It's every parent's nightmare: opening your bank statement and realizing your child has secretly spent hundreds of dollars on their favorite video game.
Thousands of Chinese parents experience that anxiety every year. Requesting a refund is often easier said than done, as users are often required to go through complex application procedures and prove that their children made purchases without parental consent.
Public anger over the issue has been growing in recent months, with several stories of distraught parents circulating on Chinese social media, and it appears the video game industry is finally starting to take action.
The Internet Association of China, a non-profit industry group, published draft guidelines on Tuesday to address the issue, outlining refund procedures for gaming companies to follow.
The guidelines contain few surprises, stating that parents and video game companies should agree on refunds based on the degree of fault on both sides, but if implemented, companies will be required to expedite the refund process by setting up dedicated channels to handle requests.
Chinese regulations should already make it difficult for minors to spend large amounts of money on online games: Game companies aren't allowed to offer paid services to users under the age of eight, and users between the ages of eight and 16 can only spend up to 200 yuan ($28) a month. For 16-18 year olds, the limit is 400 yuan.
But kids have found ways to get around these restrictions, and in recent months there have been a number of high-profile cases of minors withdrawing money from their parents' bank accounts.
In April, a video of a father slapping his 9-year-old son after he found out he had spent more than 13,000 yuan on a popular game called “Eggy Party” went viral on Chinese social media, sparking a heated online debate about who should be held responsible in such situations.
Video game maker NetEase eventually gave the father a full refund under public pressure, but many parents complain that claiming a refund is usually not that easy, with game companies employing complex procedures, opaque refund policies and strict evidentiary requirements to prove children spent money without their parents' knowledge.
“In-game purchasing is very easy – there is no facial recognition or identity verification, only a password is required. But the refund process is complicated, which makes me less willing to ask for a refund,” a father surnamed Wu, whose 10-year-old son spent more than 20,000 yuan on online games in 18 months, told domestic media in May.
According to the 2023 report, only 15.4% of Chinese parents know how much their children spend on video games. Among those who applied for refunds on their children's in-game purchases, about 30% said their application was rejected because they couldn't provide enough evidence to convince the video game company. More than 38% said they received a full refund.
According to the new guidelines, if online game providers fail to implement real-name authentication systems or implement necessary restrictions on in-game spending by minors, they will be held 100% responsible for overspending on in-game purchases by minors.
If a provider implements these restrictions but a parent helps a minor circumvent these measures or fails to provide proper supervision, the provider may be held 30% to 70% liable, the specific percentage depending on how effective the restrictions are deemed to be.
“If parents repeatedly help game companies circumvent restrictions or fail to supervise their children's in-game spending for an extended period of time, they should take full responsibility for their children's in-game spending. Adult users found to have falsely claimed refunds for purchases made by minors will be blacklisted and reported to the police,” the guidelines state.
“The new guidelines provide a standard way for minors and their parents to assert their rights and interests, and a template for how companies should respond to refund requests,” Yao Zhiwei, a law professor at southern China's Guangdong University of Finance and Economics, told domestic media.
The Chinese government has implemented strict regulations on underage video game use in the name of preventing addiction. A new law in 2021 limited minors' gaming time to three hours per week and ordered companies to strictly enforce the rules with a real-name registration system.
These anti-addiction measures have led to a significant decline in underage spending on video games over the past few years. Chinese gaming giant Tencent announced that in the first quarter of 2023, in-game spending and gameplay time among underage players fell by 90% and 96%, respectively, compared to the same period in 2020.
Additional reporting by Lee Dong-Wook.
(Header image: IC)
