how exactly do you plan a revamp of the system and what exactly is the 29x/30x/31x. please be as detailed as possible, since we're doing the same at my company, and who knows I may learn something here. I used to be an accountant before, but that' was 10 years ago. maybe things have changed. and if I remember correctly the daily rate was always more than the flat rate in just about every business I worked for.
Firstly, the two systems are separate. We're talking accounts and billing. I would love to see an accounts system revamp while the billing system stays the same.
Currently (as far as I can tell), the account system works like this: You create an account, attach a GameID to it, go through your two-week trial if you haven't already, then begin recurring billing. Once that payment stops (whether by you telling them you're done, canceling your account, or simply running out of money), the account is locked and if you were associated with anything (generally a squad, it seems) it also eats your GameID. I suspect a GameID can be unlocked(I'll find out on Monday), however an account cannot, no matter what. You must always create a brand new account and attach a free GameID to it.
Why? Why can't I have my OOZ662 account attached to the OOZ662 GameID and let it expire? There was a while I was burned out on the game. As punishment, I lost all my perks and squad affiliation. If they hadn't have done that mass GameID cleanout while I was gone, that would have been lost too. Recently I've had problems with my payment systems and so have gone through four more accounts, losing everything each time(though somehow keeping the GameID until now). I figure we ought to be able to "pause" our accounts; a yes/no option on the recurring billing. When your 30days after payment runs out, no playing until you send more money. Works on EvE(*shudder*) and PotBS, why not here?
As to the payments thing, it's assumed that a usage-based system based on too small an amount of time ruins people's lives (I've heard of at least two divorces due to the hourly billing mentioned earlier). Someone suggested daily billing. I assumed he meant "I log in and get charged for my day." That would be a huge overhead to whatever does the submission of charges (29x/30x/31x being the number of days in a month it would have to submit a tiny charge vs the 1x it submits a "big" charge now). I guess it could still be a monthly charge based on the amount you use, but that would still require a bit of work to the structure of the billing system to remember how many hours/days/whatever you've played.
Personally, I'd rather spend $.50 a day to not have to worry about a sudden $400 bill on a "good month" or to not need to "bean count" my time spent online in order not to go over. Everyone would then end up doing the same thing we are forced into by the cell services; buy a HECK of a lot more than you need in order to not worry about overcharges. More profit for HTC per user, but I bet less users since the competition bills ~$15 a month.
