Gifting Policy Makes Stockpiling Gifts Pretty Much Impossible
Valve is making some changes to its gifting policy, in order to make the gifting process a more direct one. Said changes will affect the way gifts are sent, received and declined. Observe the complete list below:
Go ahead and buy a gift months in advance and have it delivered to a friend on time, every time.
In the old system, a declined gift would sneak back into the giver’s inventory and remain on their bill. Now, if a recipient already has the title, or just doesn’t want it, they can click decline and the purchase is refunded directly to the gift giver.
No more worrying if a Gift to E-mail or Gift to Inventory is going to work for a friend, gifts sent through the new system will always work on the receiver’s account. When there is a large difference in pricing between countries, gifting won’t be available and you’ll know before purchase.
Simple, right? According to some users, this is going to have some major implications for people who stockpile gifts. If you’re the sort of person who grabs a bunch of games to distribute to friends and loved ones during a holiday, the listed changes may make things much harder for you. Also, the new cross-region restrictions mean one fewer way for people in places like Australia to get games at a reasonable price. On the other hand, these same restrictions will hopefully slow down the shady business practices maintained by re-sellers like G2A. The changes in question are currently live, though it remains to be seen whether Valve will walk back any of the new policies based on user feedback.