World of Warcraft RAF Gametime

Yeah... in the World of Warcraft section for membership, people sell 1 month gametime, but with the recruit a friend option. This option has a high chance of getting removed from your account. I bought the gametime on the 14th from a kid, and 3 days later, World of Warcraft removed it from my account so I wasted my money. This option for membership shouldn't be allowed and should be taken out, especially considering all the people selling it say in their thread "This has a slim chance of getting removed." That is horseshit.

So my suggestion is getting it the hell of sythe and not able to be sold.

 

I do not know the specifics, but if they tell you they have RAF membership then simply do not buy it off them?

I think the issue can be resolved simply by investigating your seller.

 

Report them and if they don't refund they get banned. I personally avoid it and buy my own battlechest for $5.

I avoid the raf upgrades though if more people report it less people will continue to use them.

My cousins had legitimate time he had removed and never got a response since he raf himself

 

Can't really get him banned. I took the screenshot when I handed him the WoW gold for the RAF gametime, but since I received the gametime, I figured I didn't need the screenshot so I didn't save it, all I have is our skype convo and the email from Blizzard.

 

Should still report it, proof of trade, proof of blizzard email, and skype convo is more than enough. A vouch from both would still show you received the game time and paid for it.

I think a sticky should be put up which explains RAF and the possibility of it being charged back. Also in the same sticky it should be said that whether a seller says in ToS they aren't responsible it should be stated that they still are because even in rs upgrades the same rules apply.

 

The same thing happened to me I think. I just made a scam report about it.

Isn't this similar to rs pins anyway? Those aren't allowed on sythe anymore, same should be true for RAF gametime.

 

just can't use the word pins for legal purposes but people still upgrade with them

 

This was suggested in the past, and I don't think a decision was ever formally reached. If you can show proof that a large percentage of these trades go badly, then I agree that they should be removed. From just a cursory glance, it looks like there are SOME trades that go well

 

Recently a lot of people have been upgrading accounts through the Refer a friend system and has been causing a lot of accounts to lose their membership status. It is best to avoid these types of upgrades unless you absolutely trust the person selling them and will reimburse you if the account loses it's game time.

What is Refer a Friend?

https://us.battle.net/support/en/article/recruit-a-friend-faq

How exactly am I receiving my upgrade through this method?

Through this method a seller will be upgrading two accounts. One will be an account of their own and one will be your account.

These are the steps in most cases:
1. You send a invitation to the seller's account
2. The seller sets up the account after receiving the invitation.
3. The seller will then upgrade the account to battle chest + 1 month game time or 2 month game time if it was a Nightwing mount upgrade and this will be repeated if it was 3+ months.
4. After this point the trade will be done

So what are the associated risks?

These accounts run a person upwards $20 in total and its obvious these accounts won't be lying around collecting dust. If the account was upgraded through stolen information there is high possibility the seller's account will be banned and game time will be removed resulting in your account also losing it's game time.

This isn't always true though, a lot of RAF sellers are heavy gold farmers and bot extensively on the accounts they upgrade which has a high likely hood of the account being banned. If the account is banned and the gold farmer decides to charge back their payment or if Blizzard finds you were associated with those accounts your account will also lose the membership you had bought and can sometimes lead to your account being banned as well.

In most cases this is the email you will get if you were caught being associated with the account.

Alternatives?
Well for one you can use one of the many members who sell game time through game cards and avoid the Refer a friend method altogether.

Buy your own game time, it is $15 a month and cheaper if you buy different monthly subscriptions but at least you have the peace of mind knowing you won't be dealing with issues you can't resolve over a quick phone call.

I bought a RAF upgrade and it was charged back, what should I do?

In most cases your account will also be locked if the game time was removed, at this point the best thing to do would be to call blizzard and explain the situation, I would recommend saying you met the person online and didn't know their intentions for the account, but don't say you bought game time through them as this will just get you banned for association as well.

If you know who the seller was on Sythe, I would recommend you report them here: http://www.sythe.org/report-scammer/ . Don't be afraid of their ToS because they are void if the loss of game time was due to their actions, simply report them and they will be banned until they reimburse you.

 

I'd recommend stickying something like that or just add on to it if I missed anything but that basically covers most of the information regarding RAF memberships

 

That looks like a decent FAQ. If RAF gametime doesn't get removed, at least the FAQ Punjabi made should be stickied.

 

Bumping this up. Even if nothing is changed about people selling RAF gametime, then they should at least have to change their ToS or disclaimers. Here are some examples:







(Pics taken from 3 random threads selling RAF gametime)

 

They use stolen credit cards to purchase the RAF gametime and charge blizzard back.

I used to buy lots of months of RAF gametime, and then they just started removing my gametime.

Blizzard doesn't ban anyone for buying RAF gametime, they just remove it. I've had it removed like 500 times.

 

Bumping this up.

 

I know a few people who got banned for buying multiple RAF and the Referred accounts were banned/ charged back which led to theirs being banned as well.

 

Best thing we can offer is to just say post a report on these users and we'll go ahead and ban them.

If you can properly create a sticky that warns users from this program, I'd be happy to add it to the WoW marketplace .