Microtransactions in mobile games they made a new victim: a six-year-old boy. Or rather, his parents: the child spent more than US$ 16 thousand (around R$ 80 thousand) on accessories for the version of Sonic Forces for iPad. According to the boy's mother, the amount was not spent all at once, but in several transactions on the app.

Jessica Wilton was surprised when she discovered purchases that added up to a lot of money on her credit card bill. The American says that her son George took advantage of the summer vacation period, between July and August, to play Sonic Forces. The game offers a microtransaction system that allows users to purchase virtual coins that can be exchanged for items, levels and unlockable characters in the game.

According to an investigation carried out by the New York Post, the boy had allegedly made purchases of packages ranging from US$1,99 to US$99,99 using his mother's card. The amount spent had allegedly been charged to different invoices, which led Jéssica to believe that it was a fraud on the app.

After filing a fraud lawsuit against the game developer, she was informed that the purchases were genuine and that she should contact the Apple Store. A Apple refused to issue a refund, claiming that the boy's mother did not file a dispute within 60 days of the app transaction. In her defense, Jéssica also claimed that the purchases were “supposedly” fraudulent.

According to Apple, games like Sonic Forces have a parental control setting and all transactions made on the devices Apple are reported through the iCloud account.

The boy's mother, in turn, states that she had not received any warning in her email. Apparently, the outcome of this story will be in court. Sonic Forces is a Sonic racing game available for Android e iOS. Remember: there are microtransactions.

Kids + Apps = a danger to your wallet

Children spending their parents' money on apps is very common on the internet and most companies have a fairly flexible policy on the matter, in which they usually issue refunds and deactivate the item purchased in the app. What would have complicated Jessica's situation with Sonic Forces, in turn, would have been the delay in filing the request.

Unlike Jessica, Brazil had a similar case in November, this time with iFood. Raysa Andrade, an advertising executive from Recife, was shocked when she got out of the shower and discovered that her three-year-old son had made a purchase worth R$400,00.

According to the boy's mother, in a post on instagram, the amount was spent on McDonald's snacks and gifts, made using the resource voice command from the app. In total, Tom ordered six burger specials, six Happy Meals (with eight extra toys), two portions of nuggets (large, with 12 pieces each), one French fries (large with bacon and cheddar), ten chocolate milkshakes, two sundaes, two apple pies, two McFlurries, eight bottles of water, one grape juice and two packets of extra sauce.

Not knowing what to do, the mother accepted the requests and took the opportunity to have a nice meal with the boy. Despite this, the boy still complained that he had not received the toy he wanted.

The post was shared more than 100 times and thousands of users tagged the company to send the boy the desired gift.

Street: Apple Insider