A Valve glitch made Steam Controllers cheaper for early adopters

If you didn’t secure a Steam Controller at launch, there’s no reason to panic. While resellers are listing the $99.99 controller for considerably more on websites like eBay, Valve says it is working on securing more stock. The fancy controller is also unaffected by RAMpocalypse, so there’s a real chance supply won’t be an issue here. Late adopters might still feel like kicking themselves for missing out on the initial Steam Controller launch window, though, and the reason is surprising.

Not long after the Steam Controller went on sale, some users noticed that their bills seemed slightly off. Apparently, a number of Valve customers weren’t charged an additional sales tax for their purchase. That fee isn’t much compared to the peripheral’s hefty price tag, but in states with higher sales tax, like California, it could mean a difference of just over $7.

All of this has come to light thanks to a viral post on the Steam subreddit, where one user shared an exchange they had with Valve. The do-gooder thought it might be helpful to inform Valve that they weren’t charged sales tax.

“Valve would figure it out eventually, I’d rather get it over with now than deal with any consequences down the road,” the user explained.

Valve told the Steam user that they were aware of the issue and had fixed it. More importantly, Valve said customers would not incur additional charges, even if they technically bought the Steam Controller more cheaply. Insert the Happy For You JPEG here.

It’s not really a big deal that most of us will have to pay what we’re supposed to for the controller, but the reaction to the user alert about the missing tax has been amusing. “teachers pet ahh post,” one commenter wrote.

“This is the first time I’ve seen anyone, online or in real life, complain about not having the pay sales tax on something, and asking the customer support about it,” another user said. “What the actual fuck is wrong with you lmfao.”