Here is my thing…I had a blockbuster movies pass 2 in 2 out of the store at a time…I never had problems…But it started to get expensive so I decided to try the two week trial for Netflix & Blockbuster Total Access…

WOW The Two Week Trials Kicked Ace and I loved the fact that I was sick and I got movies everyday…BUT One thing I noticed was that Blockbusters DVD’s were ALL in bad shape and would not play…3 out of 6 I had were defective….With Netflix I did the 4 out at a time because I wanted to get the FULL ANime Series Yu Yu Hakusho and so I got about 16 DVD’s in two weeks BUT I noticed with netflix service began to slow down as I got closer to my Two Week Trial being over…I had to wait an Extra day just to recieve them…

I am currently doing Netflix now and I can’t stand that the fact that I sent the Movies back LAST Thursday and it is Tuesday and they just sent one DVD out and ALL of the DVD’s in the Que were available…

It seems like they are sending 1 DVD one day and then 3 another day…Which is odd for me…I can’t understand it…I even waited to have ALL 4 dvd’s before sending them back and here is what my Que looks like now…

Movie Title Star Rating MPAA Genre Shipped Est. Arrival

1 Yu Yu Hakusho: Dark Tournament: Vol. 13
Click to rate the movie “Liked It”
NR Anime & Animation Shipping today
2 Yu Yu Hakusho: Ghost Files: Vol. 12 NR Anime & Animation Shipping today
3 Yu Yu Hakusho: Ghost Files: Vol. 11 NR Anime & Animation 02/06/07 02/09/07
4 American Pie Presents: The Naked Mile
3.5 Stars
NR Comedy 02/05/07 02/06/07

Interesting…American Pie was sent yesterday and 2 above say SHIPPING TODAY but what does that mean….and look here…Another DVD was sent today…HMMM One yesterday sent, One today sent, and TWO SHIPPING TOday…

What does it all mean BASIl???

Well I would say Netflix has a lot of movies but Customer Service sucks and they are trying to monitor people who send back movies very fast like myself because I like to watch a TON of movies. I am an ANIME Nut…

Blockbuster movie pass was AWSOME I could always go to the store and get movies no questions asked…Blockbuster online was disappointing and Netflix service sucks so…

I HOPE I can get Netflix to speed up or get blockbuster to be better.

The trick is to return all of your online-rentals at your local store at the same time. This way, they will all be scanned in (not instantly I found, but more like within 24 hours), then your next batch of online rentals will be sent to you soon after. No chance of a “scanned but not returned” movie clogging up your Queue. As a matter of fact, I last week had 6 movies marked as “Shipped” on my Queue. At the meantime, whichever movie(s) you are having trouble with the long wait for your online queue, grab it a the local store for free! After you get home, check off that movie from your Queue.

Anyway, BB online is a much better deal for the money than Netflix or any Pay-per-view service my cable company has to offer, and that’s the bottom line to me.

I have only been using the service now for a few weeks but I can say at this time, I am very pleased. While I will have to agree with you about the amount of time it takes for the DVD’s returned at the store to be returned to Blockbuster on line, it is not a huge deal for us.

We are not concerned about how long it takes to get the DVD’s. On a regular basis we would rent about 3 movies a month so the 14.99 makes sense. For us, it is like heaven because we are not used to having this kind of service and the fact that we can have 4 DVD’s at a time (since the movies that we return to the store aren’t bound to any overage charges anymore) it works out good.

Like every service, I guess this is not for everyone, and I bet they are listening well to your complaints and working hard to fix any problems that you have found with the services.

And yes I called their customer service center to complain. Their number was busy the majority of the times I tried to call and when I did get through the wait time was 22 minutes. The lady on the phone offered to send me a free in store rental coupon which I declined because that really offers me no solution to the true problem of the DVD’s shipping right away. I never use my in store coupons anyway because I don’t want to rent movies from the store because it’s a pain for me to return them on time. The only other thing she could offer me was a futal attempt to adjust my expectations. That kind of ticked me off.

To test to make sure that the people in the store are scanning my DVD’s that i’ve been returning i’ve been renting a movie in the store with the DVD return and just dropping the in store DVD in the return slot on the way out. That hasn’t helped.

So due to all this I intend on canceling my blockbuster account and going back to netflix not just because of these problems alone, but because i’ve had 3 DVD’s at the top of my que that haven’t shipped due to being on short wait availability. All these problems combined have caused blockbuster to be a much worse service for me than Netflix. Worst thing is I know that I could complain all day and all night to them and it would yield no result. Trust me I really really want what blockbuster says they’re offering. But they are promising something that they clearly are failing to deliver.

to add to your pricing, i read this is the rss news today:
For new customers, Netflix lowered its rate on the 1 DVD At-A-Time Plan to $3.99. This plan has a limit of 2 DVDs per month.

so overall, i think the end of my initial reply sums up where NF vs. BB is going: the storefront really sells BB, but are we to believe it will last? my guess is no- but that doesn’t make BB the loser. My parents, who round off the consumer market age group for rentals, never got down with NF. When I told them both about BB, however, they perked up. Difference being a physical place, and a name they knew. if BB can convert NF people with better deals, they will win over many. Whether they keep stores open or not will be defined by how they adapt, but even if they go on-line only, i think their initial customer grab will help them reach the top again.

I have been on every level of the cable train, full access to limited (my current level). I don’t really want to get into the cable argument here because it always brings in the satellite argument which always leads to the internet and phone argument. I will try and be concise here because the real argument is NetFlix vs. Blockbuster.

Let’s say that I was the type of person that liked to make decisions based on what “will” be available vs. what is currently available. If I was said person I would be holding out for the iPhone (which we all know will not come thanks to linksys) and would certainly be waiting for an online email service that prevents all spam (almost there with GMail).

I would also be interested in the IN-Demand (for Tristate lovers) or the ON-Demand for us New Englanders. When they do start offering movies when they are released on DVD’s I will be interested in that service.

I used to be _that_ guy, but since I have realized that I can’t live in the future (else the now will pass me by) I have decided that at this very moment the best use of my money is a limited cable package (digital basic) in combination with Blockbuster All Access.

To broaden the discussion (which we should surely hold off line) you should read this:

Wired News: Goodbye TV, Hello Broadband

i recently read that on demand services (including HD-On Demand) will now be releasing movies the same day DVD’s are released in stores. i forget where i read this, but the article moved on to say how this was another strike against Blockbuster, ultimately the last man standing when it comes to movie rentals.

i suppose it’s a good argument how online rental services are much better than in store, but will this change if Blockbuster closes it’s neighborhood doors? most info i’ve seen points to this inevitable event. we know blockbuster took serious hits when on-demand cable came about, followed by netflix’s growing popularity. i could see BB either closing shop completely, or becoming an online only competitor to NF.

my personal question has always been- cable or rent? in NYC, time warner has excellent prices for cable, and I am able to have HBO, Cinemax, Showtime and Starz (and all 8 million versions of each) at a reasonable rate, including their on-demand services. To boot, I can rent movies in HD any time I like for about $4 a pop (IN-Demand channel). I rarely rent anything- I either buy the DVD’s i want to own, or wait for them to hit cable. There are a number of shows and specials on cable each month that make me hold on rather than unsubscribe from the premium channels and start up an online rental account. nevertheless, its tempting to follow this course, as i have entirely way to many DVD’s.

nevertheless, a great article. personally, i think cable could destroy rental services in one swoop if they offered a monthly subscriptions service to the In-Demand HD service. With comparable pricing, it would be unbeatable.