Hey guys. So as far as I knew Steam was a free service. I have had Steam around and have bought a multitude of games via credit card. All was fine until Steam charged the credit card regularly with "Steam Service" or something like that? What is going on here? My account is currently suspended to prevent further charge for these fees. Any insight on this would be appreciated guys :)

shoundnt be, never has for me only charges when I buy games

I haven't personally heard of that happening, and generally you should only be charged during checkout when you're purchasing a game or DLC. The Giant Bomb forums are probably not the best place to get to the bottom of this.

Have you tried Steam support?

https://support.steampowered.com/?l=english

@Eric_Buck: You should definitely contact Steam support about it. What country are you in? How much are you getting charged?

I've never seen anything like that. The only time Steam has ever charged me is when I buy a game, and it's always exactly what's shown on the receipt. It shows up on my statement as "15STEAMPOWERED.COMBELLEVUEWA." If you're getting random charges (that's not from an MMO or something, but I don't know of any that go through Steam for monthly payments,) I'd contact their support ASAP.

That sounds like you're getting scammed by a company impersonating Steam. How exactly does the charge appear on your credit card statement?

Legit Steam transactions always show up like this for me:

It sounds to me like someone is charging you for something and calling themselves "STEAM something or other" in the hope that you won't notice the charge. I would contact your credit card company and ask them where the charge *really* originates from.

@iDarktread: Like 15.00$ . I'm fairly sure it's a separate charge from the actual games. I'm in Australia (of course -__- )

@Eric_Buck said:

@iDarktread: Like 15.00$ . I'm fairly sure it's a separate charge from the actual games. I'm in Australia (of course -__- )

$15 fits with an MMO, so an MMO angle sounds right. Have you purchased an MMO from steam such as Rift or any others?

Sounds strange, maybe it's an MMO like other people have suggested.

Every time you buy a game from Steam, they charge you for it. Like, in real bucks.

No but seriously check if the charge on your card matches the ones posted above. If not, it's probably some sort of scam. If so, contact Steam support.

@Knetic2341 said:

@Eric_Buck said:

@iDarktread: Like 15.00$ . I'm fairly sure it's a separate charge from the actual games. I'm in Australia (of course -__- )

$15 fits with an MMO, so an MMO angle sounds right. Have you purchased an MMO from steam such as Rift or any others?

If it's an MMO then the operator, not Steam, will charge. NCsoft/Trion, etc

@Matfei90 said:

@Knetic2341 said:

@Eric_Buck said:

@iDarktread: Like 15.00$ . I'm fairly sure it's a separate charge from the actual games. I'm in Australia (of course -__- )

$15 fits with an MMO, so an MMO angle sounds right. Have you purchased an MMO from steam such as Rift or any others?

If it's an MMO then the operator, not Steam, will charge. NCsoft/Trion, etc

I just assumed it would charge through Steam, and go to the publisher, sort-of like a unnecessary middleman.

@Knetic2341 said:

@Matfei90 said:

@Knetic2341 said:

@Eric_Buck said:

@iDarktread: Like 15.00$ . I'm fairly sure it's a separate charge from the actual games. I'm in Australia (of course -__- )

$15 fits with an MMO, so an MMO angle sounds right. Have you purchased an MMO from steam such as Rift or any others?

If it's an MMO then the operator, not Steam, will charge. NCsoft/Trion, etc

I just assumed it would charge through Steam, and go to the publisher, sort-of like a unnecessary middleman.

Nope. When you buy an MMO on Steam, what you're effectively doing is purchasing a product key. You then take that key and sign up as if you bought a retail edition.

Everything after that is handled outside of Steam, you just launch the game through the steam client, or even avoid steam altogether if the game uses an external launcher (NCsoft titles).