On 062707 I received an email from BlockBuster On-Line saying that my account has been suspended because “there have been a large number of customer service issues reported for my online subscription service over the past few months.” Two days later I received a hostile email telling me that my membership has been cancelled “because of problems with my account.” I also found out that I was blocked from logging on. After what seemed like an eternal wait, I was finally able to speak with a customer service rep, who, upon looking up my account, bluntly said that I had been “expelled” from membership. “I cannot give you any more information,” she said, “I was not the one who cancelled your membership.” I find this kind of comment from a customer service rep, who is supposed to represent the business and not herself, unacceptable. Then I sent an email inquiring about the reason for the cancellation of my membership, and received a boilerplate reply repeating what was sent to me on 062707. Yes, boilerplate replies are the routine; they never address the specific issue.

I have never been given an explanation why I was “expelled” as a customer. It seems like my membership was cancelled because I filed an excessive number of complaints (??) Certainly I have reported problems with their service, problems that are caused at their end, such as shipping the wrong dvd’s, putting disks in mismatched jackets, shipping damaged disks, and delays in shipments causing a lapse in my queue. Examples of these problems include: the same incorrect disk being sent to me FOUR times; an identical damaged disk sent to me THREE times. Movies were never shipped in queue order (which I can live with). Surely I reported these problem issues, and expected their service to improve. They would usually (not every time) send me an e-coupon as compensation for my inconvenience, and that’s a nice gesture. And now I’m told that because of the “unusual number of my reports” I am expelled from membership !!! I find BlockBuster On-Line's action callous and disgusting, as if I have committed some gross crime?!

On 7307 I sent a letter of complaint to the BB Corporate Office at 1200 Elm Street, Dallas, TX 75270 with these demands: (1) a satisfactory explanation of why BlockBuster cancelled my membership; and (2) their offer to reinstate my membership, which I reserve the option to accept or reject. I also thanked them on behalf of Netflix for giving my business to Netflix. Of course I never heard back from BlockBuster, as if they would really care ???