Adobe and their rip-off European pricing strategy

A lot has been written on the web about Adobes utterly contemptable pricing policy across Europe. They really do abuse their market position for products such as Photoshop.

For those who live in the US, this website does a great summary, so I needn't go over old ground with regard to specifics.

However recently I had no choice but to purchase Photoshop for the Mac. Despite the fact that gouging my eyes out seems like a preferable option than to give my money to such a despisable company, I relented.

In doing this I also discovered how utterly, utterly useless the Adobe website is. For one thing they had for some reason got me down on record as living in the US. So I had to create a new account (They wouldn't let me correct the details on the current one). Ok, that was a pain in the arse, but nothing too major. Then I discovered that they charge VAT at 21%!! HELLO ADOBE in the UK VAT is charged at 17.5%! Are you out of your minds?!

Now, I'm okay for this because my company is of course VAT registered. But for others, Adobes pricing policy just seems to get worse and worse! Now, I know they base their operations out of Ireland. But I am afraid that if you are going to set up a UK store, you better bloody well charge UK VAT rates to people in that country!

But it was all for nothing anyway. For some idiotic reason the Adobe site kept telling me that my credit card information was wrong. Nope Adobe, I have checked it 5 times already and it is ME who is correct, while you, as always when it comes to dealing with European customers, are wrong! It seems like Adobe is on a mission to see just how much crap they can put a customer through to get hold of one of their products!

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