Ever wonder what it would be like to lose your gamertag? I had never thought about it and then came across this guy who wrote an article recalling his adventure or misfortune of going to the university for a year and trying to come back and get some gaming in, only to find that he was screwed out of his account. Apparently if your credit card expires while you are not a member and you are away for more than a year, your account will be canceled and not be allowed to be re-opened.

The horrible part of it all is that he not only lost his gamerscore, but also all of his downloaded content and games. That means all his arcade games are gone and will not be given back to him. This actually sucks especially for those gamers that are going away to school or in the case of a guy I met just yesterday, who was stationed in Germany and then leaving to Iraq for who knows how long? Imagine going off to fight for your country and then coming back and finding out that MS screwed you.

Here is some of this gamer’s thoughts and the replies he got back from the friendly MS customer service rep. [Via Totally 360]

“But why?” I asked. “You have a violation of billing” he responded. Apparently due to my credit card expiring I had violated the terms and conditions of Xbox Live. “You haven’t phoned us for a year and thus your account is cancelled”. I went on to explain I had accessed my account on Xbox.com for the last year and was able to message and receive messages from friends as well as add gamer tags and check achievements. “Yes your account is on the system but is cancelled” he hastily said.

“But surely if my account is on the system, you can re-activate it. If I provide you with new credit card information, surely you can give me a subscription back” I worryingly asked. “You are too late Sir; your account is cancelled forever”.

Cold blooded if you ask me.