If you use a Blockbuster envelope to get a free instore rental, that rental is considered an online rental, the same as if you had received a movie in the mail. You can keep it indefinately but they won't send new ones until that one has been returned to the store.

Just do Netflix. I haven't heard of anyone who's happy with the Blockbuster thing. Yes, in-store rentals are nice, but not when your returns take forever to get credited. Netflix really is as fast as they say they are.

@steveliv: no bloody edit button? :) in addition to my above comments, this makes it so a user doesn't have multiple mail rentals and multiple in store rentals at the same time. it makes it fair to those who only rent in store, to not have copies tied up. this was a recent change, as before, if you used a envelope to rent a movie instore, they would send the next movie in your online queue.

"Thursday August 6th: Stopped by the (redacted) location...
...since they are being mailed from the Northtown location...

If you're going to redact the location, shouldn't you at least redact every instance? :)

Annnnnd I'll just add this to my list of reasons why I'll never, ever leave my beloved Netflix.

@italianscallion33: Exaggerate much? Well now you have heard of someone who is happy with Blockbuster. For $7.99 a month, i get 2 online rentals, 2 in-store rentals + 1 ecoupon good for a video game or video rental. Just the ecoupon for the video game pays for the entire membership cost. It is a great deal for us, we save a good bit of money. It's not that returns take forever to get credited, it just the way it works. In store rentals when you use the mailer, are free, but they are treated as an online rental. The user is getting less that what he signed up for.

@steveliv: We need edit buttons! :) I meant to say the user is getting what he signed up for, he isn't getting shortchanged.

While this approach works for many companies (calling to cancel your account for better service), don't try it with Sprint or AT&T unless you have 4 hours to wait "in the queue."

I've been getting duplicate meetings as well... Maybe I should cancel... I have actually thought about and resign up next month...

@crabbygeek: movies not meetings... wow what's my problem...

I've had that happen to me, however when I called to find out why nothing was shipped they told me that I needed to have at least 1 movie availible in my top 15 in the queue.

Since I had two 5-disc tv series', and 3 movies not yet released along with another 3 or 4 movies that were new releases but in high demand, they were not sending anything out. Within 2 hours after moving around my wish list, those movies were sent out immediately and arrived the next day.

This is nothing new since I had a similar issue about 2 years ago. I could not access my queue. It kept giving me an http error or something attributed to the IIS server not processing the request. after about 5 phone calls and 2 weeks of being told it'll be fixed by tomorrow, i still couldn't access. I called to cancel but that didn't bother them at all. canceled without an issue. of course i was one of those heavy users that took full advantage of the mail and in store exchanges so they were probably more than happy to see me go

@italianscallion33: It's a shame because when I was in undergrad I was using both. I had Netflix orginally and hoped over to Blockbuster when Netflix sold out and went all corporate. Blockbuster was flawless at first. There was zero wait time. When you dropped off the movies not only was the movie credited right then and there, but you could pick up a new in-store movie for each movie you returned. Then Netflix got their stuff together, dropped their price hike and went back to being awesome and I guess just dominated the market. Rather than trying to compete Blockbuster went the other direction and just keeps spiralling downhill.

@steveliv: I didn't know of that recent change in their service until I called them up to complain that my movies weren't being sent out. That's likely what happened. If you notice in his timeline, the other movie shipped when he returned his in-store rental.

@italianscallion33: I used to have it as well and was very happy with it. Movies came fast and I never once had a problem with it. I ended up canceling it because I just ran out of movies I wanted to watch.

There isn't a service out there that 100% of the people are satisfied with.

@osiris73: i like the fact that my in-store rentals can be kept as long as i need them. i hated having to sweat about due dates.

@italianscallion33: I second that. I signed up for Blockbuster's free trial since Blu-Ray rentals were included in the service at no additional cost, and while I received an e-mail stating that my movies were on the way, I never got anything over the course of the two week trail. I cancelled at the end of the two weeks, thinking that if the movies showed up afterwards I'd just return them, but they never did. To this day I'm not really sure if Blockbuster ever actually sent anything out.

I ended up signing up with Netflix and haven't had a single problem with the service. Netflix may not offer users the benefit of in-store returns, but that's not much of a loss to me anyway, given that we don't have a local Blockbuster store here in town. Netflix's "Watch Instantly" stuff is of comparable value as far as I'm concerned. I've watched quite a bit of stuff I may not have considered otherwise if I had to use up my rental slots to view it.

Of course this is just my experience with the two services. Everyone's mileage may vary.

@steveliv: Huh, I was told otherwise by the store I got em from. Good to know

Ugh, I used to use this for pay, back in the day when you got unlimited exchanges and they didn't count against your online rentals - I could have 10 and 12 movies out at a time (usually I used this to whip through tv shows in short order).

Now it's a more expensive plan, with only 5 exchanges, and they won't send new movies until those ones are back. I only use Blockbuster for free trials these days (although I get an offer about once a month to come back, so it's not as if I don't have the service often)

@osiris73: They sent out notices about it and it made a Consumerist article.

This is partially why I killed my Blockbustter account in favor of NetFlix. Slow turnover times, poor selection, wrong discs (my favorite was getting Underdog instead of Underworld)...

Blockbuster did seem to have a glitch recently where the movies weren't going out.

For the moment though, I'll stick with Blockbuster. I've been with them long enough to get 2 coupons a month, movie or game (and game rental is a huge bonus for me). I left Netflix originally due to price and location. (Blockbuster was cheaper and closer, getting my movies to me sooner.) I haven't yet seen a reason to jump. I know that when Blockbuster does eventually die, that Netflix prices will go up, because they can.

@steveliv: Netflix offers a 2 rentals a month plan for almost half that price. For $1 more at Netflix you get as many rentals as you want. Consdiering my Netflix turnaround time is something like 2 days? I'm sticking with the red envelope, plx.

@DPGumby: Don't call on a Monday. Mondays are always PACKED. And with AT&T - if the retention department hold time is longer than 2 minutes, the CSR is supposed to handle the issue for you.

I have to disagree with the poster above who said Brian is getting what he paid for. He returned three movies in store, and took out one. That left him with one out of the three movies he should be able to have out at a time. They should have shipped him two movies by the next day at the latest. Instead they waited 11 days and shipped him two copies of the same movie. This is what he's paying for? I think not.

I've had the service for several years. They used to turn things around quickly and I had no complaints. Now there's always a delay from the time they receive a movie until when they ship the next one. Fortunately, it hasn't been to the extent that Brian describes, but it's getting worse all the time. When I complain, I always get the same boilerplate language about availability, but since I have over 150 movies in my queue (most of which are listed as available) I don't think this holds water. My favorite is when they bring up "postal performance" in the list of reasons I may not have gotten a movie. How can the post office screw up if they haven't even shipped anything yet?

You know looking at Blockbusters prices and plans it's very very tempting ... but Netflix's streaming service is used constantly at my residence ...

@Oranges: My BB plan has a free video game rental coupon plus the in store exchanges offer instant gratification. All my rentals are BluRay and there is no extra charge for that as well.

@catskyfire: i agree as well, the free video game rental coupon is a huge bonus.

@TakingItSeriously: you can stream, but let me know when you can stream bluray quality hd...

@DPGumby: It works pretty good for XM/Sirius. I practically had to argue with the guy ton convince him that no matter the discount, or how many free months, or whatever else he threw at me, ever since the merger XM's music sucks and Slacker's doesn't.

@crabbygeek: Rough week at work?

The main problem with blockbuster trying to enter this market (videos by mail) and trying to one up Netflix by allowing in store returns is that on the backend inventory tracking and other systems were never set up to allow for this. They have/had to do a complete overhaul of their backend systems and processes to allow for in store drop off of your mailed videos. Thats the main reason they are lagging behind.

Netflix with their online and Xbox 360 streaming, although not perfect, is still a much better value IMHO.

Blockbuster sucks. I switched from Netflix to Blockbuster for the price reduction and the ability to drop off films in store. They screwed up the delivery of my mail order films three times. Then I canceled and they still kept sending me films in my que. I kept them, and reversed all charges to my credit card. Still have the film too - a documentary on mythology by Campbell.

And why do people STILL use Blockbuster? Aren't they going to go out of business like Hollywood Video did years ago for their crappy service? I mean who nowadays RENTS DVDs and games?

Congratulations on him even finding a phone number. Both envelopes for my 2 movie plan were lost while I was traveling. The website required an email request to get more envelopes. 4+ weeks later, I have still not received the envelopes. I claimed one of my dvd's was broken a week and a half ago and they sent a replacement disc which I used to return (now all three dvd's).

@italianscallion33:

I was happy with blockbuster...before they got rid of the free game rental coupon, and jacked their rates up 2x in 6 months. Now, they are simply a slower service that netflix, for the same price, and less selection, and a FAR inferior suggestion system.

Why is the store shown in the photo open only 1 hour from Sun - Thu? :-)

@Saboth: they tried to remove the coupon from my account way back when, but i called them up and they put it back on.

@almightytora: are you serious? in this economy, renting a movie or game makes tons more sense than purchasing one, especially if you play/watch only once. Contrary to your opinion, people still rent movies and games. For my small monthly membership fee ($7.99) i get 4 bluray and 1 video game rentals a month. Most video games retail for around $50, even used copies aren't that much of a discount. Blurays retail around $22. Renting instead of buying saves me money.

I received a 6 month gift subscription to Blockbuster "1-at-a-time total access". I'm a senior citizen and thought it would be nice to look back through some old movies. I quickly learned that Blockbuster does NOT want to mess with limited availability DVDs. I had "Anne of Green Gables" at the top of my queue for 3 MONTHS, and during the last 3 weeks of that time, I was on vacation, so I deleted everything but that title from my queue. Blockbuster never shipped that title to me.

After I got back from vacation, my daughter offered to order the movie on her NetFlix account. She put "Anne of Green Gables at the top of her queue, on Tuesday sent back a disk she had finished watching, and in the Thursday mail delivery she had the DVD! What Blockbuster couldn't accomplish in THREE MONTHS, NetFlix achieved in three DAYS!!!

Basically, Blockbuster absolutely does not want to mess with limited availability DVDs. I have a "Long Wait" and a "Short Wait" movie at the top of my queue, and after checking my last movie at the store on Sunday, here it is THURSDAY, and nothing has been shipped. A customer phone service rep told me this morning that if I don't have 15 (!!!) "Available" movies at the TOP of my que, it can delay shipment of titles from my queue for up to 3 days! The movies I want to see are not available in my local store, so the store exchange "feature" is worthless to me.

The worst part of the story is that in the Blockbuster agreement fine print, once a payment has been made (think Gift subscription), "There are no refunds for any time period (or portions thereof) already billed or paid for."

At least I'm only stuck for a couple of more months.

Great sign. Their mail service is so good they don't need to keep the store open.

@almightytora: Umm, Hollywood Video is still around. I have one near me (although another one in town did close a few years ago)

@italianscallion33: Don't forget that us Blockbuster subscribers don't have to pay extra for access to BD movies through the mail. I get as much BD as I can watch in a month as well as much DVD I can watch. With no additional charge :)

I've had problems where the movie will be returned and nothing will ship out for a day or so. I spoke to a CSR and he told me this was because the items at the top of my queue had a Short Wait or greater. Their system gives you a day or so to see if the movie will arrive, and if so it ships that one. If not, it moves down your queue. So to keep movies coming, make sure you have "Available" titles at the top of your queue unless you want to wait a little while.

I have had generally very good luck with my Blockbuster plan. 3 movies out at a time, return for 3 more, 1 free movie a month, unlimited rentals during that month. 19.95. I think its a grandfathered plan/price. Had problem getting new ones sent and found out like someone else, the ones on the top of the list were not available, chaned my queue and was off and running again

@TVGenius:
You're correct. I got XM/Sirius down to $4.99 per month. Once that deal runs out, I'll cancel for good.

@almightytora:
There are three Hollywood Videos within 5 miles of my house. I don't think they've gone out of business ... yet.

@Kiamat: Right? Someone tell me this is from Spokane...

@italianscallion33:
I have blockbuster and don't have any issues. I get free blue-ray disks within 3 days of putting the ones I've watched in the mailbox, which is about as fast as you can get. I have three movies at a time right now for I think ~$14.

Having worked for BBV, I was very jaded against their Total Access service. We had used Netflix when we lived on the mainland, but after moving to Hawaii, we were worried about lag time for shipping movies.
We switched to BB Total Access and had so many problems -- partly because we lived on an island with limited options, but also because of confusing Customer Service issues. When Netflix opened a distribution center here, we jumped back.

Even better: if a Netflix movie has to come from off-island, they automatically send me the next movie in my queue, no charge. I have no problem waiting an extra day or two if they're willing to tide me over with extra entertainment. Also, the two times I reported an issue with a DVD, they automatically shipped a new one out... no lag time to send defective back and wait for a new one. Perfect with a toddler that HAD to watch Sesame Street NOW!