God I’m crap at updating this. I really need to get into a routine of updating this more regularly, though I only know of two people who actually read it (hi Jen and Nokkon 
). Hopefully I can start updating it once a week from now on, I have a plan for that
So, what’s been going on since the last update? Well, as detailed in my last post, I’d gotten Gameplay to agree to pay for my Xbox repair. Unfortunately, things didn’t go very smoothly there at all. Just after I made my last post, I went off work with a back problem, which ended up keeping me off work for nearly 3 weeks. As my back was really bad, I didn’t get chance to send the 360 off to the repair company until my 2nd week off. They kept it for a week before eventually getting back to me, and telling me it was too damaged for them to fix! They were charging me a fee for examining the console, and shipping costs (both of which Gameplay paid for me), and getting the console back to me. I finally got the console back the day before I went back to work, and still had the wonderful task of phoning MS Support and asking them to repair it.
I could do that now, as I originally couldn’t, for two reasons. The first reason is that my console, which had initially died with a video display problem, was now showing the dreaded 3 Red Rings of Death. The second reason is that MS had finally admitted there was a problem with the 360’s, and had upped the warranty period to 3 years for all consoles that died with the 3 RRoD. So armed with that knowledge, and my dead 360, I got on with phoning MS Support. I was expecting the worst, but was very pleasantly surprised. The chap I spoke to was courteous (as I expected, US Customer Service is amazing) and efficient (that was the surprise). We went through a few bits and pieces, he took all my details (which I had to spell twice, damned Scouse accent) and explained the procedure to me. First, they’d email me a shipping label (I already had a box to send it back in), and I then had to contact UPS who would arrange for the collection of my Xbox. It would take between 4-6 weeks from when they get it to fix it (though I’d been told by friends to expect 6-8 weeks given the huge number of consoles going back for repair), so I readied myself for an extended period without my beloved box. It had already been nearly a month at this point, I was not looking forward to another 6 weeks without it.
A week after they had picked the Xbox up, I woke up to an email from MS, saying they’d received the Xbox and and were now going to look at it. A week after they got it?! I was less than happy, I’d expected them to have had it the week previous. I calmed down when I spotted a second email which Gmail had attached to the first, which stated that my console had been fixed and had been shipped back to me! \o/ If I wasn’t in work at the time I’d have done a little dance. A few days later, a nice box arrived at the house, containing an Xbox 360 for me. It wasn’t my original console (mine was a November 2005, this an October 2006), but I didn’t care. I connected the hard drive back up, plugged everything back in, and went into gaming bliss for the next several hours.
I have to say how surprised I was to get it back to quickly though. I can only guess that because my motherboard was completely dead (as pointed out by the original repair shop), MS saw this and simply gave me a refurbed console instead (hopefully one with the initial design problems fixed). I know others haven’t been so lucky, so I do consider myself fortunate here. It’s just a shame the damn thing didn’t died after my back had gotten better. 3 weeks at home with the Xbox would have been great for getting through some of the older games I’ve got.
I do have a tale of poor customer service at the same time though. With my Xbox dead and thinking I’d be without it for months, I was really in the mood to play on it, so came up with a plan to get a new one. My brother had a dead 360 with the 3 RRoD that he’d bought from Curry’s in December 2005 (so outside the initial warranty), and when he tried to take it originally he was told they wouldn’t do anything for him, so he ended up buying a Core and leaving this one spare should it ever get fixed. So armed with the Sale of Goods Act, and the information from MS regarding the new warranty, and their admission of a design flaw, I was confident I would be able to get a replacement console from Curry’s. After all, the console is inherently faulty, MS have pretty much admitted that, so surely I would be able to reject the console under the SoGA and get a replacement? Curry’s had other ideas.
I initially went into the store where it had been bought (in cash, so I just said it was my console), and tried swapping it there. No dice they said, all problems outside the initial 1 year warranty were handled by their customer service department. The chap was nice, and did warn me I was unlikely to get it swapped. I thought he was just doubting my legal knowledge, but I think he just knew what was coming for me.
So home I went, and got on the phone to Curry’s customer service line. When I explained the problem, the guy (whose name was Rakesh, for those who care) instantly replied with “you’ll have to contact Microsoft, it’s not our problem”. I told him differently, I bought the console from them, so I expected them to deal with it. “Sorry not our problem” was his considered response. We went around like this for a while, all the time me explaining the law to him and how it’s Curry’s responsibility to deal with it, and all the time he was just getting more rude, to the point where he actually said the words “we could carry on like this but you’ll just be wasting my time” (cheeky bastard). I eventually took his name and put the phone down. Time to take this further.
Still fuming, I went off and typed up a very angry, and pretty long letter. I detailed the poor customer service I got, and explained precisely why I was going to Curry’s for this problem, even going so far as to cut and paste parts of the Sale of Goods Act into my letter, explaining why they were relevant and why Curry’s had a legal responsibility to deal with my problem. I sent it off to the Curry’s MD, confident that this time it would work. Surely by highlighting everything in plain black and white there was no way they could ignore me? Unfortunately, I was wrong again. It took a while, but I got a reply that said how sorry they were I was having trouble, but I needed to contact MS for a repair. Off went a second letter, again very detailed, and being very clear that I was after a replacement console under the Sale of Goods Act, not a repair. This time I had a phone call as a response, from a chap who was apologetic enough, but whose only real response was “MS offer a free repair service so we have to let them do it”.
By this point I’d received my Xbox back from MS, so decided not to argue any more (I was really only after a console to play on while mine was meant to be out of action for 2 months), but I was really disappointed with Curry’s. They ignored their legal responsibilities and continually tried to push me to MS so they wouldn’t have to deal with me. They do this in the knowledge that hardly anyone will take them to the Small Claims Court for a replacement when MS already offer a free repair. Thinking on afterwards, I’d probably have had more success if MS’s repair would have cost me money, Curry’s wouldn’t have been able to use the “free repair” as an excuse to push me aside. It was fun arguing with them, but I was hugely disappointed with them in the end.
Hmmmm, this post has gotten very long and I’ve not really mentioned anything gaming-wise yet. I’ll do that now in a second post, so I’ll wrap this one up now by saying Curry’s suck ass, but MS rule.
Oh, and I love my Xbox 360
