Okay, here's a pro-Netflix story that even surprises a supporter.

I mailed out a movie on Saturday afternoon, and damned if I didn't
receive its replacement today (Tuesday).  Not too bad, considering the
only days in between mailing and receiving the replacement were a
Sunday and a postal holiday.

Actually, I shouldn't be completely surprised, as I did receive the
"we're received" email yesterday/Monday morning.  Somehow, I guess
Netflix did receive (and ship) mail yesterday, even though there was no
regular mail delivery.  Well, at least the local Netflix did.

"SoHillsGuy" wrote in alt.video.dvd:
Outside of small towns, many post offfices have someone working
Sundays and holidays. Boxholder mail can be put in on those days.

Quite right.  I have a PO Box at the main post office of a town of
150,000 people.  I get mail 7 days a week.  It's awesome.  Now if only
we had a local Netflix center, I'd be in heaven.  Also, if they worked
Saturdays.

-beaumon

In article <1109147433.912536.261***@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>,
lorincantr***@yahoo.com says...
If you had a local netflix center you'd recieve less movies per month.
The shorter your shipping times, the more money you cost them in
postage, and so the more "undesirable" you become as a customer.

On 2/23/2005 6:45:48 AM, theyak wrote:

I have a local center and my turnaround times are typically three days.
If I send a disc in on Monday, they get it on Tuesday and ship me the
replacement that day, and I receive it on Wednesday.  Occasionally,
they'll ship the next day, making my turnaround time four days max.

Of course, if you're renting an obscure title, it may have to come from
another distribution center, which could add a day or two to shipping.

YMMV, depending on your local distribution center.  They're not all
created equally, and some are more heavily taxed than others.

In article <g8ccb956den8$.***@tarkus.karnevil9.com>,
Tarkus <karnev***@beer.com> wrote:

Show quoteHide quoteNo, really! It's all been scientifically proven and it affects EVERY
account. There's no disputing it. :)

In article <regdwight-121671.09435823022***@news.verizon.net>,
regdwi***@verizon.net says...
Show quoteHide quoteYep, Netflix employee, it does.

From http://www.manuelsweb.com/netflix.htm

"Rent As Many DVDs As You Want*" Netflix Legal Disclaimer

A frustrated Netflix customer e-mailed me that he called 3 different
lawyers and all refused to take up his case because of the  online
agreement  Netflix has.

Delivery and Return of Rented DVDs
We reserve the right to allocate and ship DVDs to you in any manner that
we, in our sole and absolute discretion, determine.

In determining priority for shipping and inventory allocation, we give
priority to those members who receive the fewest DVDs through our
service.

Basically, this says they don't have to ship you any rentals and makes
them impervious to any law suits regarding service.  It also says
they'll slow down your service if you rent too many movies.

Oh,  Netflix also says  by becoming a subscriber you can't sue them
unless you do so on their home turf and on their terms.

Disputes
You and Netflix agree that the United States District Court for the
Northern District of California and/or the California Superior Court for
the County of Santa Clara shall have exclusive jurisdiction over any
dispute between you and Netflix relating in any way to the Netflix
service or Web site or these Terms of Use. You and Netflix expressly and
irrevocably consent to personal jurisdiction and venue in these courts.

In article <MPG.1c86b3541b116355989***@news.easynews.com>,
theyak <y**@dev.null> wrote:

Anecdotal. But you knew that. Just can't fathom it.

BTW, thought you were done with me. Ahaahahahahaha...

In article <regdwight-BE8C08.21214823022***@news.verizon.net>,
regdwi***@verizon.net says...
Ignored the thread, not the poster. But after looking you up on google
groups, I should.

In article <MPG.1c87a6c41cdd28e989***@news.easynews.com>,
theyak <y**@dev.null> wrote:

LOL! Look who's talking. Did mommy wash your mouth out with soap or can
we expect another diatribe laced with your colorful language?

On 2/23/2005 1:28:31 PM, theyak wrote:

You have an odd grasp of the English language.  What they're saying is
that they'll give slow renters first choice of titles.  Nowhere does it
say they'll slow down your service for renting too much.

Irrelevant.  They can't disclaim their way out of the law.  That's just a
scare tactic.

"Tarkus" wrote in alt.video.dvd:
Sorry, but it's you who have trouble with the language. If they
give better service to people who rent fewer DVDs, then by
definition they give poorer service to people who rent more.

Note that they do NOT say "when two people request the same title".
They say that people who rent fewer DVDs get better service.

This sort of clause is standard in contracts, and it's almost
always valid. It is not "disclaiming their way out of the law" --
most big corporations that do business with the public make it a
condition of doing business with them tht you agree to sue them
only in their home state.

On 2/24/2005 8:28:26 AM, Stan Brown wrote:

What they say is they get preferential treatment, which logically means
they get first choice on titles.  And my own personal experience supports
that very theory.  Anecdotal to be sure, but so is every other claim to
the contrary.

Sports teams all the time put stuff on the back of tickets saying they're
not responsible for this and that, and yet they often lose court cases
for this and that.  Disclaimers do NOT supersede law.  They're designed
to discourage lawsuits, not prevent them.

Hey, if you don't think Netflix is worth the money, don't use them.  I
would never for a second tell you to do any different.  They're a good
value for me, but YMMV.

Stan Brown wrote:

If one were picky, that'd not really be true.  It only *potentially*
provides poorer service to people who rent more.  What it really
said is that those who rent fewer discs get first dibs, so to speak.
However it may be that someone else with second-dibs always gets
theirs too because there isn't a shortage of resource.  So there would
be no difference.  What you say in this context depends on there being
a shortage of resources to fulfill both classes of users, and that's
not a guaranteed given.  Something probably true, but not certain
"by definition".

I suspect their software tries to limit rentals to the point where
they're breaking even on postage/envelopes vs payment to them (which
is to say, they'd be losing money slightly when counting overhead.

I personally prefer that they'd maybe up their prices a little to
make sure they sustain profitabilty and to finance capital costs
related to increasing their title 'count' with sufficient numbers
of discs per title to not yield 'very long wait' status (which several
in my list have).

Mike

Does anyone know exceeding what number of rentals per month makes you
a frequent renter subject to a potentially slower turnaround? Is there
an optimum number of rentals per month in the $17.99 3-out program
that doesn't put you on the frequent renter list but is better than 12
rentals per month?

I've read that if you cancel service and re-subscribe, that you get
faster service for a while until they re-establish you as a frequent
renter. Is that true?

I've never tried Netflix but was considering starting it to rent a few
dozen old catalog titles I can't find locally. I'd probably stop
service after that because I don't have time to keep up with new
releases. Would Blockbuster's online service be better for this?

On Wed, 23 Feb 2005 21:28:31 GMT, theyak <y**@dev.null> wrote:

Show quoteHide quote

John wrote:
We've the 5-out plan ($30/month).  I think our record month had maybe
34-disk rentals or so.  The $30 probably just covered the postage both
ways
and the printing of the envelopes that month.  :-)

So I'd guess a 'slowdown' is to the point of getting a disk per dollar
paid, per month.  So my guess would be the 3-out program would try
and limit one to maybe 18~20 discs per month.

I think the "slowdown problem" is maybe overstated a bit.  It's the
adding of an extra one day (sending next set the day after receiving
the previous -- rather than sending out on the same day received, which
they often do, do).  Plus some come from cross-country and the mail
takes
longer.

Mike

In article <1109631631.314711.318***@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>,
gew***@yahoo.com says...
Show quoteHide quoteMail has absolutely nothing to do with it. My Netflix discs used to come
and go back to DFW (2 days). Now they've opened a center where mail
takes one day to reach it's destination. And now, amazingly, it takes
the dvds a day longer (3 days) to go 50 miles than it took to go 250.

theyak wrote:

Of course it does.  It comes by mail.  It's fair
to say that UPS and Fedex times have nothing to do
with it.

When I mailed a package recently (I'm near
Portland Oregon), one went to Salem, Oregon.
Maybe 50 miles away.  Told the counter guy that
the cheap-fee way (not Priority mail) should be
fine, it's not going far.  He said that it really
goes from here to Seattle (the opposite direction of
Salem, and a lot further) first to be sorted, and then
comes back (passing through Portland) on it's way to
Salem.

When I once had a package from Fedex sent to me from
the Boston (Mass) area, I tracked it using online
tracking.  It arrived in Portland the afternoon before
the day it was due to be delivered.  It had to transfer
from the Portland office to the Tualatin one (Portland
suburb).  It went those 15 miles through Memphis, Tenn.
overnight.  And it arrived on time.  But.....

Point being being xxx miles away may have nothing to do
with how far it travels from there to there and Netflix
has nothing to do with the path it takes.

Further, I'm certain that 100% of my netflix disks do NOT
come from the nearest netflix center (although they
all get returned there).  There are inter-region flows
to balance where the inventory is and where the demand is.

Mike


Show quoteHide quote

In article <1109707284.901331.41***@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com>,
gew***@yahoo.com says...
Show quoteHide quoteAll the mail in this area goes to the same damn building where the
netflix po box is. It all gets sorted in the same place. It's wheeled
over and stuck in a hole in the wall. That's the extent of my dvd's
travel once it hits the post office. Yet it takes 2 days for netflix to
check their mail. Yea, right. Netflix uses the post office as their
scapegoat.

Irrelevant.

Show quoteHide quote

theyak wrote:


Mail gets sorted on every level just as email gets routed ("sorted") at
every router it passes through from source to destination (which may be
quite a few).  So certainly it gets sorted there.  Question is, where
do they route them after the sort?

As in my Fedex example, it may get sent 100 miles away then back
to the same post office on it's way to or from you.  They probably
are using the same distribution techniques.  You're assuming that
two users of the same post office would avoid having the mail go
somewhere else inbetween.  A poor assumption I think.  I've already
shown how that doesn't happen in at least some instances.

What do you mean by scapegoat?  They explicitly say that they may
slow down those who rent a lot during the month
(key word is "may" which means not always).

A DVD coming across country isn't relevant to how long a DVD
takes to get to you?  I don't think so.  Makes little practical
difference where an email is sent from, but a physical DVD disk
takes maybe 3~4 days longer to get to me from Florida as compared
to Oregon.  I consider that a significant difference in mail delivery
time.

I also find that they don't always seem to process all their mail
every day, especially Mondays where they've multiple days worth
of mailing backed up.  However it does seem that they will
process dvd's mailed on friday before ones mailed on Saturday or
Sunday.

The couple they received today (from my mailing them yesterday) are
going to
have their replacements mailed out tomorrow (where sometimes they'll
mail
them out the same day).  They're slowing me (my wife mostly) down
a little.  Which is fine, we get more than our money's worth from them.
We usually have nearly 200 on our queue.  :-)

In practice (over maybe a year or so), we've paid much less per disk
of rental than we did going to rental stores prior to that (mostly
Blockbuster, using their "bonus" sort of program) -- plus our selection

choice has been much greater.

If you find going to Blockbuster stores cheaper per disk due to
Netflix's
processing of your discs unsatisfactorily (no matter who you think
they blame), perhaps you should go back to the rental stores.  At
very least to calm your karma.

Mike

P.S. - I do notice that once in a great while, the time for a DVD I
sent
       to them takes more than the single day it usually does.  Once or

       twice I think it took five or six days!  However, this also
happens
       once in a great while when I send packages or letters to
relatives
       that usually only takes two days.  One common problem, I
understand,
       is if the zip code gets misread.  It'll get sorted and sent
cross
       country where they'll then read it right and route it back
again.
       I once was upset with an ebay seller because he lived only 120
miles
       from me, but it had been a week and a half since he said he had
mailed
       it to me via first-class mail.  I didn't belive him until it
arrived
       with a postmark matching his claimed mailing date!

On 3/1/2005 4:56:44 PM, Anoni Moose wrote:

Only if your distribution center has maxed out the day your disc(s) are
received.  So once again, it has a lot to do with your distribution
center, their workload and even quality of workers.  That's why some
people receive a lot better service than others.

Tarkus wrote:
Yes, I recall reading an interview with the Netflix guy.  Centers' work
is done by "hand" to a good extent, and the number of employees used
is what one would call small -- running "lean and mean".

So I expect that the ups and downs of work-load through a week or
over a month's time (esp w/holidays, etc) are smoothed over by not
finishing all the work for heavy-load days and pushing it over to
the next (etc) and just being staffed for the average load.

Certainly, their return address stick-on label must be put on the
envelopes by hand.  They're crooked most of the time and oriented
every which way.

Mike

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