As a gamer, most of you know that a lot of banks in Malaysia has blocked transactions when it comes to buying games through services such as Steam and Google Play, forcing us to use alternative methods. The excuse, the services are not secured and therefore is not safe to be used by its customers.
When they implemented this restriction, I did have a lengthy talk with my bank’s operator and they said that because some people were reportedly getting charged even when they used the service once or not at all, it was easier to just restrict everyone from making payments to this services. With the growth of the gaming scene in the country, Maybank has finally provided a new method to provide Steam Wallets to its customers by adding an extra option in the Buy Online section of their maybank2u website. Currently, they are only offering credits from MOLPoints, Steam and MyCard, there is a slight tax charge for the wallet codes which is not really an issue as other vendors are also charging tax for all wallet codes.
It’s good to see that banks are realising that the gaming community in Malaysia is growing rapidly and because of that, the demand for a better payment service is always welcomed. It would still be better if we could just purchase the games directly from the game client and avoid this tax, but nevertheless, it is the first step in helping gamers play the games that we love.