The Gamefly Aftermath

An interesting thing happened this morning. I actually got a call from Gamefly. The guy explained that he saw my emails and my blogs and would try to smooth things over.

First thing I thought was "Wow, someone reads my blog?"

At any rate, I explained my grievances and he did something that reminded me of the Gamefly of old. He didn't do the whole "game availability spiel". Instead, he actually explained in explicit detail how the process works.

And he made sense.

The short of it is this. They don't look at just your queue order, but instead how long a game has been in your queue, along with how long it's been in other queues. If I put a game in my queue yesterday and a guy who had the game in his queue for a while puts it at the top of his list, when a copy becomes available, he'll get it first. Makes sense right?

He also explained that distribution centers serve their primary areas first. Again, that makes sense.

He stressed the importance of having games in your queue, which makes sense of course. I told him that since I split an account with my wife and rent for two systems, it's important that I get the games for that system instead of risking being sent something from another system. This is where a profile system like what Netflix has would come in handy. He stated the best thing to do would be to plan ahead and put those games in my queue instead of adding them last minute.

At the end of the call I was actually satisfied. He even gave me the phone number, which on the website is harder to find than the holy grail.

So apparently my problem is that I was using it like it was 2003. Back when I didn't have to worry too much about queue management. The system does have some flaws, but apparently I have to plan ahead somewhat, as there are other factors involved.

Now there's just one thing that Gamefly should do. Put all of this information on their site somewhere. Their FAQ is a joke for all intents and purposes. Also they should fire all the guys who handle the emails, since they seem to send canned responses for the most part. Then, have the guys who handle the phones do the emails as well. If someone would have explained this in better detail long time ago instead of doing the whole "game availability" shill, I wouldn't have this problem.

At any rate, only time will tell at this point. It's nice to know that they took the time out to try to keep me as a happy customer. Of course, as usual, it seems that if you actually complain about something on twitter, then the company will bend over backward for you. GameFlyInc on twitter kicks ass in this regard. Keep that in mind folks.

Gamefly, what the HELL happened to you?

I've been with Gamefly on and off since 03 and I generally didn't have any problems with them.

I resubscribed with them in November and I've had three hiccups so far. The first one wasn't really their fault. I had reported a game as missing since it had been about a week. They were in the process of shipping a new copy when I received the first game in the mail. So I let them know, but since they were already shipping my game, I ended up with two copies of the same game. No big deal.

Second hiccup was when I noticed that sometimes, my queue would be out of order when they receive a game. No biggie. I just reordered it, thinking it was a glitch.

Today was the biggest hiccup so far. I see they received a game I sent and I checked my queue to make sure it was in order. It was. I had Final Fantasy X on my number one slot. So everything's fine right? Wrong. I check back in a few hours and see that Final Fantasy X-2, which was in the second spot in my queue, was shipping instead, despite the fact that Final Fantasy X was "Available Now." To add insult to injury, FFX-2 wasn't at my shipping center in Pittsburgh and instead shipped from LA. So now I have to wait two more days for a game I didn't even want yet.

Needless to say, I fired off a complaint, so we'll see how it's taken care of.

I just have to wonder what happened to Gamefly? In 2003 when I started using them, they were very friendly. They prominently displayed their phone number and I remember one occasion in which they conference called my bank to see why they were taking out too much money. (Long story there.) I also remember when I could just set games in my queue and forget about them, reordering them only when I wanted them to ship in a different order, or when a new game came out.

Now they've become this huge corporate sellout. The only way you can contact them is through e-mail (I can't stand when companies don't even acknowledge that you might want to call them), the queue is fucked up to the point where you have to make sure everything is in order whenever a game is returned, and they've just lost their "gamer" feel altogether.

It's really quite sad. If this keeps up, I'll have to take my business elsewhere.