Abob Teff

The problem is that you need to stop and look at who the actual customer is. Is the customer the consumer (the people buying the product) or the shareholders (to whom the company is ultimately responsible)? The problem lies in the practice of becoming a reputable private company that the consumers love, then selling out and going public. Too many companies at that point lose sight of the people that spend money regularly and only do things to please the people that throw large sums of money at them sporadically.

It takes away the buying power of the "product" consumer and shifts it to the "company" consumer. Look at Hollywood Video (I use them frequently as an example because I am familiar with them): they had (in a well run store) some of the most customer friendly policies that I have seen. Then they started answering too much to the shareholders and implemented policies that flew in the face of what they claim to stand for. Now the company is trying to de-list and go back to being privately owned. The shareholders began impeding the product.

mljones99

i cancelled netflix a month or so ago and have been renting from a video store close to downtown. They specialize in indie/foreign stuff (but also have new movies as well). they also have a Criterion section that is almost complete.

hobbes4444

I've had a slow down issue with Netflix as well. It happened after the week i wound up with 10 movies (i'm on a 5 out plan and in the same city as a distribution center). for over a year, my discs were always received the day after they hit the mailbox & shipped out that same day. a few weeks ago i received 5 on tuesday and returned them on thursday. got my next 5 shipped friday. after that week, it's been a much slower process in receiving and shipping my titles. some discs have taken a week to ship. some don't get logged in as returned for 2-3 days after i mail them and then the new title takes another day or two to ship. very disturbing. and if the practice continues, i too will cancel and then rejoin to see if there is a difference.

DVDTalker002

Has anyone noticed this? Netflix no longer will mail my movies off in the early mornings like they used to? They used to mail my movies off at 9am to I would get them nextday. Now they are waiting until 4pm so I have to wait another day. This is very shifty.

jough

I don't think it's shifty as much as they just can't handle their fast growth. They need to expand with more distribution centers and with more people working at each.

They probably are going through a growing pain now, where their income can't justify hiring enough people or opening enough distribution centers, but the current centers can't handle the traffic they receive. Eventually they'll get more working capital and be able to properly expand again.

DickS

NETLFIX has been experiencing financial difficulties, thus the increase in rates. And, one reason why you might not receive all of your movies at once is because some of them might be getting shipped to you from warehouses further away - some of the catalog titles are not duplicated among all of their inventory warehouses. Furthermore, I believe the USPS is at least in part responsible for the inconsistencies in turnaround times. Some of my OTHER mail winds up getting delayed for no discernible reason except that the USPS is not as efficient as it once was. I've received letters with as many as four postmarks before - one of them from a P.O. on the West Coast!

All that said, if you believe you are being ripped off, e-mail them, and if that produces nothing but a form message, phone them and ask to speak to a supervisor. Those of you who are used to receiving 24-48 movies per month because you live in a NETFLIX warehouse town, consider yourselves damned fortunate. Where the REAL discrimination comes is in the DISTANCES we live from these locations, which is not our fault, and which is of course never taken into account as far as billing is concerned (I don't know - would different billing for different zones even be feasible?) I live in Maine, and even with a new Worster, MA outlet, it takes about a week for a full turnaround (although last week, they didn't even receive my discs back until 8 days after I returned them). But, it still works out to about half what I would pay for local rentals, and the selection is pretty great, so I am not complaining.

shill66

Ah, you Netflix newbies. Who's with me? Who remembers when their only distribution center was in California, and east coast members had to wait about a week to ten days to get their next movie? Who remembers dropping that just-watched movie in the mailbox and then going online and clicking "movie has been returned", so they'd send out the next one, which would say "sent" about 2 hours later?

I've been on vacation this week and have been turning around my Netflix rentals next-day. On Tuesday I received a title that was cracked and wouldn't play - I went online and asked for a replacement. Wednesday the broken disc went out with the mail carrier who also brought the replacement. Thursday the replacement went back, and I expect it to be received soon.

I haven't experienced this slow-down phenomenon, but I also should say I very rarely rent new releases, usually only older catalog stuff.

jough

Yeah, I was a member way back when, and paid only $9.95 a month to keep 4 discs out at once, and the turnaround was slightly less than a week.

Now it's more than twice the price for 3 discs and turnaround is slightly more than a week.

Ah, progress...

asperdank

I have noticed a slowdown too. I am on the 3 at a time plan, and last Thursday I sent back all 3. They received them all on Friday, but only shipped out 1. The other 2 didn't ship until Monday.

I also tested the theory about long time users and/or those who get a lot per month, VS. a newer user and getting new releases. I put Kill Bill vol 1 on my queue list a week before it was released and put it in my number 1 slot. It went right into "very long wait" when it was released and has been there ever since. I asked my brother-in-law to add it to his list on Saturday of this week. He just started his account less than a month ago. Kill Bill shipped to him on Monday. He lives 2 streets away from my house. I will be sending an e-mail to netflix about this matter.

skeeto

I tried Netflix for the first time back in the Fall of 2000, and remember when they were just working out of California. One of the reasons I cancelled my membership after a few months was the delivery lag that I got being in New York. Good concept though.

Last month, I decided to sign up with them again. Figured I didn't have anything to lose with the free trial. I found out I had a distribution center close by so now the turnaround was pretty quick. They'd mail a disc on say a Wednesday and I'd get it Thursday morning. Returns were just as quick. Pretty sweet. I have noticed that the turnaround hasn't been as quick since my free trial ended. I think it started around the time I got an e-mail survey from them asking some questions about the turnaround. lol. Now when the site says a disc will take 2, sometimes 3 days to get to me, it usually does. I'm not too upset about it though. Especially when comparing it to the first time I tried the service.

Apparently Netflix is planning on expanding to a Video-On-Demand type of downloading service. They'll have a TiVo-like box (or work out a deal with them) that allows you to connect to the Netflix service and "download" movies to your television. That'll be interesting. Wonder if it'll just be the movies offered up for download, or a "virtual DVD" that will function about the same and have all the extras (if any) as if you popped the disc in.

Netflix To Deliver Movies Over Internet
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...toryID=4927664

Netflix Targets On Demand
http://www.fool.com/community/pod/2004/040427.htm

HistoryProf

you know....once again I shipped two movies back at the same time from the same post office, and once again they claim to have only received one of them today....it's bullshit. I went ahead and reported the other lost so they'll ship me two today, but still....the last time i waited 3 days after the first had been received before reporting the other lost, and it magically showed up as received about 6 hours later. go figure. i'm betting this one will tomorrow AM too....

While on the one hand I have a hard time thinking that they could be so organized as to pay attention to whether one of mine has already been checked in that day, but at the same time, i'm having a hard time believing that out of 5 times i've sent two back together, each time only one is received the next day, and the other takes another 1-4 days. the distribution center is only 150 miles away....

al_bundy

I live in NYC and my distro center is in Flushing. I mail discs on a morning and the pick up is 10am. I get new discs on the second day in the mail.

scarredgod

so far i have no major complaints with netflix. the shipping times are very reasonable and so far only one DVD (Alice) wasnt available immediately, and one did arrive damaged, cracked (Bio-zombie). i must say that i only rent catalog titles so i assume its much more difficult with new releases.

my only complaints is that they do skip over DVDs in my query for DVDs lower in the list. i had Happiness Of The Katakuris #2 on my list, and they recently sent #3, #4 and #5 while Katakuris is still available right now. i also feel they should have sent me a replacement DVD immediately for the damaged Bio-zombie instead of waiting until i returned it.

apart from that, i have been satisfied.

jough

Well, I mailed three discs in on Saturday night, they received them yesterday, shipped them yesterday, and I received three discs today (two of which said "Long Wait" yesterday).

So I guess I hit a temporary slowdown last month.

GatorDeb

Blockbuster now has $24.99 for 2 out and $29.99 for 3 out at a time. Good if you have one nearby.