It seems HTC are experiencing technical issues with their payment processing systems and customers’ banks which are leading to some pre-orders for their forthcoming HTC Vive VR system being cancelled.
So it seems it’s not just Oculus who are experiencing launch woes. We’re receiving multiple reports from people eagerly awaiting new of when they can expect to receive the HTC Vive VR system after pre-ordering, who have been told their order have been cancelled. It’s not yet clear how widespread the issue is, but the issue seems to stem from HTC’s choice of credit card payment system (namely the widely used Digital River).
Update 4/2/2016 @4pm ET: We received this official response from HTC on the matter.
While fulfilling this week’s orders for HTC Vive, a limited number of individuals were affected by auto cancellations due to processing issues with financial institutions. We’re actively working to resolve this, and have already reinstated orders for some customers. We want to assure our customers that we’ll work with them to process their payment so they can receive their Vive when they were expecting it. If you pre-ordered a Vive, we encourage you to contact your financial institution to notify them of upcoming charges.
We apologize for the inconvenience. If you have any questions regarding the status of your order please contact us at +1 888-216-4736 or online at http://www.htcvive.com/support/contactus .
Customers apparently began receiving cancellation notice emails from HTC overnight – the notices appear to have been preceded by a call to action to address the payment issues, but as many were asleep, orders were cancelled.
Update: We’re receiving reports stating that the declined payments from Digital River were flagged as fraudulent possibly due to the 3 digit security code (usually found on the reverse of your card) missing as part of the transaction.
We’ve reached out to HTC for comment on how widespread the issue is and for official instructions on what customers should do if they’ve received such a cancellation. We’ll update with the latest information once we have that.
For the moment, it seems that the aggregated advice being fed back from HTC customer support is to get in touch with them immediately. This report states that HTC are suggesting customers’ place in the pre-order may not be affected if HTC are contacted ASAP. Predictably however, HTC are experiencing high call volumes so you may need to be patient. HTC are stating no loss of place in line due to these issues via their twitter feed.
Interestingly however, HTC Vive’s official twitter feed are responding to queries from worried customers stating it’s an issue with the card issuers or banks.
Support channels are country specific, but if you head to the official HTC Vive website and click ‘Support’, you should find links to their live chat system and a form to email them.
There seem to be no published Vive specific support telephone numbers, but if you head to HTC’s main site and hit ‘Support’ menu item, you should find a ‘Call’ icon in the top right of the page which should take you to geographically specific numbers for your region.
You can also tweet the official HTC Vive twitter account here too.
Have you experienced issues with your HTC Vive order? We’d like to hear from you in the comments section below.