No "Throttling" for Blockbusters Customers

[jm1647]

Everytime I go to my local BB I hear them giving thier long speaches about how great the TA is.

So you buy your DVDs elsewhere . And where else are you gonna get ~40 DVDs a month for $17.99 +tax a month. You could never do it with NF and you said the Movie Pass at your store wasn't that great anymore because the removed a lot of titles for online.

[photo_angel2004]

So you buy your DVDs elsewhere . And where else are you gonna get ~40 DVDs a month for $17.99 +tax a month. You could never do it with NF and you said the Movie Pass at your store wasn't that great anymore because the removed a lot of titles for online.

I do get about 40 to 50 a month but I have to pay for the instore and the online to get them all so thats $24.99 + 17.99

[jm1647]

I do get about 40 to 50 a month but I have to pay for the instore and the online to get them all so thats $24.99 + 17.99

Get ~20 DVDs a month with NF for $17.99, a great selection too gives me ~60 DVDs a month cheaper

[redeye13]

I think the most frustrating thing about BB is after having NF for so long I have actual proof how an operation like these companies have, can & should be run. With NF 80% of the time receiving in movies the next morning after I take them to the post office, I find it hard to justify how BB takes days to receive & ship new movies from the time they are scanned at the store. Their obviously unskilled people at customer sevice via phone & online are not able to give me anything that resembles an intelligent answer or solution. These off the street walk ons at both locations are only programmed with a certain list of excuses & are not able to provide any more help than a grade schooler. This tells me that there is more than just a learning curve & ramp up problem - the apparent attitude of BB management is we are all ignorant enough to believe their "customer service" garbage & just accept the status quo. NF is surely not perfect & needs to address the throttling issue that they continue to half heartedly deny, but the only place BB beats out NF is in their arrogance that goes along with their poor performance. BB is like high school playing against the pros when it comes to overall operations.
Lets say I receive 3 discs from BB Mon., return them to the store Tues. & receive 3 when they scan them in. That means 6 discs so far this week (without a waiting period for the first 3) & that appears to be good - for now. These 3 that were scanned will not show up on the queue as received until Thursday or Friday. Nothing will have been shipped to me before this about 98% of the time. It will be at least another day before they ship after receiving discs & they don't always ship the full 3. This puts us into now receiving 1, 2 or 3 around Tuesday. Take those back Wed. & receive in store the 1, 2 or 3 & the scanned ones won't show received until Friday or Saturday. See how this starts stretching out deliveries & store discs from 6 the first week to a decreasing number as we go further along? Try to explain this to the apologists at the store, by phone, on line or where ever & aside from the normal usless excuses, they are totally confused.
My main problem is they don't ship as their advertising implies - shortly after they are scanned at the store. If they adhered to the "within one business day" after the scanning things would be OK but it goes days before they ship. When you talk to a "supervisor" they always try to fall back on "1 to 2 business days" & they have no answer as to why they don't ship after scanning or why NF is able to do it thru the post office & they can't do it thru thier own system.
I'm sure they are riding high on all their new signup since TA but it still is hard to believe a company this size & with their time in the business that they are not concerned with getting better or doing more to please customers.
Their advertising & apologists tout how many discs can be received because of the TA program & I agree with that - IF ONLY THEY ACTUALLY DID WHAT THEY SAY THEY WILL DO. It hasn't been happening here & their overall shipping performance (not to mention their poorly managed web site notification system) hasn't improved since I cancelled last June. I was hoping things would have changed but they haven't.
My mistake !!

[katzdvd]

Has anyone here ever sent a link to this thread to BB customer service?
Wonder what their reaction would be

Remember: "The customer is always right"

[photo_angel2004]

Has anyone here ever sent a link to this thread to BB customer service?
Wonder what their reaction would be

Remember: "The customer is always right"

There are lots of "guests" that look at this thread who is to say that someone from BB isnt watching over it.

[Aegmorgil]

Remember: "The customer is always right"

We may be right, but do they give a damn? they'll apologize for any inconveniences, give out coupons or reduced rental fees, and then do it again without fixing the prob. redeye makes good points. TA sounds like a fantastic idea, and some people can go nuts with it. BUT, BB has to make their money somehow. sure, you get the "free" instores, but your onlines slow down.

Nothing is free. If it sounds too good to be true, it's probably not true!

[BR7]

I wasn't to happy with them today .Out of 4 DVDs 1 was playable 2 were cracked and 1 was snapped in half.Between this and them forking with my queue I am about ready to go back to Netfilx and I really don't care how much better the BB deal is.You shouldn't have to ride a companies ass this much to keep them in line
I am not patient enough for this kind of aggravation

[redeye13]

As I mentioned in an earlier post, the "supervisor" I talked to on the phone told me the online "customer service" department in not in the U.S. & maybe there are some communication issues. I explained that communication shouldn't be the case because I replied back to each of the people & was always very explicit with the problem & told them the exact quotes that they always send that I didn't want to hear again. They would turn around & reply with the quotes that I just told them not to reply with. If you've ever noticed the surveys they send out regarding your satisfaction with the answer given to each incident, their questions are mostly concerned with proper sentence structure, punctuation, spelling & overall professionalism. Only one question asks about how satisfied you are with the answer. Maybe they are overseas & are more concerned with their command of English so as to not let on it is an offshore operation. Their major concern, along with the redundant answers, would lead one to believe it is offshore where the unskilled people in the boiler room operation have no clue as to what is going on.
If this is the case, I don't think them reading any of these posts would make a difference. They had to expect this kind of problem & I'm sure their priority is to not let the cat out of the bag that they have people answering the customers questions when they really don't know what they are doing - just following pre planned scripts. You would think they would be a little more concerned about their reputation & do some better training instead of only the focus on proper grammer.

[Pseudonym34]

I signed up with Netflix far before Blockbuster came out with their program and I was pleasantly surprised with the service. I mean, I would mail out a return one morning and by the post the next day I would have a new movie...I was really impressed. When Blockbuster came out with their program I found it repulsive...to me it was just another way of a big company crushing a smaller guy's initiative and innovative idea. For me alone that is reason enough not to switch to Blockbuster. I am currently on the two at a time program and I am plenty satisfied with the service. Yes, I would like to get the New Releases faster but overall I would have to say that Netflix has and continues to, provide excellent service. I just thought I would throw my two cents into the ring after reading this excellent thread for a few days. (sheepish grin)

[jm1647]

I signed up with Netflix far before Blockbuster came out with their program and I was pleasantly surprised with the service.

I was with NF on the 3@time plan way before BB started TA. I was getting 20 -22 DVDs a month with NF then it went down to ~13-15 for months. I complained and was told I was a high volume renter and was low priority for shipping. It was in the Terms Of Service. WTF???? I was so fed up with NF the I started using BB with the intent to cancel NF but when BB started TA the shipping from BF picked back up to where it was. Now I still have both

[redeye13]

Shows what competition does. As I mentioneed earlier NF does have an issue with the throttling. They don't call it throttling but they do turn around & say they will give priority to those with fewer rentals if they get swamped. We don't really know when they get swamped so they can always fall back to that excuse. Also, why is somebody else's money more valuable than mine? I pay the same so I should get the same service!!!
This to me appears to be the biggest issue with NF. It doesn't happen too often but when it does it's very irritating. The proble with BB is it seems to be irritating all the time. I kept a spreadsheet to track all the movements of my discs from BB & it shows the glaring holes they have in their system.

[Aegmorgil]

Now I still have both

That's me, too! I was shifting back and forth between the two, and then enrolled in both to compare and see which one pissed me off more, and then I'd cancel that one. So far, it's neck-and-neck. I'm easily aggrivated by stupid crap, and they're both aggrivating me in different ways! I can't decide!!

[Pseudonym34]

@Aegmorgil

rotfl. I love your answer! I would like to hear an update.

@jm1647

Does anyone really ready "terms of service"? I guess I will have to start reading them. I never really noticed the lack with Netflix, but then again I had nothing to compare it with.

[jm1647]

@jm1647

Does anyone really ready "terms of service"? I guess I will have to start reading them. I never really noticed the lack with Netflix, but then again I had nothing to compare it with.

I never read the NF TOS either until they told me to , when they said I was a high volume renter and I was low priority. That was last year but as I have mentioned that was before BB TA. The NF shipping has picked back up and that is whY i kept it and have both NF and BB now.