Guild Wars 2

Hi guys,

I wanted to bring something to your attention about the gem prices that i find pretty weird, and I wanted to know how the community and the people from GW2 react to this.

I like to buy a few gems from time to time… It gives me some nice opportunities to buy some nice items. I also like to think that i’m helping Arenanet with buying their gems, it gives me hope for a new expansion (maybe somewhere soon??!…)

However, I have a problem with something:

Why is it that player from EU servers buy 800 gems for € 10,00 while players from US servers buy the same amount of gems for $ 10,00?? If I make a quick calculation:

$ 10,00 = € 7,55
€ 10,00 = $ 13,25

?!

That something you’ll have to explain to me… I don’t like the thought of paying € 2,45 more for the same amount of gems than US players do? And before people start about the fact that it’s only € 2,45 please think about this:

For 4000 gems US players pay $ 50,00, for the same amount of gems EU players pay € 50,00!!

$ 50 = € 37,74
€ 50 = $ 66,25

?!

So this means EU players pay $ 16,26 more(or € 12,27!!) than US players for the same amount of gems!! Please explain this to me…?

Regards,
Suburbian

You may find this discussion enlightening: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/bltc/Buying-gems-with-Euro

Yeah, and still no admin response -_-"

not a big thing but it bothers me.
Its $10.00 not $10,00 to be clear, its " . " not " ,"

We use the “.” to separate dollars from cents. Where as we use the"," as a point of reference for every hundredth place.
So with the “.” its ten dollars, but with the “,” its ten thousand dollars.

Ya ya, I know im nit-picked. And we all know what you mean.

differences in taxes? I dunno.

In Europe tax is deducted from the sales price, so for 10€ in sales, A.net only gets about 8€. In US it’s the other way around, tax is added to the sales price, so for buying 10$ worth of gems, you actually pay 12$.

I must say, it is extremely annoying buying stuff in the US, because you’re always paying more than what’s written on the label. But that doesn’t take away the bad taste gaming companies leave in my mouth by being so stupid with it. It should be pretty easy to split those prices and allow for fair comparisons.

XelNigma.6315:

not a big thing but it bothers me.
Its $10.00 not $10,00 to be clear, its " . " not " ,"

We use the “.” to separate dollars from cents. Where as we use the"," as a point of reference for every hundredth place.
So with the “.” its ten dollars, but with the “,” its ten thousand dollars.

Ya ya, I know im nit-picked. And we all know what you mean.

Oh okay i’m used to “,” here in crazy Europe Thanks for pointing that out, but I think I made my point without that detail, don’t you think?

Because of taxes, simple as that.

lordkrall.7241:

Because of taxes, simple as that.

So you’re stating that we have to pay € 12.27 taxes on an amount of € 35.00?
That’s 35% taxes!! That still ain’t right

Sounds about right yeah. That is a rather usual number for taxes.

Not here in Belgium mate :P

By the way, when online stores like Amazon, eBay,… sell to customers from, let’s say, Belgium they have to respect the taxes/VAT used in that country…

Suburbian.1023:

Not here in Belgium mate :P

There are different kinds of taxes. The tax in question here is most likely a combination of import-tax and VAT.

Looking at VAT for the big countries in the EU.

Germany 19%
France 19.6%
UK – 20%
Ireland – 23%
Italy – 21%
Spain – 21%

Then you have to understand those exchange rate calculators you see, is between global banks. Individuals and businesses don’t quite get as favorable an exchange rate. Then you have to understand they don’t want to reset the price every day/month/year plus rounding to an amount for the lowest purchase so in the end, yes you are paying more than the US is.

You’ve never noticed that the list price of a game console is the same in $, euros or pounds before?

Edit: Oh look, Microsoft revealed the price of the XBox One today. $499, €499, or £429. Let’s see, what’s the cost of 40,000 Gems? $500, €500, or £425.

It’s a conspiracy I tell ya!

At least I wanna see where this comes from, so if i could get some detailed info about the VAT/ other taxes on gems, that’d be great!