Blockbuster Feature Warns About Duplicate Titles

I got home from Blockbuster last night, and the Blockbuster website warned me that I had a title in my queue that I just rented from the store. It asked me if I still wanted to keep the movie in my queue, or delete it, and also offered me the ability to make this a permanent selection.

I've had a duplicate movie from my queue shipped out after renting it in the store, so I'm very happy to see this feature.

Comments

[Old Timer Too]

Nice feature and since they can track between the two systems (as they do whenever a film is turned in at the store), this was to be expected... so, someone (I'm not sure whom) is thinking at Blockbuster.

But first, they need to fix the bugs in the queue area, because I cannot delete, move or do anything that performs an update on a queue that has over 800 titles in it. If I catch it before it has fully loaded, it seems to work. But if I wait, then it will crash with an "Internal Server Error."

The "customer care" person has no clue and sent me "how to" instructions, which, of course, were what was not working.

I've complimented BB on vastly improving the site, but now that I've signed up with NF, I can see why people complain about BB's site. It really does stink by comparison. If I were to rate the NF site, I'd give it an 8 out of scale of 10 (that may be me, but I find some things irritating). BB would get a rating of about 2.

[Edward R Murrow]

"But first, they need to fix the bugs in the queue area, because I cannot delete, move or do anything that performs an update on a queue that has over 800 titles in it"

Yep, this defect is most heinous and BBO needs to fix this pronto.

Although 2 versus 8 on the web site ratings seems pretty harsh. All I do on the Netflix and Blockbuster websites is put movies into my queues and rate movies. I can't see spending more than 5 minutes per day on either of these websites. Anymore time spent is a massive waste of time, IMO.

[Firstlawofnature]

OTT is no flix groupie so his ratings are pretty interesting. BBI's site does suck by comparison though it still beats going to the store.

[corey3rd]

now that I'm about to quit, they finally get around to making this happen.

[GEoff]

Now if NF would only remove a movie from my queue when I watched it using Watch Now...

[Edward R Murrow]

"BBI's site does suck by comparison though it still beats going to the store."

It all depends on your point of view. I always make a point of hitting on the hotties when I go to the store, so I'm always looking for an excuse for a road trip. In fact, the chicks that work in my local Blockbuster store used to be Hooter's girls.

On another point, if you're one of those users who spends hours on the Blockbuster and/or Netflix websites then I can see where you would like the Netflix website more. But doesn't website stability come into play at some point? Whoever is in charge of running the Netflix servers and the Netflix website must have setup a Drop Point in Afghanistan and started eating Afghani hash on a daily basis.

[CJ]

If I see this, I'll be checking "always keep this title in my Queue" so hopefully I won't get these type of e-mails ever again.

I have a pretty elaborate system already set up among BB online, BB in-store, and NF rental options overlayed with SD, HD-DVD, Blu-ray formats, to try and get new releases. I shoot for Hi-Def format first, but settle on SD if it doesn't appear I can get the title reasonably soon as Hi-Def. Obviously I do a lot of queue deleting and moving items up and down queue. This new, helpful, BB e-mail feature would just confuse my already confusing procedure.

[d3vkit]

It's about time they did this.

Won't help me any though; since I work there I know what we have for rent (usually) and what I don't, I "check for rental" online. What we don't have, I queue up; what we do, I exchange for. So I'd never be renting a title I recently exchanged for, since everything in my queue is only available online (this is really to me the only reason to have the service).

But this is great for other customers!

[type-cast]

My problem is that the stores are refusing to give me the 5 free rentals I was promised. I went in the other day and they told me I was over the limit, despite not renting any thing on that billing period. The guy in front was also forced to put several discs back by this dumb system's bugs. Has anybody else had any problems trading movies recently? They're not giving us what we paid for. Oh, well. Guess I will just keep their new releases for 9 days and see how they like losing more money.

A title may still be diplicated if you rent it in different formats (i.e one DVD and one BlueRay)

[Kyle]

I just rented Across the Universe at the store, and then BBO sent it out to me. I guess it's because the one in the store was a 2 disc special, and the one online is the one disc version. They need to build in some better logic.