Time to Cancel Blockbuster?

Tuesday, January 24, 2006
I've been thinking more and more that it is time to cancel my Blockbuster subscription. Lately, its felt more like a chore to watch all the movies I get from them then something I really want to do. I still get about 3 movies a week from them, but in all honesty, I watch them somewhat reluctantly.

I'm also not crazy about the service. The movie turnaround time is pretty bad considering I'm not a heavy user anymore. Most of my movies don't get scanned in as "returned" until about 2 days after I send it. This despite the fact that their are "distribution" centers all over the L.A. area.

Also, they do really funny things with my queue. I get movies I don't really want that are like 5th or 6th on my list of things I want. I'm not a heavy user anymore. I should be able to get one of the top 5 movies in my queue. I know Netflix throttles its users and determines priority this way, and I'm pretty sure Blockbuster does it as well, but this should not be happening to me considering I'm a relatively light user.

Maybe I'll give it another month. But I'm starting to think it might just be worth it to just rent movies the old fashion way.

3 comments:

Kat said...

the last two movies at the top of my netflix queue had a status of "very long wait" when they first came out on dvd, even though i'd had them in my queue since they were in theaters...

i waited a month, still received movies below them on my queue, and finally ended up going to rent them at blockbuster. for the record, they were madagascar and the constant gardener.

Anonymous said...

Doesn't Blockbuster give you two coupons per month for in-store rentals? I suppose they do this in recognition of the fact that they don't have enough of current movies in circulation to satisfy the mail customers.
If so, it's inconvenient to have to go to the store, but still a feature that netflix can't offer.
-John

Anonymous said...

I meant to add - since there are many older titles the stores don't carry, the Blockbuster by mail is still worth having.