Just got an email from Steam regarding currency

[chozo_hybrid]

Got this in my inbox this morning:

"Dear Steam User,

Steam will soon be priced in New Zealand Dollar!

If your Steam wallet has any money in it on March 24th, 2015, your U.S. Dollar balance will be converted to New Zealand Dollar, at a conversion rate dictated by market value at the time of conversion.

To view your account balance, simply log into your Steam client or the Steam website at http://www.steampowered.com. Once you have logged in, you will see your balance in the upper-right corner next to your account name.

Thanks,

The Steam Support Team
http://support.steampowered.com"

I had forgotten they were doing this, but does anyone know whether prices will change conversion aside? New game in the store costs the usual $60 US will cost us that converted, or are we going to get screwed and have to pay $100 or more just because of where we live now?

As far as I can see from the email, they'll just be converting the currency, but why do I have a bad feeling in my gut about this...

 

[SoreWristed]

The whole idea behind this will be, as you fear, about regional pricing. See this in conjunction with this thread =>http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.872267-Steam-is-now-Regionally-restricted

 

[Maximum Bert]

I dont know to be honest but I would expect to get screwed im sure they are not doing it for your convenience usually its just a reason for a price hike and hey if you dont get screwed then you have something to be happy about.

 

[Hairless Mammoth]

Yep, start checking other region's prices and conversion rates as soon as the change happens. If they do something dirty, don't buy things from them (until the prices drops and sales that meet your budget) and spread the word to everyone you know in NZ. If enough people protest (with their money), publishers might get a message about ripping off people in other regions (or Valve will at least notice a revenue dive and may relay that message to the pubs).

 

[Sillarra]

To be honest, when this happened to my region (Malaysia), I was a bit surprised, but ultimately I didn't mind much because when I checked, the game prices actually drops compared to converting directly to USD. But then again, this is the region that got locked from sending gifts to anyone outside my own (game bought from this region can only be activated here).

The one thing my friend complained was that they no longer accepts PayPal, which is an odd move.

 

[Raggedstar]

They did that with Canada last year. Our game prices are similar to the USA's and we would have to convert anyways on check-out (for example, we would be charged $15 USD, so it would roughly be about $16 CND), so it didn't make a huge difference. Now it posts the value of a game in CND. Mind you the loonie is shit right now so our prices are getting a bit wonky both on Steam AND in physical retail. Our digital sales through Steam at least mean us in Ontario don't pay 13% tax.

Can't help you too much with NZ. Canada and the USA historically had the same prices when our exchange rates were a little more even.

 

[chozo_hybrid]

To be honest, when this happened to my region (Malaysia), I was a bit surprised, but ultimately I didn't mind much because when I checked, the game prices actually drops compared to converting directly to USD. But then again, this is the region that got locked from sending gifts to anyone outside my own (game bought from this region can only be activated here).

The one thing my friend complained was that they no longer accepts PayPal, which is an odd move.

They're doing that region thing to everyone now I believe, which I guess kind of makes sense, but still sucks. I just hope that prices don't change radically, because that would suck for people not just in my country, but lots of places.

 

[CrystalShadow]

Fairly sure the prices I got both in the UK and Australia were already in the local currency. So, this isn't news to me, but...

Yes, I hope they aren't using this as an excuse to radically alter the prices...
That would suck.
A lot.

 

[Simskiller]

Got similar email when they converted to Cdn$

Prices just got converted, no other real pricing difference (but hey, its canada, there never really was to begin with).

 

[Phrozenflame500]

Yeah we went through the Cdn$ change a while ago, and as people have said they basically just bumped the price up by the then current exchange rate (about 10% at the time, now it's much worse so we're actually getting a bit of a discount). We also don't pay providential taxes.

Best case scenario they'll just to the same thing with you, which would mean a 60$US would be 80$NZ going by the current online exchange rate.