neowin.net

Today is a very special day. Today, the 27th of December, is the day I accept my defeat against Xbox's customer service. I believed this battle was over, I thought I had won, that I could finally move on with my life saying with pride and dignity... but this morning, the delivery guy brought me the evidence I needed to face the hard facts and realise I was against something much bigger than myself. This, is the story of my experience with Xbox's support. This my friends, is the Xbox Faceplate Saga. I know it is a very long post but I wanted it to be as complete as possible to avoid the usual "me no happy, me post a rant" stereotype.

Everything started 4 months ago, in August. During summer, I organised a big contest to celebrate my software's 6th birthday and for the top prizes, I chose some Xbox 360 Elite, some PS3 and some Wii. This way, I thought nobody could accuse me of only promoting my own personal preferences and the 3 systems have their benefits anyway, none is bad, none is THE one. I am a happy owner of several Nintendo and Sony systems and I just never had the chance to try out an Xbox. So anyway, the contest ended, the systems were dispatched and unfortunately, one of the Xbox never got delivered (South America, the post office had warned me about it). The package was insured so I filled the papers, waited and, surprise, the Xbox showed up at my door the last week of August. Instead of reimbursing me the declared value of the package, the post office "miraculously" located the lost package and shipped it back to me. One problem though: I had to pay for Brazil->Canada shipping which they estimated to 140$ (how they estimated it? simple: that's what I had paid to send the package in the first place). Long story short: I paid Post Canada while cursing their name and I sent a Paypal transfer to the Brazilian winner so that he could get the system in his country himself .

I was now the proud owner of a brand new Xbox 360 Elite! Considering the fact that Microsoft had decreased the price of the system of 100$ recently after I bought it and that I had pay for a shipping sitance of half around the world, I decided to bite the bullet and keep it. I didn't have much time to play with it but I had my eyes on Blue Dragon for a while and this perfectly justified the expense in my little head. A couple of days later, I finally opened the package. Everything was in order except for one small detail: the faceplate was broken. One of the memory slots was detached, the associated metal piece was missing and part of the faceplate itself was damaged. I knew they were selling faceplates at Futureshop but after everything I had paid and done to get this thing, I assumed Microsoft could do something about it (after all, it was the first time the box was open, it was a brand new Xbox and the faceplate could have easily been damaged before it was sent out to Brazil).

Important note to put everything in context: I've always been a supporter of Microsoft's products. They've been in the business of customer support for a long time and I always had some very positive experience with the MSDN Developer's Support. In this post I have summed up the discussions and translated my memories from French to English. I don't pretend to give an exact transcript but I promise it's the honest recollection of my experiences. Some of the dates may not be exact either, it's not like I have kept a diary about all this.

Here is the first call I made to Xbox's customer support:

I was a little disappointed by this arrangement but I know they all have procedures to follow and there's not much you can do about it. Why was I disappointed? because this expensive piece of equipment looks nice when it's complete but if you remove the faceplate form it, it just looks like an opened computer case, it's ugly, and I knew it would have to stay like this for at least 2 weeks next to my TV. I also knew that the faceplate would probably be immediately thrown in the trash can after reception so this was a useless use of time and money, for everybody.

In any case, the same day, I went to the post office and sent back the faceplate to the address they gave me, in Toronto. By regular mail it would take less than a week to arrive at the warehouse which was ok. Time passes by, no news... suddenly, I realise that one month has passed so I decide to call them back.
Two days later... nobody called me back, I call.

Three more days, still nothing. I call.


Finally! after more than a month, many calls, and a lot of time spent on the phone re-explaining my issue to a different tech every time, my problem was over. It was not a pleasant experience but it was not like it was the first time I had a bad experience with a customer support call center... at least, I wouldn't have to call them again and I could get myself a good game (for some reason, I refused to do anything with the Xbox until I considered it to be "complete", I know, I'm strange). So, the following week, I hear my doorbell, sign the delivery confirmation and happily open the package: there was a plate in there alright, a blue one (id: Hotrod). It's not like it didn't look well, but I could have ordered this plate for 10$ on Amazon which is what it cost me to send the original broken plate back to Microsoft. I didn't care about a faceplate I could easily get in any video game store. This was not a replacement plate for my Xbox Elite, my Xbox is black, the original plate was black and naturally, I was expecting a new piece of plastic that was plain black, something that no store could offer me (at the time). It could seem trivial but considering the hype that was around the new color of this Xbox when it was released, I just wanted to experience it the same way as all the others, I didn't need any frankenstein system.

This whole thing started to get on my nerves. My work was already stressful enough already a it was. A video game system is supposed to help brighten your day a little, not make it worse by sending a message equivalent to "I don't give a damn about what you". One of the reasons I was so worked up with this has to do with another thing I called Xbox for in the meantime (regarding the country associated with my gamertag, that's another story but needless to say that the problem was never solved). So, I called back:


This one hour call finally ended properly. I may be naive but I'm not completely stupid though, I knew the girl had probably taken the call with a message saying "this guy needs to be calmed down" but as far as I was concerned, I was satisfied with everything she had said to me. It sounded a lot better than the previous "don't know, don't care". And I remember I couldn't help myself but to compare this replacement issue with a similar experience I recently had with Nintendo. During the same period, Nintendo had decided that new Wiimotes would now be sold with a protective jacket and for some reason, they deemed appropriate to offer a jacket, for free, to any existing owner of a Wii. It took me three minutes to go to their site, enter my address and my serial number, and confirm the order. Their only question? "how many jackets do you want". I asked for 3 of them because I have 3 Wiimotes. No need to send the controllers back, no need for an invoice, no need for anything. Just a confirmation message thanking me for my "order" and telling me it could take a while before I get the jackets because of the high demand... I finally got the package only 5 weeks later, and they were not blue.

So, anyway, back to Xbox: I waited for my new friend to call me back... 4 days later, despite her multiple promises, still no news. I call:


Seeing that I got the last plate less than a week after getting a shipping confirmation, I assumed I'd get my new plate soon... time passed by... it is now November 19th, 3 weeks after the last call. I decide to call them to know what's going on. After waiting for about 10 minutes, I get a message saying "we're sorry we couldn't take your call. Please leave your name and phone number and we'll get back to you in the next 24 hours". No option to keep on waiting. I try to call again, I get the same automated answer so I leave a message, with my name, the ticket number and some info about the issue.

November 22nd: nobody called me back or tried to call me back (I work at home, it's not like they could have missed me). This is crazy, borderline impossible. We're talking about Microsoft here, one of the largest corporations in the world. I cannot accept the fact that their customer support center could be arrogant to the point of rejecting your calls, recording your messages and not follow-up on them. I call again. "we're sorry we couldn't take your call. Please leave your name and phone number and we'll get back to you in the next 24 hours".

November 24th: no call yet. I try calling once more. "we're sorry we couldn't take your call. Please leave your name and phone number and we'll get back to you in the next 24 hours". I'm starting to wonder if they filter my calls. This time, I add a note at the end of my message saying this is the third time I've left a message in a week and that I'd really appreciate if somebody could call me back as promised.

November 28th: I call again, this time, I get to finally speak with somebody.

I couldn't believe me ears when this guy told me he was not responsible for sending out replacement parts. This may sound like not much of a statement but to me, it means a lot: I know most companies delocalize a lot of their customer support for financial reasons nowadays. Whether we like it or not, that's a fact. But in general, they at least pretend to be part of the company to some extent. As far as I'm concerned, "they" are Microsoft, "they" represent the company and "they" are the only ones that can help me with my problems. What the tech said to me blows it off completely and equals to "I'm just here to take your call, if they don't ship it to you, what do you want me to do?". Suddenly, I'm talking to a complete stranger, not affiliated with Microsoft in any way and who admits he can do absolutely nothing to help me. So what am I supposed to do now? this guy cannot help me but he's the only one I can call. Anyway, I give up for the time being, I have more important things to take care of.

3 weeks later. I'm now done with my software update, it's been released and Blue Dragon is waiting for me. It's not the faceplate I wanted but it's still a "complete" system so I decide it's time to get something good out of my Xbox. Still, as you can guess, I did not receive the promised black faceplate and I'm in the mood to call once more.

I was shocked! such efficiency! I didn't have to do anything but give my previous ticket number and voila, problem understood, let's place a new order for you. For a minute there, I was a believer...

... which brings us to today, the last day of my saga. This morning, I received the package from the warehouse. How does the story end? I won't spoil the surprise with another boring paragraph, a picture equals a thousand words...



...and yes, if you're wondering, I did call Xbox before writing this post: "we're sorry we couldn't take your call. Please leave your name and phone number and we'll get back to you in the next 24 hours".

Take very good care of your Xbox Elite if you have one, your faceplate will probably be worth a lot of money on eBay in a couple of years...
Patchou

wow. i cant believe they sent you a white one at the end of it all.

Spray paint it black.

I would be, in all honesty, absolutely livid. In fact, I most likely would have just ended up giving in and buying one on eBay, or something. So, what are you going to do now? I think this should be reported to someone higher up, because it's frankly unacceptable.

That just adds insult to injury

I on the other hand had a different experience.

When my wireless controller's A button stopped working, they sent me a wired controler as a replacement. Called them up, they said to keep the wired controller and they would re-send the wireless one

And the moral of the story is ..................





to use registered post.

wow, its like they did it just to **** you off

Why didn't you just buy a replacement faceplate and spray paint it?

You've probably spent more time, effort and cash on faffing around with the phone support.

I don't really think that's the point. MS are supposed to provide a service, and they are failing miserably.

Mhm, i would have thought 'i wont be so arrogant and up myself, take a quick trip to the local shop and buy a new plate'

Each to his own.

@ photo at the end, that about sums it up yes :'D

Not really.

Anybody could falsely call for a faceplate and try and blag one.

As I stated earlier, it's up to you to use registered post, that way you have comeback either from the post office OR MS.

It aint rocket science really.

since he already paid for his xbox that comes with a (black) faceplate, why would he have to buy a new one? sure he paid for the deliverycosts of his broken faceplate, it's more a matter of prinicipal imo.

I really enjoyed reading a well-written, long & interesting post for once, thank you

But i must say, there is no words for the situation you are in and have been through, no excuse!
Hope a Microsoft employee ( Wink Wink ) Sees this and compensates you, with like gold & jewelry.

But as suggested, spray that white one black, no ones gonna notice