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Trouble for Tivo and NetFlix Partnership?
lucabrasi999 writes "Well, things may not not be as good for the potential joining up of Netflix and Tivo as once thought. Herb Greenberg, of CBS Marketwatch has a commentary which hints that this deal may not be as great as it once appeared. Why? In short, distribution rights. It appears that Netflix may not legally distribute all of the movies in it's library via Tivo. As a side note, Netflix may also be feeling some economic pressure. It now forces all cancellations occur by phone, making it more difficult to cancel because of a long hold time."
When I called to cancel one of my units about two weeks ago, my hold time was approximately 4 minutes. That is not unreasonable.
Netflix now forces all cancellations occur by phone
Could some inspiring Business Major retort the Uniform Consumer Rights for us? Off the top of my head, which will not be a good verbatim translation, it states that:
A cancellation of an order must be accepted as in the method original ordered in or in a manner that is faster in speed. Meaning that if signed up electronically than they have to accept an electronic cancellation or any means that would be faster. Like if I signed up via mail than if they have a means of electronic cancellation than they have to accept that too all the while accepting the mail as a cancellation method.
It now forces all cancellations occur by phone, making it more difficult to cancel because of a long hold time.
Wish someone would force all submissions occur after proofreading...
I had Netflix for a few months earlier this year, I loved the service, and when I decided to cancel for financial reasons, it was very easy. I just hopped online, and clicked a link. Then they told me I had 7 days to return my three movies, and we were done.
For this exact reason, I planned on signing up again in the near future. But if they are going down the road of AOL, where you can only cancel by phone, after long waits and pushy sales reps, I may just go try Blockbuster Online instead, and see how it fares.
Boy, I sure am glad that copyright laws have so encouraged the creation of this wonderful science.
:(
Oh wait...
Nevermind
no
Yes, I'd like to cancel
Really, why?
Don't want it.
But have you seen our super new optimized enhanced keyword system?
Yes, don't like it.
What didn't you like?
I just want to cancel.
We're just trying to determine why you were unsatisfied
Perhaps it's things like this that make me unsatisfied.
What exactly do you not like about the cancellation process?
JUST CANCEL ME!!!!!
It now forces all cancellations occur by phone, making it more difficult to cancel because of a long hold time."
As a Netflix subscriber, I have a "Cancel Your Membership" button on my account page...
-Chris
1) Blockbuster is in the market. Same 3 movies at a time, same postage paid, ~$3 less a month plus coupons for two free movie rentals a month. BB has a larger library plus their instore stock.
2) WalMart has also gotten into the game. Also cheaper than Netflix, I expect them to be the 'low cost' option by cutting their prices below BlockBusters.
3) Netflix recently changed their price (increased it) while making postage free. The result is the join-and-forget customers who are a the best type of customer for them will now be prompted to cancel, leaving them with the habitual heavy renters who make the free postage an expensive decision.
4) The clock is ticking against their entire business model as digital media delivery speeds accelerate.
A positive sign is that they recognize #4 and were making an attempt to bridge the gap with Tivo. Unfortunately, it can probably be done better by TW and other cable providers.
Still, I wish them the best of luck.
Long hold times at profitable companies are balancing their books on your free labor. Customer service is a collaboration between customers and the service providers. It's impossible to predict exactly the number of callers in a given hour of business, so avoiding any holding by callers means having extra answerers available. Since most problems are handled within a script by otherwise untrained answerers, a surplus of answerers is a simple expense at an outsourced call center, standing by with multiple companies' scripts at the ready. When callers don't immediately get an answerer, that's revenue not spent on the call center. Without the call center expense, that's profit. The time we wait on hold is zero productivity labor time spent by the customer that is counted as profit by the nonanswering company.
--
make install -not war
With being gone for a while and a two week BB test period, I figured I can't lose. Also, I like the idea of two in-store coupons/month from BB. (It was always the selection that kept me with Netflix, not the pain of a local store.)
how NetFlix was going to be allowed to basically do P2P distribution of movies... even if it was completely secure and paid for. The Publishing houses (Disney, Paramount, Choam, Fox) go to great lengths to control their content viability. Especially Disney which cycles content in and out of the market to keep demand as high as possible. A download library like Netflix would take alot of that power to create market-hype out of the hands of the publishers.
(Though I still think it's a cool idea and properly setup could work around those concerns...)
Just a quick observation--you say you don't pay for TV, yet your sig is from a CABLE TV program. I can't decide whether to jack your credibility or call the cable office first.
Suckas. Over the air radio and TV is still freeee as in look at all the money I didn't spend today.
You are watching ads like a motherfucker. I consider that a shackle myself. You are also watching 8 channels (that's as many as I could get w/the fucking rabbit ears I had for a year and a half before I went w/DirecTV) of snow/infomercials. Hell, two of the eight stations were shopping channels and one was a relgious network. Mmmm, five channels of snow.
Fox and UPN were the only two channels to really come in. They are worth it for ME as I like the shows they carry.
Tivo makes TV really fucking enjoyable. I'm up to 15 seaons passes. I don't even think about watching Live TV anymore unless my Tivo'd shit is all my fiance's stuff and then I am more likely to surf the net or do something outside.
I won't even get into OTA Radio and what you put up w/RIAA bullshit there.
The cancel-by-phone only rule must be pretty new, because I cancelled my Netflix subscription *yesterday* (9/8) using the web interface. Took all of two clicks.
That's $5 more than I gave 'em.
Your 5 bucks will pay for what, about enough envelopes, letters, and stamps to send out about 10 more extortion threats?
And they can keep their advertising revenue stream, I wont begrudge them that. They may have my eyes and ears, but they don't have my dollars. They don't have my attention, either.
Radio isn't as bad as you think. There are still long commercial free blocks of music. Music is just background noise to me anyways, all the copyright tantrums and handwringing have killed the artform for me.
And all that "overlayed crap" I see is on cable channels, not the free-to-air ones. Isn't it odd that you pay a monthly fee, get the same amount of regular commercials on channels you pay extra for (like HBO), and ON TOP of that, they pop little ads up over the content you payed for?
All the local air stations around here do is pop the station logo up once every hour, or however often they're required by law to do a station ID.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
When they pry the remote out of my cold, dead hands.
...on purpose.
If you ever get an email asking how long it took for you to get a specific movie, *never* under any circumstances tell them you received it early. They will stall shipment of future movies to make sure you're not getting more than they think you should get per month. They've been getting worse and worse about this.
-Randy
He's right. You click on the "Your Account" link, which takes you to a page that lists your current rental status and tells you your current package, i.e. "Three At a Time Plan." Next to that are two links, one that says "Change" and another that says "Cancel." If you click "Cancel," the first bulletpoint on the next page reads, "Cancellation will be effective immediately." All you need to do is check the "I understand and agree" box and submit the form. Who told you that you needed to call by phone?
Breakfast served all day!
If they're billing my credit card, and I want to cancel, and they make me jump through unreasonable hoops, I just won't. My credit card company will happily take my call and my instructions that any charges from Netflix are fraudulent because I have notified them in writing or using any means I choose that I am no longer a subscriber to their service. Then if Netflix wants to make a big deal about it, I'll bet they'll take the call from my credit card company.
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
How to cancel, quick:
Tell the first person you speak to that you are cancelling your service immediately, and that you have informed your credit card company to refuse all future charges. It's up to them whether they want to update their systems with the cancellation now, or spend 3 months trying to contact you in hopes that it was some kind of mistake, while you continue to use the service.
I can't find it now, but Walmart's site specifically stated that you would be charged for any DVDs lost in the mail. Where as Netflix absorbs that cost.
And as for Netflix, you can still cancel and restart your membership online.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Lois, this isn't my Batman glass. - Peter
Right from netflix website... Can I cancel anytime?
Absolutely. You can easily cancel your membership anytime, online, 24 hours a day. There are no cancellation fees. To avoid being charged after your trial, simply cancel your account before the trial ends. No clue what that guy is talking about...
. .
No, seriously.
The only acceptable defense of scientific results is to say that they were the product of the Scientific Method.
1) Only s-video video output
2) Only stereo audio output
I rent movies because I can view them using the DVI output of my DVD player and the optical audio output to the 5.1 reciever. The Tivo is not quality audio or video capable, so I'd never use this service in the first place.
But I have noticed netflix is starting to slowdown in response time. My turnaround time with them is generally 1-2 days - sometimes it's just a few hours (get it in the mail, rip it to my hd, stuff it back in the post office box). For a while there I could get three new movies every week quite reliably, but now they've started playing games: I'm sure the movies don't take any longer to come and go, but instead of three days each way it's becoming four and five and even six days from the time I send in my movies until I see the next "arriving soon" notices in my email. At this rate I'm going from "about 12 movies a month" for $23 to maybe 9 and possibly as few as six. Given that I mostly rent foreign and old scifi releases (the 99 cent stuff at most stores) this is not a very good deal.
I hate the long drive and the selection isn't nearly as good at the "local" (40 miles) movie gallery, but I can rent five movies there for five days for only about six bucks - and two disc sets don't count as two discs, but one rental. That's half the netflix rate just for the inconvenience of stopping off at the rental place twice a week.
I hope to see wal-mart fire up the competition soon. Competition is a good thing :)
1. When Netflix receives a disc, more often than not they ship the next disc the same day. Look at your queue page or read your e-mail. The date they sent the disc is right there. You can compare the date you got it with that date and know that that was the post office transit time. On occasion, they fill your order by shipping you a disc from another hub. When that happens, it takes an extra day, plus whatever extra time the postal service takes. They do this to shift inventory to match a demand shift. When it happens, your queue page keeps you informed.
2. You can still cancel online. Any suggestions that you can't are nonsense.
3. Negotiating rights will be part of any electronic distribution venture, regardless of what companies are involved. Everybody in the business knows this. Nobody would be proceeding with any ventures of this sort if they didn't have a plan for it.
4. Your answer to a delivery survey does not affect your account in any way. Others have speculated that the rate at which you turn discs around has an effect, but see #1 above. They ask about delivery time so they can figure out when and where they need to open a new shipping hub.