Screwed by Blockbuster (1 Viewer)

[Qui-Gon John]

Yesterday I went to rent some movies for the weekend, as I usually do on Thurs. See I have a Gold Rewards Mbrshp and Sun-Thu it's a free rental with each paid rental. Anyway, the chump checking me out said I had a balance of $4.45 due to a late return of a DVD. Now I know I did not return this DVD late. It was a one week (actually 8 day rental) that I rented on 2/6 (Thu) and dropped off the next Thu when I went to rent more movies on 2/13. But this clerk and the store manager were adamant that it was not checked back in until 3:21 in the afternoon on the 15th.

What pisses me off is I rent hundreds of movies there each year and only once was I late, because an emergency came up and I was unable to drop off the DVD in time, and I knew I was late and I paid it. Now these motherless fux won't budge on one f'n late charge. I called the District Manager and am waiting to hear.

 

[Jerome Grate]

Maybe you can request a print out of all the movies you rented for that year. Then share it with the district manager and explain to him or her that in comparison to all your rentals and as your record reflects, it's clear that the error is the staff of that store and not yours. Therefore to remain a valued and "loyal" customer, you don't think that you should pay for an error clearly made by staff.

 

[Qui-Gon John]

Well after calling everyday, sometimes more than once a day, I finally spoke with their Dist Mgr yesterday. She said she removed the late charge from my acct and suggested that in the future I always hand my movie to a clerk to scan in. Thing is, she never called me back until I tried to get in contact with her supervisor, the Reg. Mgr, on that call, the Reg. Mgr's asst took the info and said she'd call the Dist Mgr and get it straightened out and someone would get back to me shortly!

 

[Roger Li]

Yet another reason to not rent from Blockbuster. I've had at leat two similar experiences with "late" returns. On time, my wife returned the DVD on her way to a morning class (before noon). The computer showed that the DVD was "returned" at 10PM that day when my wife and I were together and NOT anywhere near the Blockbuster. These experiences and Blockbuster not carrying wide-screen versions of many of the newer DVDs is a reason I have switched to Hollywood Video!

 

[Brae]

When returning stuff to BadBusters, I always hand the item to the moron of the moment and make them scan it back into their inventory right in front of me.

They pulled this once on me and I stopped renting DVD's (I now buy them). The wife now makes them hand-scan them on return when she rents DVD's for herself.

Sorry, its too easy for their minimum-wage smucks to take your returned copy home and ...

 

[nolesrule]

Why bother when employees get free rentals?

I worked at Blockbuster a few summers when I was in college, and the they would do late fee credits all the time, except of course if they were habitually late.

The whole noon thing actually makes things more confusing. It was much easier at midnight. When the store closed, you emptied out the box and scanned everything in. Even people who dropped stuff off after midnight would get scanned in as long as the person scanning hadn't finished. Once finished, movies would be left in the box till morning because the computers were locked down (except for time clock functions).

But there are some incompetent employees. I had the honor of trying to check out movies for customers that they got off the shelf that hadn't even been checked in. Made me roll my eyes every time.

Glad I don't have to deal with that crap anymore.

 

[Brae]

Joe, I am not saying its a BB Lifestyle of Abuse, but the temptation to cross the tracks is there, as is being lazy and not recording in returns when you are suppose to.

I have had them do inventory checks when a coworker got accused of not returning (to their store) a DVD. I figured, what the hell, and they had every copy they were suppose to.

Its not the 'honest' mistake that bothered me as much as the attitude the manager copped. First, they were upset that my coworker actually was disputing their accusation. Then, they got further upset when we asked, then demanded, and inventory check, and upon the discovery they were wrong the attitude remained in place.

No, this kind of incident was not mutually exclusive to one location as the same exact episode played out in my case more than a year earlier at a BB some 25 miles away. Its hard to 'do your job' and 'be smiley nice 24x7' when you make next to nothing in a company that doesn't offer much. Still, the customer abuses are there, and I simply chose to not be abused anymore.

 

[Qui-Gon John]

Its not the 'honest' mistake that bothered me as much as the attitude the manager copped.

This was my problem as well. The whole thing happened one other time to me, several years ago, and as Joe said they gave me a late-fee credit, no problem. But now this new manager, Greg, had the attitude, things have been messed up in this store and they brought him in to 'fix' them, i.e. blind, rigid adherence to arcane policies even in the face of overwhelming evidence that I almost never bring a movie back late, and lo and behold, the other rental I had out at the same time, shows it was returned exactly when I said.

And Joe, I have been on the other end of the movie going out again without being 'scanned in for return'. They called me another time and told me that some movie I had, had not yet been returned. The next day I went up to check on it and they said, 'someone else returned it last night'. So I returned it, and it went back out, yet the computer still held that I had it, until the other party returned it.

 

[nolesrule]

That shouldn't be able to happen; it's a very simple sales/inventory program. The software doesn't allow the CSR to ring out a movie to a new account if it hasn't been checked in. It gives a big warning across half the computer screen that says the movie needs to be checked in before it can be checked out again. From what you describe, that's a true case of employee incompetence.

Makes me wonder if the second renter didn't even pay for the rental, if it's still showing on your account.

Also, in instances like that, any late fee incurred should be wiped out because there is no way to determine when the movie was actually returned.

 

[Bob McElfresh]

BB does not seem to be a place that values their employees. Most of the CSR's seem to hate the place.

I heard one year that to avoid a layoff, they messed with peoples schedules so that the most experienced CSR's would have to close at midnight, open at 9 for a 4 hr shift, then come back at 8 pm/ etc. Basically trying to piss them off so they would leave.

Hollywood video has had some turn-over, but the employees arent so disgruntled by the company. And the most stable chain seems to be Bradly Video where the manager and several of the clerks have been working there for 4-5 years. They enjoy the job and it shows in the way they treat their fellow employees and the customers.

There is a simple rule in business: you can get great employees, but you just have to pay them. BB seems to treat it's employees with contempt so it passes down to the customer.

 

[Qui-Gon John]

I don't know Joe, it was a weird one, But it did happen, it was a couple of years ago. Maybe when the person went to check it out, they had several movies and somehow that one was 'missed', so the computer still showed that I had it.

But seriously, only 1 time did I ever actually return a movie late. I had it in the car, a situation came up which prevented me from going there. I knew it was late and I pad the late fee, no questions asked. The other times, 1 late several years ago, the weird incident above, and the incident I opened this thread with, I dropped them off by the time they were due. As I said I easily rent at least a hundred or more movies each year from them and that should have been looked at. I anticipate Regional will get a lot of complaints about this manager.

 

[nolesrule]

When I worked there, there was an actually policy that if you closed one night, they weren't allowed to schedule you for the next morning. The store may close at midnight, but you'll be lucky to get out of there by 12:45.

There was one time where I was accidentally scheduled to do a close/open, and the store manager apologized to me when she came in at noon.

I guess it has to do do with the quality of the manager. You can get by-the-book, fair, lazy, etc. Of the 9 different managers I worked for only 1 was a jerk that I hated being around. The best ones left for better jobs though.

 

[Jeff_HR]

It is because of these kind of problems that I refuse to rent. My video library is large enough with 400+ Laserdiscs & 400+ DVDs and 100+ VHS tapes that I usually have too much in the way of choices.