ErinQL In Time

[Personal Experience Warning]

Microsoft just hung up on me. Or rather, the outsourced person in India did. Are they calling me back right now at the number I just confirmed for them to resolve? No.

I have an XBox 360 that died from the Red Ring of Death. I shipped it back, they shipped me a different box, and everything seemed to work fine. Thanks for the quick turn around by the way - only a total of 10 days. Not bad.

Then my son tells me we have some games that have reverted back to Trial mode. Hmmm....

Turns out, these games might have been purchased under an old account that can no longer be accessed, because I had let it go when I couldn't afford to pay for the Live account. The two games in question are Marble Blast Ultra and Geometry Wars. Both games that were purchased over two years ago when we first got the system.

Last year, when that Live account lapsed, I could still play those games. I could even play them last month. Now that I have a new XBOX 360, with a new serial number, I can no longer play them. Why?

And more importantly, why can't Microsoft find the proof under my old account that these games were already paid for? I recently read a Wired article about a similar issue relating to achievements, and more importantly that Microsoft has been rolling back their databases to fix bugs.

So I can't help but wonder that when I asked for an escalation to do a search on my gamer tags on an older version of a database, that they had hung up on purpose. To be fair, they had asked for the telephone number of the prior account, which I could not recall, because I have switched phone numbers a few times since then (it's been two years).

Or maybe they line was dropped through no fault of theirs. But how about a call back?

Here's the killer question: If these games only cost roughly $4 a piece, and it's $8 of revenue that they are 'giving up' in trusting that I once owned these games, what does it really cost them in goodwill to just give me back the games I already paid for? Because in reality, they already have my $8 from two years ago, and I'm sure that has made some good compound interest for them when you consider the millions or perhaps billions it adds up to.

But at this point, I think it's better to just move on - my kids want a Wii and I want a PS3 for it's blue-ray player. Rather than spend the $8 again, or another hour on the phone with Microsoft to get back what I've already paid for, I'm ranting in public and moving on. I'll own that.

My message to Microsoft? You can afford to give away $8 in electronic revenue, even if it's to 100,000 people with the same problem, just because they bothered to call you and ask for it, and because WE ALREADY PAID FOR THOSE THE LICENSES!

If you wish to renegotiate, I'll be happy to take your call.