…and I have to wonder: what do PC Gamer think, be affiliated as they are by the discount code? Do they even know?

Real shame–they have some great deals on atm. Hopefully they’ll get a different payment partner.

Yeah, they’ll email you a code which you then put into Steam.

How exactly does this Digital Download -> register to Steam works? Am I only going to get a code for steam or…?

Yep I used an M&S credit card and it went through fine. (They’re part of the HSBC group)
Sorry to all the guys and gals who are having issues :S

Wow, some incredible work there. Thanks very much for the info, saves me a lot of bother in trying to get it working.

Kudos

@JohnPeat

Nice work. That puts me out completely in that case, as my bank’s part of that group as well.

and even more info – this definately applies to anyone banking with the Lloyds group (so that’s Lloyds, TSB, Halifax, BoS and anyone else they’ve swallowed-whole) and possibly also to Barclays.

Ztorm claim to be ‘working on it’ but I’d not hold-out for a quick solution…

When I asked what that meant – they said they’d had a much higher than expected number of complaints relating to the vendor (they referred to Ztorm who run the site rather than PCWorld who’s branding it carries) and as a result they were blacklisted/transaction being automatically blocked.

They said they could try to flag my account to accept the transaction but it might take “up to 14 days” to take effect and the amount of effort required here has far exceeded my patience threshold so I said not to bother.

Yep, getting exactly the same problem.

Tried 2 different cards, both verified with my bank earlier today, and they were both blocked as an untrusted transaction.

Phoned my bank, they’ve authorised the cards for use with this system, and they’re still not going through.

Really irritating; I’ve likely spent about £8 on hold to my bank trying to sort this out.

Quick update – I raised a ticket with Ztorm (who run the PCWorldDownloads service) and they reckon it’s a problem with “my bank” and not their site.

My bank has no idea what they’re talking about – my card works on other sites – no-one seems to have a fucking clue (as usual)

Bottom line – the PCWDownloads site is for people lucky enough that their card might just work – it will be GAME’d (new term?) within a month at this rate 😉

I’ve had this same problem with them before – I’m going to guess you’re using a debit card or some sort???

They don’t ask for the secondary verification details of such cards (either issue number or start date on the card) which means the bank verification stage will fail every time.

They’re Swedish and don’t understand I suspect – chances of it being fixed if that is the issue are close to zero.

Good, I was worried that there was an issue with my card. I did have one instance of them asking for verification of card details but the second time around it just told me it hadn’t worked.

I’ll try again later, I guess

Same here – accepts details, forwards to the verification service and then fails saying I’ve entered details wrongly (without asking me for any).

Clearly they don’t want my money which is fine really – their loss…