Last year, we looked at the ACCC’s successful prosecution of Valve (provider of the online gaming platform, Steam) for breach of the consumer guarantees in the ACL. Valve’s contracts for example provided that all fees were payable in advance and not refundable. Valve’s main line of defence was that it was in the US state of Washington and so not bound by the ACL.
On 23 December 2016, the Court fined Valve $3 million for its breaches: $2.2 million for the contraventions involving the Steam Subscriber Agreement and $800,000 for the contraventions involving the Steam Refund Policy.
This was in a context where, while,the number of accounts developed over the 3 year period of the misconduct, Valve had some 2.2 million Australian accounts (I.e, about $1.36 per account) and had received communications about refunds from over 21,000 accounts. What is more, despite its no refunds policy wording, it had actually paid refunds to some 15,000 accounts. Another factor was Valve’s high-handed approach to its legal position in Australia; apparently deciding it had no liability as a matter of policy without reference to Australian legal advice.
Australian Competition and Consumer Commission v Valve Corporation (No 7) [2016] FCA 1553 (Edelman J)