I can’t even count how many hours I’ve spent in the past year arguing about some BS charge, trying to get something repaired under warranty, or even trying to redeem an valid coupon that was sent to me. I’ve reached a point where I’m exhausted in trying to fight these kinds of things but I feel like I can’t just let any of it go. Sometimes I wish I could hire a Karen, it would be 100% worth it.
I had a $200 gift card to Google Play that came with a Samsung TV. I redeemed the card and wasn’t spending the balance very quickly. Next time I checked, the balance was gone. I contacted Google support and they tried to tell me there was never any credit on the account to begin with. They tried to get me to contact Samsung. I asked them why Samsung would have information on my Google Play balance after putting a Google Play-branded giftcard on my Google Play account (never got an answer to that). After multiple escalations, they finally told the balance was either zeroed for inactivity or expired (it had been a year-ish). I received no warnings, no notices in change of terms (this info wasn’t on the gift card), nothing. All the credit was just gone one day.
I requested clarification/explanation (including a copy of their gift card expiration policy) but they simply stopped responding to emails. The whole process took over a month.
It’s become worse dealing with Google over these play cards since covid. They shut down all phone support. I made 13 attempts to get a $100 card deemed with them and I got all kinds of reasons why I couldn’t redeem the card by email despite providing the receipt, card and codes and my utility bills. I even called other departments within google to try to get it fixed. Nothing.
I wasted way more of my time on principle. It happens quite often I read online for many people.
I think Google should be barred from selling these cards. There’s no recourse and they keep the money. It’s a racket and there’s no way to recover the money unless you pay by credit card with a charge back. Those that used cash or debit are out the money as there are no refunds from the store.