I really don’t enjoy analogies because it’s not really accurate to compare two different services from two very different companies. And there’s always a way to poke holes in them –
In your original analogy, you are operating within the retailers existing refunds and exchange policy. In your original analogy, you exchanged your item with the vendor within 2 hours of purchase without equipping or modifying it. In your original analogy, Blizzard and your example retailer are actually offering the same customer service.
Lets modify your analogy to more accurately reflect the interaction with the game. You ordered a pair of shoes, you thought “I’ll run faster if I paint them red” so you modified them to better suit your desires. Then you realized you made a mistake and try to return them. I cannot imagine that a retailer, seeing that the product has been modified after purchase, is going to be too keen to accept the return from you.
I appreciate that you understand and are willing to take responsibility for the mistake. That also means accepting that the rules that apply to everyone else in this type of situation also apply to you. The in-game refund/exchange system is there so that players can resolve these mistakes without a Game Master. Because of that, our policy is that we will not assist if the system is not utilized.
We often see players who are upset with a declined request because from their perspective it is a very simple thing to fix. And yes, a lot of things can ‘technically’ be done very simply. If I wanted to max out a players gold, for example, I could do that very easily. If a player were to request that, I would still tell them no. Customer Support Departments (no matter the industry) operate based on policies which guide what they can and cannot do regardless of what may be technically possible.
When you’re told no, it doesn’t mean that the Customer Support team doesn’t care or doesn’t empathize with your situation but they do need to follow policies that were put in place for good reasons. In this case, the reason is that these types of requests took up a LOT of time in Customer Support in years past. So much time that the dev team decided building an in-game system would ultimately be more efficient even though it took developer attention away from other things. Now that is the system the game team expects players to use, and Customer Support is able to focus on problems where there may not be an in-game option to fix.
It’s ok to be dissatisfied with that, and we do provide surveys when your tickets are closed in order to gather satisfaction information and feedback. You should see them on your ticket history page: