In the VSL T&C it just says a 'handling fee' will be charged for replacing the licenses, without saying that it could be €2,000 for a customer with the whole collection.

This sounds to me like it's in breach of the "Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999"

I'm going to make a complaint to Consumer Direct (UK consumer protection agency), see if they can do anything about this. (EDIT: I see I have to make a formal complaint to VSL first, ok).

Does anyone agree with me here that VSLs customer-punishment policy is scandalous?

Ah a peaceful resolution.  The pain, the joy, the pain, the joy.

So here's what happened - I WASTED £7 sending my broken USB Key to VSL this morning, because just now Steinberg sent me, free of charge, as a matter of policy, all the lost licenses, INCLUDING the lost VSL licenses.

The moral of this story? Make sure you put a Steinberg product on every USB key you have, then you get free activation codes, DON'T send it back to those money-grubbing fiends in Vienna.  ESPECIALLY if you have a lot of VSL products - their cheating policy could cost you over a thousand £, $ or €.

Actually, maybe Steinberg did this because the broken key was theirs, not a Vienna Key. In which case, the moral is that you need to transfer your VSL library onto a Steinberg USB eLicenser instead of the Vienna Key. So, without knowing, it's hard to know exactly *what* the moral is, except Steinberg = hooray, VSL = boo, hiss!

:) 

Dan, have you actually even thought about why Steinberg can provide free licences, but VSL can't? Could it be something to do with the fact that Steinberg owns the copy protection system, and therefore doesn't have to pay a 3rd party to supply licences?

DG

DG - have you thought about the fact that if VSL knew this they could have told me to contact Steinberg instead of offering to waste my time and take my money?

@dagmarpiano said:

DG - have you thought about the fact that if VSL knew this they could have told me to contact Steinberg instead of offering to waste my time and take my money?

I have no idea whether VSL "knew this", or if it is indeed an official policy of Steinberg. All I was trying to do was offer some explanation as to why VSL can't provide free licence replacement.

However, to describe the VSL team as money-grubbing (don't you mean grabbing?) is very unfair in my view. You might also like to consider that this policy from Steinberg (if it is a policy) has only been in force since they bought Syncrosoft, for exactly the same reasons I outlined above.

DG

Just a thought:

Doesn't the eLicenser Control Center synchronize and backup all your licences?

Maybe there's some way to restore from their database?

I don't like the harsh words directed above to VSL. They are incredibly helpful and supportive in general, particularly when compared to other companies like EastWest and Native Instruments. This suggestion of a huge cost of replacement does disturb me though.....

@Another User said:

I don't like the harsh words directed above to VSL. They are incredibly helpful and supportive in general, particularly when compared to other companies like EastWest and Native Instruments. This suggestion of a huge cost of replacement does disturb me though.....

The only current solution is to make sure tat your keys are less than 2 years old, and make sure that you have insurance. This way you are covered for loss, theft, and breakage.

DG

Yeh I know, it's easy to throw out harsh words when you're annoyed.  I think though if *you* got an unexpected obstacle while under work pressure, then charged money with no justification offered, and then a different company solved it quickly without asking for money, you'd be annoyed at the policy of the first company.

As for this not being Steinberg policy DG, you might be right. Maybe I just got a trainee who did something generous without realising it, who knows.  

SO anyway yeh I'll calm down and shut up and get on with my work now.  But before you blindly worship VSL, you'd better cross your fingers and hope you don't lose your whole VSL collection on a dead USB Key - it might be a pricey fix if you have to pay their generous 'handling fees'.

As for Money Grubbing DG, it's American for Money Grabbing. Don't ask me why I said that, I'm from the UK. Perhaps, it's the 'grubby' implication.

Is it really true that this very high €20 per license fee is just something which Steinberg charges VSL, and so they are only passing on their cost?

Even if so then the whole system could still be improved.  They should send out email warnings after two years for example, that the warranty has expired, with the option to buy a replacement or purchase an extended warranty. Also, the actual potential costs should be specified as a clear warning when buying, not just a very vague 'a handling fee will be charged' hidden in the T&C.

How likely is it that typical composers will be keeping track of how old their USB keys are, remembering to replace them every two years and then transferring all the licenses across?  Does anyone reading this do that? Only people burned by a key failure I bet.

Ooh, good info. I now have almost the entire DVD collection and lots of download licenses I got along the way on one 5 year old VSL dongle. I also have a spare Steinberg dongle sitting around so it looks like I should spend some time moving house.

So... I'm sorry about your struggle, Dan, but thanks for calling attention to it for the complacent like me, especially the fact that Steinberg replaced it all.

Update and warning for you didger -

I asked Steinberg their policy and they said that because most of the licenses on this USB Key were Steinberg, they made an exception and provided the VSL activation codes, whereas if it was all VSL licenses the request would have to go through VSL.

My advice, which I've just done now, is to buy a new Vienna Key every 2 years and transfer all your VSL licenses onto that. It's a PITA but at least it beats pulling your eyes out with anger at the extreme cost of lots of replacement codes.  With your spare dongles, you could make a nice necklace. Or use them for temporary demo licenses.

Anyway surely in a few years everything will be in the cloud... no more USB pains, we can hope....!

This page seems to contain useful information about this topic:

https://www.steinberg.net/en/support/knowledgebase_new/show_details/kb_show/usb-elicensersteinberg-key-details-tips-and-troubleshooting.html#lk

Accordingly it sounds like as long as you have a registered device then the codes can be downloaded from the elicenser software. See section 2 last paragraph where it states:

"I broke my USB-eLicenser!

• You need to buy a new empty USB-eLicenser.
  Please make sure that the defective key has been registered in MySteinberg before contacting us for any license replacement.
  The new activation code(s) can then be downloaded to the new USB-eLicenser using the License Control Center."

What I find kind of irritating is the fact that you can - if you have registered the Special Edition - you can buy the standard library of many instruments at a reduced price, e.g. the french oboe for as little as EUR31. You get a licence for every single DL-Instrument. If the "handling fee" was just a 1:1 passover from Steinberg, this would be a very bad deal for VSL.

I even wonder more where VSL gets all those demo licences from. Does Steinberg NOT charge for demo licences? Does it take tem less effort to provide a demo licence than a permanent one?

hmmm, do not think it does matter here what Steinberg charges. VSL chose this copy protection so they are responsible for pricings, not Steinberg IMHO. They are not a victim, but a customer. (which in case of Steinberg -in my past experience -really seem to make not much difference -but again, thats VSL's problem. they are free to quit )

personally I consider this fee insulting. eLicenser is the key with the worsed convenience for the customer -compared to iLok online license storage etc. -and on Mac it is troublesome anyways.

knowing this I might really have to think over which products I license in the future. there are companies that have ways more customer friendly licensing policies.

best

I think it would be fair if they made an official statement - of course 20 € per license is also some kind of handling fee, however, it pretty fast gets really expensive. calculating how much that was for my current key with vienna licenses is not encouraging. Also, a span of two years warranty for the key seems quite -also considered the time it takes syncrosoft to transfer licenses from one key to another -which I would describe as painfully slow. and of course there is also risk with that super management software, to ruin something.

just my thoughts

best

Well I love VSL. But I too would be furious if I had to go through all the above and if I understand correctly - pay €20 per licence. Furious. 

@Christian Marcussen said:

Well I love VSL. But I too would be furious if I had to go through all the above and if I understand correctly - pay €20 per licence. Furious. 

Agreed! I have around 20 full library collections, several download instruments and other Vienna software, all on one key. (Because everything runs through MIR). Sometimes I have to take the dongle out, for mulitple reasons. I can't even imagine having issues like the ones mentioned above. Apart from the cost, I use VSL for work which I am bound with very tight deadlines. I simply CANNOT afford to fail on delivering to my clients. Infact one of the reasons I love VSL, is because the software is rock solid! When thinking about this, I think Syncrosoft and every other similar company should consider building military grade dongles made of other material than plastic. And also having the ability to pull-in the dongle interface plug, like some USB pen drives available on the market. As much as this might sound a bit over the top, after considering the amount of money spent on software licences and how much time, money and hassle it takes to bring them back, I guess it all starts to make sense.

There are 4 important questions that VSL need to answer:

1. Do you charge €20 per license for EVERY replacement code? Including individual instrument downloads? And therefore people might be paying over €1,000 if their USB key dies and is over 2 years old?

3. Could you please include specific warnings about the 2 year warranty, and the exact costs of replacement if a USB key gets over 2 years old, when people buy software, so that they are clearly warned?

4. Could you email customers when their USB key is getting close to 2 years old, as a reminder to buy a new one, with another warning about the costs in the event of a failure?

My point is that the very high costs in themselves are not the main problem. The main problem is that VSL have a 2 year warranty and an extremely expensive replacement program, WITHOUT TELLING ANYONE, and therefore customers have no ability to plan ahead and do the sensible thing - buy a new key every 2 years and regularly transfer their licenses across to avoid getting caught out.

Is this too much to ask?!

 Perhaps I can make a suggestion for VSL to consider.  They could introduce a kind of license protection scheme.

If a solution is to buy a new key every two years at €24 (€12 per year), then maybe a system could be introduced that allows users to pay €10 per year to VSL to be part of the scheme that would replace any lost licenses and key free of all costs to the user (faulty key only - would have to exclude lost/stolen keys).

If VSL had a thousand users take this up, that would give them a fund of €10,000.  Assuming the keys don't fail that often, this may or may not be enough funds,  so if this principle is good, VSL would know how many faulty keys they see each year, and would know what fund they would need to cover this. 

Think of it more, as all the users getting together to contribute towards each others license replacements.

I would be would be quite happy to pay €10 per year for this security, although VSL are the only people that could come up with a workable figure.