otherwise authorized a refund. It also told consumers that it could provide refunds using virtual PlayStation currency instead of money,” ACCC says. You can read their entire complaint here.

They think this approach is misleading, as, according to Australian law, the consumers have the right to request a refund, repair, or a replacement „if a product is faulty because it is not of acceptable quality, is not fit for purpose or does not match descriptions made by the businesses, depending on the seriousness of the fault.” „We allege that Sony Europe gave false and misleading information to their customers about their rights in relation to games sold via its PlayStation Store. Consumer guarantees do not expire after a digital product has been downloaded as we allege Sony Europe told consumers, and refunds must be given in the form of original payment unless a consumer chooses to receive it in store credit. Consumers who buy digital products online have exactly the same rights as they would at a physical store. Sony Europe’s alleged conduct may have caused Australian consumers to not seek a refund, replacement or repair for a faulty game when the Australian Consumer Law gave them a right to do so,” ACCC chairman Rod Sims said in a statement.

We might have talked about how ACCC madeValve  pay a 3-million dollar fine in 2017 when they had the same issue with Gabe Newell’s company. Since then, the Australian version of Steam clearly outlines the refund policy. ACCC says that every company who operate in Australia has to comply, and that means Sony is about to pay a hefty fine…

Source: GameSpot