There’s a story brewing that EA have removed the option to refund Battlefront II through Origin, forcing you to go through customer service. The theory goes that this is to discourage you from cancelling the order because the process is too time-consuming. However, this isn’t the case.
Related: the PCGamesN Star Wars Battlefront II review.
When you buy games through Origin you can see your purchases in your order history tab. Under most games you have the option to refund your purchase:
However, as BatofSpace points out on Reddit, the option isn’t available on Star Wars Battlefront II orders:
I bought a copy of the game to confirm this wasn’t an issue specific to Australian customers, and I encountered the same problem:
Now, according to EA’s refund policy, we should be able to refund Battlefront II within seven days of release if you’ve pre-ordered and haven’t yet launched the game:
If you go to EA’s refund page you can see what games are available to refund, and Battlefront 2 isn’t listed there either.
The theory in BatofSpace’s post is that EA have taken away the button, forcing you to go through customer service, a process that is time-consuming and might discourage someone from going through with the refund.
However, there is no evidence that there would usually be an option to refund a pre-order in this manner. In fact, there are forum posts dating back to 2013 from people looking to work out how to cancel their pre-orders and being directed to go through customer service.
Just to check that this wasn’t an issue specific to Battlefront II, I bought the Elite Trooper Deluxe version of the game that allows early access to the game and, for that version of the game, you do have a refund option in Origin:
(Yes, my bank account is hurting in confirming this story.)
That version of Battlefront II does appear on the refund page:
All the documentation on EA’s support pages suggests you should be able to refund pre-orders through Origin, which is likely where the confusion has stemmed from. However there is no evidence that Battlefront 2 is any different from any other preorder on Origin and that EA has removed the button. Rather it was never there.
If you want to cancel a game you pre-ordered through Origin you’ll need to go through customer services.
Alternatively, you could wait until the game launches on Friday and then refund the game through Origin.