In this age, anything you buy online has a decent refund policy, right from clothes to online subscriptions. Steam is finally offering refunds to games you are not satisfied with.
Being one of the most popular gaming service to buy, play and consume games, Steam with 125 million active users has finally enabled refunds for almost all the games and applications you buy via their platform. Serving that huge number of Steam users means there would be some unhappy customers who did not like a particular game based on its initial preview which made them buy the game especially after the launch of 'Early Access' games which gives you the very first playable game with bugs and half-baked storyline. This definitely is not the right group of games which give you a fair warning that the game will be laden with bugs and other annoyances but this definitely the group for which the refund policy is not great as it might be exploited by many.
Anyway let's get back to understanding what the Refund Policy is and how useful it is.
Below is chart for quick review/view of the refund policy. For detail information on everything check the info below the chart
Steam Refund Policy
Games or Applications or Softwares
14 Days
Playtime less than 2 hours
Game DLCs ( Downloadable Content )
14 Days
Not consumed, modified or transferred
Title's Playtime less than 2 hours
In-game purchases
2 Days
Only Valve games & limited third-party games
Pre-Purchased Games
Before Release
Cannot be refunded after release
Game Bundles
14 Days
No item of the bundle has been transferred
Playtime less than 2 hours for all titles combined
Steam Wallet Funds
14 Days
Only if the funds have not been used
STEAM REFUND POLICY DETAILS
Refunds are available for all the games and software applications purchased within two weeks and that has a playtime of less than 2 hours in total.
Refunds will be released within a week of the approval from the Steam's Support Staff.
Refunds will be released back to the Steam Wallet or original payment methods. Some payment methods might not support refunds so in those cases refunds will come back the Steam Wallet.
PRODUCT DETAILS
Games or Applications or Softwares : Any game or software which is bought on the Steam Platform can be refunded within 14 days only if its playtime is less than 2 hours.
Game DLCs ( Downloadable Content ) : Any DLC for any game can be refunded only if the main title for which the DLC was purchased has been bought less than 14 days ago and has been played for less than 2 hours. These DLCs should not have been consumed or modified or transferred. Steam cannot refund a third party DLC.
In-game Purchases : Only applicable for Valve-developed games. Any in-game purchases for eligible games can be refunded within 2 days as long the purchased product is not consumed or modified or transferred.
Pre-Purchased Games : When you pre-purchase a title on Steam (and have paid for the title in advance), you can request a refund at any time prior to release of that title. The standard 14-day/two-hour refund period also applies, starting on the game's release date.
Game Bundles : You can receive a full refund for any bundle purchased on the Steam Store, so long as none of the items in the bundle have been transferred, and if the combined usage time for all items in the bundle is less than two hours. If a bundle includes an in-game item or DLC that is not refundable, Steam will tell you if the whole bundle is refundable during check-out.
Steam Wallet Funds : You may request a refund for Steam Wallet funds within fourteen days of purchase if they were purchased on Steam and if you have not used any of those funds.
VAC Bans : If you have been banned by VAC (the Valve Anti-Cheat system) on a game, you lose the right to refund that game.
Movies : We are unable to offer refunds for movies on Steam.
Refunds on Gifts : We are unable to offer refunds for gifts after they have been redeemed by the recipient.
Abuse : Refunds are designed to remove the risk from purchasing titles on Steam-not as a way to get free games. If it appears to us that you are abusing refunds, we may stop offering them to you. We do not consider it abuse to request a refund on a title that was purchased just before a sale and then immediately rebuying that title for the sale price.
The refund process is not very complicated but a painful task rather than a click to refund button. Being complicated is not bad though, it might ward off some abusers. But also starts a big problem of abusers who might buy, play for 1 hour, leave a bad review and request a quick refund, leaving the game with tons of bad reviews and no real way to understand if the game is really bad or targeted with such abusers.
You can ask for a refund at Steam Help
Read more about the Steam Refund Policy
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