UPDATE: The Welcome Back offer has been extended until 9am Pacific on Tuesday, July 5th. If you haven’t had a chance to download the offerings, please do so before then.
Just a friendly reminder: Your complimentary Welcome Back games are waiting for you, but they won’t wait forever.
To welcome customers back after last month’s outage, we’ve made a selection of PS3 and PSP games, as well as a 30-day subscription to PlayStation Plus available for free download via our Welcome Back program. This offer expires on Sunday, July 3rd, so please make sure to claim what’s yours before then.
For more details on the Welcome Back program, please click here.
Now start downloading, and thanks for being a part of PlayStation Network!
I just want to point out Post 277 by Neil_McK1701 as perfectly highlighting exactly what is going on right now, to anybody on the PS staff that’s handling this stuff.
Please take particular note of his remarks on time zones and that this is the US Blog.
I swear, you Sony folks can just be maddening. Not like, Grrr I’m so angry at you, but like What were they thinking? sort of way. You just don’t make sense. I solved the first Rubik’s Cube I ever handled when I was six, and I can’t for the life of me figure out why you make the decisions you decide.
Just ordered my brand new XBox 360 and put my PSP, PS2, PS3 and all 4 of my kids PSPs online for sale. Will be adding BOTH my 42″ Sony LCDs, bluray 370 surround system and 5 disc DVD surround systems as soon as the new Yamaha and LG gear arrives in the next few weeks. Sony has been the best advertisement their competition could hope for.
Dishonest, incompetent and lazy. Just whet everyone else thinks of Sony and now Sony has gone and proven them all right.
Sony has lost my business permanently.
I will not buy a single PSN game again.
I will not buy a single PS3 retail game again.
Shame on Sony’s part for ending it before the allotted time. BTW through July 3rd mean any time after July 3 @ 11:59pm. Not mid-day. Glad to see Sony is back to their trick again….
This is so rediculous. Me and my brother have been trying to reset out passwords so we could login in the firstplace so we could access the welcome back package, but the reset password always leads to a site matience notice. Luckily we remembered qriocity and tried that using that to reset it, it finally worked so we finally got new passwords but now we cant find the package. Im pretty sure its still the 3rd and you said through the day…. so we werent even given a chance to get the package because the site is always under matience… very poor sony.. very poor
Just like everybody else, I can’t find the Welcome Back link. I was hoping to try out PS+, but I guess this will end up saving me even more money. Thanks Sony.
Thanks sony, Gotcha! bad bad business. The free games should have been a credit on each account. Period. No time limits. Accounts expire, systems die, that is how you let a deal that was born from a security failure go forth.
Pathetic, not only Sony but the customers too. The customers actually believe what Sony says? They have been lying since they launched the Welcome Back program. First off when it launched they never gave a time limit for when it would be gone. One would assume that it would be there forever, for the people who were users before the outage. Then, suddenly they give a date on a forum site, and not even on there actual PS3- PSN networks.
That’s Sony for you they are greedy, and they always will be. That’s why they started charging for YLOD PS3’s, even though its proven to happen to the FAT models after a while. Yet they try to convince their customers that it is a probability. What a joke Sony, I am not a 2 year old you cannot fool me.
I just got back to my home after being away, knowing that is would be my last chance to access the welcome back package, and was outraged to find that Sony had ended it at 2:00 eastern time. All other companies end their offers at 12:01, what makes Sony so special as to not have to end it then, AND not say what exact time they are going to end it. I am very disappointed in Sony and will be following up with more complaints if it is not extended by a day or two.
add me to the list of unhappy customers didn’t get my game because they shut the program of at 9-ish
sorry for the double post but the op claims to be lookin into it http://twitter.com/#!/jeffrubenstein
It is still July 3rd. Why has the Welcome Back option been removed? Is it a time zone issue? It was there this morning and I downloaded 1 game. Technically, given the time, those of us in the Mountain Time zone should still have time to download our other games.
Actually, saying the program runs through July 3rd means it runs through the completion of July 3rd, and as such, it should have run through July 3rd worldwide, not just through July 3rd in certain time zones, especially since it was not stated that way.
I can’t honestly complain about my failure to get free services and products, but this failure of Sony to honor their commitment is really laughable considering how they got into this mess in the first place.
If anything, since “Welcome Back” was meant as an apology, an additional grace period should have been included, not an early termination of the offer. This additional screwup is really good news for Microsoft.
Thank God I got both my two games. Unlike many of the obvious choice, I selected WipEout HD instead of LBP.
First, I want to have the Game of the Year Edition of the latter. Second, that racing game comes bundled! (Fury). And third and most importantly, the game is a hell of a ride! …Literally!
I wish the PSN keeps as strong as ever and giving us a god sevirce as always. That’s the main reason I chose the PS3 as my re-entry for console gaming.
Greetings.
I had signed in this morning and downloaded one of the welcome back games. I am in the Mountain Time Zone like Wonder92c and tried to sign back in this evening to look at the other welcome back games. I am not understanding why the time zone is set for availability for the welcome back. I also agree with Tribrix, having the promo running through July 3rd should be available world wide. Playstation is not only used in one time zone, it should be available through all time zones.
You know, if Mr. Rubenstein had simply posted “I’m really sorry, I posted the wrong date in the blog! I don’t know if we can do anything about it now, but I apologize for my mistake,” instead of “Why did people wait? We were clear from the beginning,” people would probably be taking this a lot better. It’s like a politician denying fooling around — people are more willing to forgive misdeeds than they are to forgive not owning up to them.
It’s about not treating your customers like idiots. Way to “manage” the social media there, guys.
Amazing… I am completely shocked at Sony dropping the ball here at the finish-line. Unlike the Network outage that led us here, the ‘Welcome Back’ plan was on your terms with your own time-lines. There is absolutely no excuse for failing to execute the plan according to the date that YOU announced.
Offering something “through July 3rd” means that it should be available “through July 3rd.” Period. End of discussion. There is no debate here. When a movie theater says the show starts at 8:15pm, and then starts it 15 minutes early, customers deserve to be pissed. When a retail store says that they close at 9:00pm, and then shuts their doors at 8:35pm, customers deserve to be pissed. And when a multi-billion dollar corporation tells you that they have arranged to give you something for free to make up for their colossal screw-up, and then proceeds to yank the offer hours early, customers deserve to be pissed!!!
Seriously Sony, if you can’t even pull this off without a hitch, how can you honestly expect me to trust you with my personal information and my hard-earned dollars for your products and services?
LOL@285 Wirehedd
Yeah, I for one totally believe you gathered up your family’s wonderful Sony electronics collection and put them up for sale.
I mean, if my dad suddenly had a butthurt with Nintendo back in the 90s and snatched up my games, GameBoy, and SNES, I don’t quite think that would have won him Dad of the Year in my book.
I love the post, really. You even started it with the dessert, saying you bought an X-Box 360 because of all of this. There’s nothing quite like ice cream for breakfast.
I just know about this, can you shut it down till 5? because i was supposed to today use PS plus because i was out of the city :S
I just noticed something odd…
On the Sony Facebook page, it said that the Welcome Back package ends on July 2nd. But on Sony’s Twitter, this blog, and in other reminders, the end date is July 3rd.
I’m a grown woman and I can afford my own toys so it doesn’t bother me if I miss the Welcome Back package. Inconsistencies and carelessness bother me though. If I had known the deadline was July 2nd then I would have redeemed it earlier. First you are careless with my personal information, now you are careless about your own deadlines? I want to give the benefit of the doubt here but I feel like there is a level of dishonesty at work. How can a large company get confused over their own deadline?
I believe that “through July 3rd,” to most people, means an individual has the option to take the specified action during the whole of that day, unless otherwise noted. Sony needs to allow those that intended to access the “Welcome Back Program” today that opportunity.
Pathetic, typical greedy corporation tactics… they tell you that the welcome back will be “available through July 3”, but they take it down a few minutes after July 2 into the 3rd. Nice use of semantics to get around customer satisfaction. I thought I would continue to support sony but this just shows they have no regard for customers.
look sony, i have no excuse my car did catch on fire and that kept me from downloading the welcome back program, there was no 30 day power outage, i was not out of the country, i was not in a coma, my wifi did not hold out on me, or my ps3 had some mystery break down….
i waited to get ps+ to give me some extra time. my problem with all this is the way you worded this blog..ended july 3 means i have 24 hours to get my stuff and on july 4 it is no more.
look i dont plan to put my sony stuff on craigslist and buy a wii (thought i would say that since x box is getting all the attention) nor will i blow it up as a tribute to the 4th and protest to sony, or melt them down and mold my on xbox.
i just want you to honor your word. if not i will continue to use my free ps3 that i got with reward points and when the psv comes out i will get one with my reward points…..so free hardware and games i really cant complain.
That sucks that Sony says it ends on July 3rd so when I go to get my free games it’s ended early.
can u still get them? i know sunday last day of welcome back. i cant find them?
Sr. Social Media Manager Jeff Rubenstein on Twitter, “There were 30 days to claim it, not sure why people decided to wait. We were clear from the outset.”
It doesn’t matter what my “excuse” is, but I will tell you since you anyway, having a newborn and busy work schedule, this is the first vacation/free time I had since the program started.
If you say we have it “through July 3” typical people who read that understand it was being available throughout the day on July 3, not ending at the start of July 3.
It was nice to do this BUT when something says “will be available through July 3.” I think it’s assumed that it will be there on the 3rd! If the deal was for it to end on the 2nd at 11:59:59… it should have read as ENDS ON THE 2nd…. I am not too happy about this.
This is funny to me at this point. You people had 30 days to sort this out, which you failed to do, and now you’re complaining?
I’m sorry, but it’s no one’s fault but yours that you made the choice to wait until the last minute. I don’t are about your reasons or excuses; claiming the package took me five minutes. If you’re telling me that you couldn’t spend 5 minutes sorting this out within 30 days, you are, straight up, a liar.
I agree with what Jeff said on Twitter 100%.
Yeah, i couldn’t download my free game today…Sony you should give another day or two for the people to download their free games or give us vouchers for the free games.
I’m not joking.
I wish I was but after the problems I’ve had with Sony now for the last 2 years (there were other issues before this regarding promised features that never materialized) and I’ve wanted to upgrade the family room and game rooms and this is the excuse I need.
This is the straw that broke the camel’s back. I’ve been trying to get through to PSN since Thursday and have been trying to get a response from customer service about the money the vaped out of my store wallet since the outage and they haven’t responded ONCE.
I’ll go out tomorrow (I’m in Canada) and buy my kids each a 4th gen 64GB iPod Touch just to soften the blow for them if they decide they don’t want to part with the PSPs.
My older kids have iPhones and the little ones (8 and 10 yrs old) already have 3rd gen 16GB iPod Touches so selling the older ones afterward is no big deal.
My sons have been asking for an XBox 360 and I’ve always told them they didn’t need one with the PS3. I guess I was wrong.
It may seem petty but Sony doesn’t seem to give a rat’s ass about their customers so I have no use for them or their gear.
Principle counts to some of us.
If Sony does not resolve this problem then I am definitely going to get rid of all my Sony products as well and never recommend Sony to anyone. I like many others have the PS2, PSP, and PS3, but I also have an Xbox and 360 as I like all video games and each console has games that don’t come out on the other. However I’m willing to forget all the “exclusive” Sony games forever and just stick with my 360 and whatever they come out with next. I was even looking forwards to the PSP 2 (I will NOT ever call it the name they “officially” gave it because it is so lame and stupid) but I will pass on it this time around. Plus it’s not like I play my PSP that I have now all that much anyways, so the PSP 2 would be the same as I would only play it on trips or during lunch break and or Dr visit’s, stuff like that.
I will be also contacting the Attorney General and lawyers to see what kind of lawsuit can be brought against Sony for this FALSE ADVERTISING. They obviously haven’t learned their lesson and still don’t care about their customers. It’s obvious with all the people that has called into support and the reps don’t care and don’t help.
This is absolutely RIDICULOUS!!!
you can still get the welcome back gifts from europe who are several hours ahead of us, thanks for the shaft sony here in the us. Is this how you celebrate the fourth by lighten the fuses of your supporters and watching them explode, happy b day usa. KABOOM
HEY JEFF YOU ENJOYING WATCHING THE FIREWORKS SHOW HERE ON THE BLOG. KABOOM THERE GOES ANOTHER PS SUPPORTER. SUCH A PR NIGHTMARE. BOOM…BANG…HOW DOES IT LOOK FOR YOU JEFF….
very disappointed with Sony today, still had one more game to download, figured I’d do it about 15 minutes ago. Couldn’t find welcome back link. Oh wait, Sony had to really cheat us out of this last day. Learn to use english in your posts. (“through July 3rd”)
Seriously? I got the games but was waiting to get the ps+ trial. Went to get it after a full Sunday of baseball and it is gone? Through the third. Still the third here…
IT IS STILL JULY THIRD AND THE WELCOME BACK TAB IS MYSTERIOUSLY GONE!!!!!! I want to download infamous and Sony took it down early!!!! WHY???
I tried to download my games last week but it would only ley me select them. It said something about me being able to download them in July. I logged on today and they aren’t there to download.
Would they really lose money by extending this offer? Maybe the Sonly Plus would cost them money but they free games?
Am I correct that I couldn’t download them….just chose them last week and since I did, shouldn’t I be able to download them?
This ticks me off to BTW. They should extend this now that the people with lives realize it’s time to move on this Welcome Back program.
was looking up PSP games, decided on ModNation Racers/Killzone Liberation, and now “Welcome Back” icon is gone. Should have said offer good through July 2 11:59:59 (PST?)
smh -_-
Yup, Welcome Back tab is gone. I thought I had this available through July 3rd…meaning THROUGH the whole day of July 3rd….
Alright, Jeff Rubenstein says he is checking on this on Twitter, we have to give the man credit at least for that. Fight for us Jeff man and you’ll be rewarded with happy customers . :)
I have to say though that the Welcome Back program made Sony get more sales from me. Not only did I buy Braid and will buy Shank, and maybe some more DLC, but I will buy Pursuit Force Extreme Justice thanks to getting the game free from this program.
Sony really dropped the ball ending the Welcome Back Program early. Jeff, if Sony was “clear” the original FAQ and your “reminder” would have given an exact time the program ended. Instead the exact time for the end was definitely ambiguous. If everything was clear there certainly wouldn’t be this many complaints.
If the Welcome Back tab on the PlayStation Store wasn’t prematurely taken down, then please explain to me why I was still able to download the 100 Free Virtual Items from the kiosk in PlayStation Home on July 3rd at 5PM Central Time? Wasn’t that also part of the same program?
The facts are that the 100 Free Virtual Items for PlayStation Home was available on July 3rd (as promised) but the Free Games (PS3, PSP) and 30 Free Days of PlayStation Plus was not. (promise broken)
Jeff, would it kill Sony to just turn it back on and let all those entitled redeem the offer? After all, the only reason for the complaints is the incorrect end date in the original FAQ.
This has been done.