Notices

Summary:

Rejected payments as of late (which Nokia apparently is aware of but doesn't mention a thing), incorrect prices listed and hidden reserves on your card when you make a purchase

In detail:

This is basically my experience with the OVI Store, with a few comments added at the bottom.

A couple of weeks ago I purchased Angry Birds Level Pack 1. I live in Romania, and prices in the OVI Store are thoughtfully displayed in RON (Romanian currency). I was a bit taken aback when looking at my account transactions I noticed that not only the amounts charged were in HKD (Hong Kong Dollars), and thus did not reflect the amounts quoted on the OVI Store but were a couple of cents higher due to different exchange rates applied, but also that there is a 1GBP reserve per transaction from the OVI Store.

Now I wasn't so much bothered about the small difference in app price due to the exchange rate (although quoting a price and charging another, be it even only slightly higher, constitutes unfair practices), but about the 1GBP reserve that was not mentioned anywhere during the payment process. After all it is MY money, and I find it preposterous for an allegedly respectable company like Nokia to engage in such practices (although after the MyNokia SMS mess, I'm not surprised anymore).

I wrote to support, and received a vague answer to the effect that Nokia only charges the amount displayed on OVI Store. After writing back and basically disproving this (exchange rate differences + the 1GBP), I suggested that the 1GBP might be a reserved amount (at the moment I couldn't tell for sure, but it seemed like it), to which I was answered that yes, it is a reserved amount. I let it go at that - my time after all - after writing to express the wish that they mention the actual (correct) amount and the reserve during the process.

Fast forward to yesterday, when I attempted to purchase the new Zen Bound game. Tried and failed. After filling in my credit card details and the first validation step, I got hit with a failure message and advised to contact my bank. Following this I checked my online banking application, and noticed that infamous 1GBP reserve on my card. On the other hand, the costs for the game were not charged. So apparently the process should work, I told myself, since they're able to reserve funds on my card. Tried again, and again failed. At this point I thought that it might be a temporary issue with their payment gateway, and decided to give it another try later, after a few hours. Nope. Didn't work, apart from another 1GBP reserve showing up on the credit card statement. Today I gave it one more, final try. Same.

I decided to contact support again, and described my problem, as well as my annoyance at the shady practices which I might have expected from an obscure internet store, but not from a company such as Nokia.

One hour later I got a phone call from a Nokia support representative (from the center in Romania). He confirmed the issue with some cards not being accepted, said that it is known to the 'guys in Finland', and that they've been advised to maintain a list of people having this problem. He also added that in Finland they were working on it, but didn't have any other details. I described the other gripes I had regarding the incorrect prices and the hidden reserve, and told him I was unhappy with Nokia's practices recently. He was rather apologetic, said he understood, but it left me with the impression that there's not much that he can do from here.

To recap, I'm pretty miffed at Nokia as of recently (aka since I got my N900). Delayed updates, OVI Store multiple debacles (delay, payment issues, more delays, pr1.2, promises, more delays, slow trickle of apps, again payment issues), lack of communication with the user base. I cannot say I have been a Nokia fan, but I have been happy with them so far, and with a minor exception only purchased Nokia (6630, N70, N73, E61i, E71 and now the N900). However recently I've started to look more and more into the Android offer, and I can say that I am tempted. My next phone would have been a Nokia MeeGo, but I'm not so sure anymore. I'm not ruling it out either, but somehow I feel disappointed and annoyed at what is currently going on with Nokia.

I've also seen reserves on my account, but have never been able to purchase anything. It's a US bank and VISA card, and another US bank and Mastercard. As long as the money marked as a reserve is given back upon failure to purchase i don't really have a problem with that. What I do have a problem with is despite my desire to support Nokia and thus Meamo and Meego, I'm being rejected.

It's sad, becuase the N900 hardware and software wise provides the kind experience I want. I want to be able to use my phone how I please and not how Apple or Google wish. Sadly Nokia continues to drop the ball.

2d

well said......

Well the same here.

A few weeks ago I could by the Angry Birds LP with a german Visa-Card. The price in OVI store was in EUR. But they charged my card with something else and at the end they got 2 ct more from me than they should have.

And now I want to by Zen Bound but it doesn't accept my card anymore.

One should think that Nokia is a big company and credit card payment is not exactly new. But well they totally fail. I don't get it, how hard could it be?

You don't have to be genious to do the math... if 100 000 people pay extra 0,02€ Nokia gets 2000€ extra money on their bank account. I think that's just plain stealing, nothing less, nothing more.

as far as the 2cents goes that happens everwhere. I'm in the US and when I buy something over seas it never converts right. The real rip off is with companys that send money to other people for you. Like Western Union if they tell you that your $100 will be sent for 80Euros and you really could have sent 100Euros for $100 then they get to keep the 20Euros(BTW I made my own numbers up I have no idea of exchange rates.)

Well, those two cents, that doesn't happen everywhere.

When I buy in a store and it gives it's prices in EUR I expect them to bill it in euro. If they would do so, I would have paid 1.99 EUR as stated. But because they didn't took EUR (without any info about that) two cent got lost at unit conversions and I had to pay 2.01 EUR the end.It may only be 2ct, but I think gives very bad und unprofessional feeling to it.

I mean I go to a german website, buy something in EUR and they use some other currency? Didn't expect that.

Hi! I'm also from Romania and I confirm the problems with OVI store. I called Nokia Care Center and they confirmed me also the troubleshot they are having on OVi. It is a good sign that Nokia is working hard to resolve OVI issues and hopefully soon the things will be back to normallity. Hope this information was usefull!

Success!

After the phone call with VISA I contacted Nokia via the OVI-Support-form. They answered just a few hours later and told me to try to bye it again BUT NOT to save the credit card details for later use in the store. First this went wrong, so I called the service line given in the support mail. The first call was not successful, but they promised to call back later and after half an hour they did. No new advice, but told me, he wanted to give my OVI-Login to the shop support. This was at 13:00 MESZ (9 hours ago).

Now I was curious about it and tried it again and it worked!

So if the payment doesn't work for you, uncheck the "Save credit card details for further usage" (or whatever it called in your language) checkmark when typing your credit card data.

Now I try the game, download and install was fast (WLAN).
hobbsch

hobbsch I read your comments and had a ray of hope. Alas I am still getting card usage denied. I really hope this is ironed out soon. I was really looking forward to Zen Bound.

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