Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Being flixy
I'm a big fan of NetFlix but they've slowed down or become less diligent or in any case changed something about the way they process films. It used to be that when you returned a film, it was recorded the second it hit the mail, presumably through some kind of computer notification, and your next selection was sent almost that very millisecond. You'd send a film back one day and have a new film in your hands a mere two days later. But now it's almost a full week turnaround. Did the bad guys figure out how to get the postal code to indicate a film had been returned when it wasn't? All I know is that this is frustrating and it's hard to time things so you get what/when you want. For example, I sent three films back on Monday morning and they still haven't been registered as received/returned and it's Wednesday.

As for alternatives, Blockbuster doesn't carry the quirkier, foreign and not-shoot-em-up films I like and, besides, I swore I'd never go there again after they started editing films to remove things they found distasteful (yes, I'm afraid it's been documented that they do that) and after they pulled that overcharging scam for late returns. And my computer isn't fast or big enough to do downloads easily. Bottom line is that I'd prefer to stick with NetFlix, but I hate being manipulated and this is frustrating.

I remember hearing a rumor a while back that NetFlix deliberately slows things down for heavier users. Do they register a single returned film as son as it hits the post office but wait for physical returns when there's more than one? And although it seems idiotic to mistreat your best customers from a public relations point of view, it makes some dollars-and-cents sense. On the 3-films-at-once plan, if you get 9 films a month, it's $1.70+ each; 3 films is almost double that. Obviously customers having fewer films is better for them (unless customers stop renting at all, of course). Although when you multiply any amount times one or two gazillions of their customers, the numbers are enormous any way you cut it.

I wonder how to figure out if the slower turnaround is deliberate and/or how to "work" their processing.

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Permalink | | posted by jau at 7:28 AM


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