I Do Not Want to Pay for Stolen Tapes, Blockbuster

I disagree. Why should Blockbuster pay for something that wasn't their
fault? Regardless of how cheap the DVD would be to them, or how loyal
the customer was, that would eventually come out of someone's paycheck
barely making ends meet on the bottom of the totem pole, not the rich
president of the company who could afford it. The economy is bad
enough as it is.

I agree with you.
I think that if you have actually been a loyal customer for 6 years,
and pay over $40 a month for unlimited rentals, then they could comp
you something in this case. Blockbuster does not pay $22 for movies,
they can get them for less than $10.
If you had a police report and the computer system reflected what you
have stated, a discount or a one time waiver would a great way to
please the customer and build a future relationship.

Any further loss or theft, even with police report, should not be
granted the same compensation. Like I said, a one time deal.

I agree with you.
I think that if you have actually been a loyal customer for 6 years,
and pay over $40 a month for unlimited rentals, then they could comp
you something in this case. Blockbuster does not pay $22 for movies,
they can get them for less than $10.
If you had a police report and the computer system reflected what you
have stated, a discount or a one time waiver would a great way to
please the customer and build a future relationship.

Any further loss or theft, even with police report, should not be
granted the same compensation. Like I said, a one time deal.

I dislike Blockbuster alot but I have to agree with them on this. The
tapes were in your posseion when they were stolen so its not their.
One of the reasons I stopped going to Blockbuster was because they
value the money their customers spend, but they rarely, if ever, value
just their customers first.

Never, ever leave any valuables in your car.

What I've always been told is that if you rent something or borrow,
you are responsible for it. No ifs, ands, or buts. If someone steals
it, you have to pay for it. I would.

My purse was stolen out of a car years ago - hard lesson learned there
- anyway, the monetary value of everything lost was covered by
homeowners insurance. I don't know why it was that and not auto, but
it was.

I would hope that the value of the tapes would be covered as well.

Good luck.

Personally, I'd be more concerned about the stolen purse than the
tapes because of the high rate of ID theft, but that's just me.

It's $44. Roughly the cost of a utility bill. If you have the
insurance on your car, why not claim the cost under that and let your
insurance company pay for it. If not, well then maybe it's time to
chalk it up to a lesson in the school of hard knocks - DON'T leave
your purse unattended in the car and don't leave anying of value in
plain sight. It's just common sense.

I worked for Blockbuster many moons ago. If a customer would produce
a police report, I would normally help them out in this situation.
It's just good business. If the customer spends as much money as she
claims (and the employee will have records of this on the account
screen), then there is no reason not to help her out. Now if someone
were to do this multiple times, I would probably not be willing to
credit fees, but for a first time, why not?

P.S. These kind of claims that items were stolen happen very
frequently. The funny part is that after I would say, "Sure, we will
credit any fees as long as you bring us a copy of the police report",
99% of the time the customer would not show up. Some people like to
tell stories.

I don't want to pay for stolen tapes either, and if BlockBuster just
eats stuff like this, then that is exactly what will happen. Net-flix
is awesome comes right to the house or the computer never even goes
near the car.

Actually, I had the same thing happen to me, and they removed all the
charges once I gave them a copy of the police report. Similarly, as a
former manager of Hollywood Video, it was our policy to remove the
movies from the user's account and not charge them upon receipt of a
valid, truthful police report. One cannot expect that a renter will
carry the movies with them if they have multiple stops on their way
to/from the video store, and is usually considered a cost/risk of
"doing business."

Unfortunately, they take a certain amount of money out of your account
every month in exchange for providing a certain set of services -- and
replacing tapes that have been stolen is not on that list. So they're
not going to suddenly rewrite the contract so that it costs them an
extra $44 (or whatever their actual cost is), any more than you would
suddenly agree to give them $50 a month because they've been giving
you unlimited rentals for the last 3 or 4 years.

I doubt that they are going to make a new category of service for
people who are willing to pay a certain amount extra every month so
that if Blockbuster's property is stolen, Blockbuster will eat the
loss, either. That would just give unscrupulous people an incentive
to fake thefts. But even if they did, would you really take their
offer? I don't think I would. Especially since all those
unscrupulous people would be driving up the cost to Blockbuster,
meaning that it would cost much more than the number of rentals we
keep in our cars every day divided by the likelihood that our cars are
going to get broken into per day. We'd be subsidizing dishonest
people. And in general, even if they didn't take on an extra fee like
that, if they agreed not to bill customers for stolen DVDs, the prices
of the plans they already offer would go up as they covered more and
more thefts -- because as soon as dishonest members found out about it
they'd start faking thefts and selling the stolen videos for a little
extra cash.

I'm sorry that this happened to you, and I'm sorry that they got the
DVDs. But I don't think Blockbuster is likely to do this for you, and
I think that even with this theft and the $44 cost, if you stick with
Blockbuster for much longer you're probably better off that
Blockbuster isn't paying for stolen rentals.

Sorry, but you're responsible for them, as they were in your car.

While it wasn't your fault your car was broken into and the BB tapes
were stolen, do you think BB is responsible?

Your agreement with BB was to rent the tapes from them and return
them. BB lived up to their end of the agreement and you didn't
(through no fault of your own). Until the tapes were returned they
were your responsibility.

not covered under your insurance? I'm guessing you made a claim
against your policy for the loss of your purse and other personal
effects in the car, right?

nt

I had been a customer for several years.

I gave them a copy of the police report number.


They took off the late fees, but... yes I had to pay for the loss of
the tapes, and I did.


Sure it wasn't my fault they were stolen. BUT their loss STILL costs
them money. They still have to get new copies of the tapes & dvds
regardless of why they were missing.


So yes, I had to pay to replace the missing tapes.

Dani S.,
I am sure some place in the paperwork you signed with BB there was
stipulation about lost and stolen goods and who settles.
This one appears to be on you.
You might check with your vehicle insurance agent to see if they can
give you an assist.
BillR.

I have to side with Blockbuster on this. The tapes were stolen from
your car not from their store. If you have insurance coverage, that
should cover the cost of the tapes.

A translation of their stance might be something along the lines of
"you shouldn't have left our property in your car". And they would be
right about that. Not only because it attracts thieves as it did in
your case, but also leaves it exposed to damage from sunlight, heat,
and moisture.

As another poster said, you'd be much better to go with Netflix,
especially considering the high volume of "tapes" (I didn't know VHS
tapes were still available, unless you meant DVDs) you rent. Netflix
is MUCH MUCH cheaper, and they're certainly very reliable.

While I’m sorry for your misfortune I totally agree with the
Blockbuster Manager. How do they recoup their tapes, or the cost of
them? If you borrow my lawnmower and leave it in your yard overnight
and its stolen, I fully expect you to replace my lawnmower.

If you have insurance they should cover the DVD’s, from past
experience I know my insurance covered almost everything stolen.

Well looks like it's time to switch to Netflix.

I'm sorry this happened to you. I had my car broken into a few years
ago and it's horrible.

15 years ago I had a similar incident. I left an empty computer
notebook case on the passenger seat (I took the computer inside a
store to do some work). My car was broken into. They took the empty
case (they were probably pissed off when they found out it was empty)
and a rental video tape. I knew I would have to "eat" the price of
the tape since I left it inside my car. It's always said don't leave
valuables inside your vehicle and I learned the hard way. Sorry, but
I don't see how Blockbuster should "eat" the price of the tapes (or
were they DVDs?) even if you are a loyal customer.

Precisely. The tapes were not stolen from Blockbuster, they were
stolen from you. Therefore you are responsible.

Your patronage of Blockbuster doesn't give you a "pass" when you can't
return something you rented from them. Think of how "annoyed"
Blockbuster would be if all their customers said the video had been
stolen, and it couldn't be returned.