Memeo Unicom Systems Inc. Unicom Global Asked me to pay twice as much for a software license update I already own Campbell CA

Seriously Robert, this is not meant to be a debate forum! If you are NOT DIRECTLY AFFECTED by these reports stay away!

Again this is a PUBLIC site that contrary to your wishes or beliefs, this site allows for the public to provide comments and has no requirements that we must be somehow directly affected. With the added comments that bring up alternate points of view, other members of the public can read both sides and decide if it is indeed ludicrous to expect to be able to upgrade software for less than you originally paid.   As remember that is what you originally stated you wanted.. to pay less than you ORIGINALLY paid.

This is as far as I can go with this, as I said I don't intend to go back and forth. So I won't be replying anymore. But since I am fairly sure you will want to get the last word in I am sure we will see another post.

Based on Robert's last reply, it has become clear that there are people on this planet who need a life! Robert decided to spend an inordinate amount of time responding to this matter that doesn't concern him at ALL!  Robert even admits not working for nor being affiliated in any way with the company I reported this incident about, the Unicom/Memeo Group. Robert believes that this is a "PUBLIC" platform he can just freely post his opinions to.

Seriously Robert, this is not meant to be a debate forum! If you are NOT DIRECTLY AFFECTED by these reports stay away! There are other platforms better suited for debates and PUBLIC comments, ever heard of Facebook or Twitter?

Proof that Robert is not part of the Unicom Memeo Group is listed below in his last answer:  "First off it is standard on this site that if someone doesn't like what is said and goes against what they believe, the default response is "Oh you must work for them". So contrary to your belief I do not now or have I ever worked for this company. This is a PUBLIC web site and just like you can post, so can the public. And this may be a shock to you but the PUBLIC may not always agree with you.

OTHER ASNWERS AND REBUTTALS Robert decided to get involved in:

What you fail to understand apparently is that I ALREADY OWN THE LICENSE. I already paid for it back in 2013!

Robert's Reply:  - Yes, and this is what you fail to understand. You paid for the LICENSE to INSTALL and USE a specific version of specific software, you did not purchase the software itself. What did the license state about upgrades? What did it state if it no longer worked on "newer" machines. Did it grant you upgrades at a lower cost than you paid regardless of the reason you "need" to upgrade?

Now, we can go back and forth all day about prices of various commodities. But based on your response even though case after case could be shown where prices have outpaced inflation, you will come up with some justification why it is invalid and this is the only company in the history of business that is charging more than they should. That is just in straight costs. I haven't even bought up situations where you get less product/services for the same price today, or the software companies(even the one's you mentioned) going to cloud based models or "subscription" services to get more money for less services. Where if you stop to pay their monthly fee you lose access to the software.

My ANSWER:   My purchase of Memeo Autosync was NOT a cloud subscription service purchase, so lets not muddy the water here bringing up different sales models that do not apply here. You are yet again completely out of line, it is common practice for software companies to offer upgrade pricing that is substantially lower than their current "full purchase price" to existing customers who purchased previous versions. And that is true regardless of whether or not you actually own the software or are just receiving a license to use it. I am not here to debate software licensing models with you and I do not appreciate your rebuttals since you are not involved. And yes, we could go on all day about what prices should be based on regular inflation but yet again, nobody asked for your opinion, this is a complaint site about a specific transaction, not a debate forum! Stay out if you are not directly affected by the report! 

Your answer is completely out of line considering you are asking me to buy your software at full price again minus the minute discount you offered, for $48, as you correctly stated.
Robert's Reply:  - You are not being asked to pay full price. If your complaint is that they shouldn't have raised their prices that much that is one thing and your opinion. But remember your initial premise wasn't that they raised the prices to $59.99 it was that you were being asked to pay more for the upgrade than you ORIGINALLY paid. Those are your words.."updates for existing software users should be lower in price than the original license you paid for it" which if we go literal on your words you want to pay less than the $19.95 you actually paid because of the discount you got. So inflation has nothing to do with this. Even if by "inflation" you think they could charge $100 for the original software license, if they asked you to pay more than $19.94 you would think they are ripping you off.

Anyways this is about as far as it can go, so good luck..

My ANSWER:  My initial premise was the ENTIRETY of my complaint and not just the fact that they asked me to pay full price (or close to it)!  You don't get to decide what my initial premise was without taking EVERYTHING into account that was stated in my complaint. And yes, I was being asked to pay full price since they do not have an upgrade pricing model at all. Offering me a 10%, then 20%, discount was just them feeling guilty about it and knowing full well that they increased the price of Memeo Autosync way too much without ever even offering reasonable upgrade options to existing customers.

First off it is standard on this site that if someone doesn't like what is said and goes against what they believe, the default response is "Oh you must work for them". So contrary to your belief I do not now or have I ever worked for this company. This is a PUBLIC web site and just like you can post, so can the public. And this may be a shock to you but the PUBLIC may not always agree with you.

What you fail to understand apparently is that I ALREADY OWN THE LICENSE. I already paid for it back in 2013!
- Yes, and this is what you fail to understand. You paid for the LICENSE to INSTALL and USE a specific version of specific software, you did not purchase the software itself. What did the license state about upgrades? What did it state if it no longer worked on "newer" machines. Did it grant you upgrades at a lower cost than you paid regardless of the reason you "need" to upgrade?

Now, we can go back and forth all day about prices of various commodities. But based on your response even though case after case could be shown where prices have outpaced inflation, you will come up with some justification why it is invalid and this is the only company in the history of business that is charging more than they should. That is just in straight costs. I haven't even bought up situations where you get less product/services for the same price today, or the software companies(even the one's you mentioned) going to cloud based models or "subscription" services to get more money for less services. Where if you stop to pay their monthly fee you lose access to the software.

Your answer is completely out of line considering you are asking me to buy your software at full price again minus the minute discount you offered, for $48, as you correctly stated.
- You are not being asked to pay full price. If your complaint is that they shouldn't have raised their prices that much that is one thing and your opinion. But remember your initial premise wasn't that they raised the prices to $59.99 it was that you were being asked to pay more for the upgrade than you ORIGINALLY paid. Those are your words.."updates for existing software users should be lower in price than the original license you paid for it" which if we go literal on your words you want to pay less than the $19.95 you actually paid because of the discount you got. So inflation has nothing to do with this. Even if by "inflation" you think they could charge $100 for the original software license, if they asked you to pay more than $19.94 you would think they are ripping you off.

Anyways this is about as far as it can go, so good luck..

Memeo's Rebuttal:
- By that logic when I paid $100 for version 2.0 of my Photo Editing Software back in 2013, if I wanted to upgrade to the current version which now retails for $499 they should be required to sell me the upgrade for less than $100?

I do love optimistic thinking. I guess you also expect Gas to still be $1/gallon and be able to get into a movie for a Quarter..right?

Does the same thing work for cars? I just want to "upgrade" my 1972 Corvette to a 2019 model I guess I should not be required to pay the 55K sticker price and Chevy has to give me the "upgrade" for less than the $5,000 I paid back in 1972.

My Rebuttal (from the original complaint owner):

Nothing optimistic about my complaint! Ever heard of standard inflation rates?
Average inflation in the United States is about 2.5%/year. At that rate your Memeo Autosync software should have increased in price from $29.95 (which was full price in 2013) to no more than $34.95 in 2019, and not $59.95 which represents a 100% increase since 2013 (or more or less 16.5% year after year since then, over 5 times the standard inflation rate?!). As I mentioned in my original complaint.... GREEDY! 

And by the way, your examples in your rebuttal are ludicrous, car prices and movie tickets do not increase much beyond standard inflation rates year after year, not without major improvements! Not to mention that there is no photo editing software that went from $100 in 2103 to $499 in 2019 without MAJOR improvements?! Your Memeo Autosync software has not added any major improvements to its original synchronization feature which is all it was designed to do. 

Memeo's Rebuttal:
- And a business can't increase their prices?  But you aren't even having to pay that.  It now costs $59.95 to purchase the software new. Since you are upgrading they offered to sell it to you for about $48.

My Rebuttal (from the original complaint owner): 

I am a seasoned software sales expert and I fully understand how software sales works! I have worked for large companies like HP, IBM and StorageTek in their software sales targeting large data centers.  Your answer is completely out of line considering you are asking me to buy your software at full price again minus the minute discount you offered, for $48, as you correctly stated. I originally paid $19.95 after discount in 2013, full price back then was $29.95. What you fail to understand apparently is that I ALREADY OWN THE LICENSE. I already paid for it back in 2013!  As such, it is standard practice in the software industry to offer UPGRADE PRICING and not to ask an existing license holder to purchase the software again at full price (even if you offer 20% off a new ridiculously high price).  Two major issues here:  Not only have you jacked up the price of Memeo Autosync by 100% since 2013 (effectively a 16.5% increase year after year), but you also do not offer a reasonable upgrade path/price schedule for existing customers. It is standard practice in the software industry to offer upgrade pricing, you fail to do so, all you did was offer a 10% discount off of FULL RETAIL price at first, and then 20% when I complained about it, effectively asking me to pay more than twice what I originally paid for my license in 2013!

If Memeo Autosync was anything like photo editing software (which you mentioned in your reply), where serious improvements in features and functionality were being added year after year, then a steeper price increase could be warranted. But in this case, Memeo Autosync still performs the exact same task as it did in 2013, and nothing more, other than being compatible with the latest Windows version, not a feature improvement at all! 

You may have the right to increase your prices as much as you want and I have the same right to warn people about what they can expect from Memeo based on my experience with my Memeo Autosync license. People need to know how crazy your price increases for Memeo Autosnc are since 2013 and how unresonable your upgrade demands are compared to software industry standards.

There is a reason people despise guys like Martin Shkreli and companies like yours who think it is ok to increase their prices well beyond standard inflation, effectively ripping people off.

They did offer a 10% which is ludicrous considering that updates for existing software users should be lower in price than the original license you paid for it.
- By that logic when I paid $100 for version 2.0 of my Photo Editing Software back in 2013, if I wanted to upgrade to the current version which now retails for $499 they should be required to sell me the upgrade for less than $100?

I do love optimistic thinking. I guess you also expect Gas to still be $1/gallon and be able to get into a movie for a Quarter..right?

Does the same thing work for cars? I just want to "upgrade" my 1972 Corvette to a 2019 model I guess I should not be required to pay the 55K sticker price and Chevy has to give me the "upgrade" for less than the $5,000 I paid back in 1972.

Memeo has become extremely greedy and has jacked up the price of Memeo Autosync from $29.95 in 2013 to $59.95 in 2019.
- And a business can't increase their prices?  But you aren't even having to pay that.  It now costs $59.95 to purchase the software new. Since you are upgrading they offered to sell it to you for about $48.