Tobold's Blog
Friday, May 16, 2008
 
DVD subtitles

I was blown away today by the excellent customer service of Amazon.co.uk. I buy a lot of DVDs from them, and on their website it isn't always obvious whether the DVDs have subtitles or not. I already had several cases where no subtitles were mentioned on the product page, but once I received the DVD they fortunately had subtitles. English is not my native language, and especially when heavy accents are used I much prefer having English subtitles on my DVDs. So I wrote to Amazon with my concern, and received an answer less than 2 hours later. Not only did they promise to forward my request for more consistent information to the relevant person, but they also provided me with a link to www.dvd-subtitles.com, a site which calls itself the "ultimate online resource for subtitle users". This is going to make buying DVDs over the internet so much easier! It is hard to believe if you are an online gamer, but there ARE companies with great customer service on the internet. :)
Comments:
i can just remember my experience with funcom during conan "open" beta.

i had loading times 7-10 mins, 3 tickets and 4 mails... only automated msgs as reply's... :(
i usually buy a lot of stuff from amazon, but never used their costumer support, im really glad to read this article !

G
 
Amazing how things can get togheter just by chance.....

A friend wrote me about dvd-subtitles just this early morning... and now reading Tobold.. I get the same advice....

Just coincidence or there's an alien cospiracy? Elvis is really dead or just got back home in another galaxy far far away? ^_^
 
It is hard to believe if you are an online gamer, but there ARE companies with great customer service on the internet. :)

Hmm, try telling that to those that pre-ordered AoC from Amazon UK but didn't get their codes in time to purchase early access.

I'm not sure if that was Amazon's fault or Funcom's though.
 
Thanks for the link Tobold. I particularly enjoy foreign film, especially Italian and Japanese stuff.
 
My mother returned two books to Amazon last week for some reason. She said the customer service people solved her problems without hassle and were SO sweet to her on the phone. They even had a conversation about Barack Obama. No way that would happen with a game company's customer service.

The issue is of course that gamers are a passionate bunch and really freak out when something goes wrong. Also the customer service guys are more likely to be geeks and naturally tired at being yelled at all day.
 
Well, the sad part in all this is that I sent amazon.co.uk a mail about the same subtitle issue two years ago and they told me the same thing. And yet still they don't show subtitles on their website. So I have moved onto buying dvds elsewhere who do actually tell what there are.
 
Amazon rocks. We started ordering from them when the opened in 1995. To date, the only problem we have ever had with the company was some slow shipping around the holiday season of 1999. It's never happened since. When returns have been necessary they've been accepted and credited with all due speed. Even big ticket items - we had to return a HD TiVo that arrived broken and they did not give us any difficulty.

My sole complaint right now is that Unbox videos won't play on my iPod Touch. Not much of a beef, but I'd rather buy from them than iTunes.

Amazing how few companies earn my unquivocal support, but Amazon's one of them. And you're right, it's too bad gaming companies don't offer similar customer support. Someday, once the technology is ubiquitous and there are many more options to choose from, service will determine who gets customers and who doesn't. Sadly we aren't there yet.
 
I buy alot of things from amazon, i've never had to use their customer service but i'm glad to here its top notch in case i ever have too :)
 
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