Associated Press
SEATTLE — John Kreis thought he was lucky when he scored Microsoft Corp.’s Xbox video game console the day it came out.
But the $300 system stopped working almost immediately. The 31-year-old Chicago man said it took a month of aggravation with Xbox’s customer service line before he got a replacement.
He loves the new game system but won’t soon forget the experience.
"The whole thing that was so frustrating was the fact that still to this day I’m waiting for a call back just to explain to me what happened," he said.
Across the country, Xbox users complain of a similar problem — a game system that never worked or worked for a few hours or days before freezing up.
Some, such as Kreis, Paul Adams and Debbie Mason, complain of enduring poor customer service as they waited for a resolution.
"I’m taking my Christmas decorations down and (my son) hasn’t gotten to play with his Christmas toys yet," said Mason, of Uniontown, Pa. She had just been told in her ninth call to customer service that, despite an earlier promise that the system would be sent back that day, it was still broken.
Others, such as 49-year-old Marc Patri, say they had their Xboxes repaired and returned within five days — about the time Microsoft sales and marketing director John O’Rourke says it should take.
"Even though I was a little upset with the unit breaking down two days after I got it, (Xbox) made up for that in the great service," Patri said in an e-mail interview.
He’s been playing Xbox four or five hours a day ever since.
Microsoft said it uses outside companies, including San Antonio, Texas-based Harte-Hanks Inc. and Sykes Enterprises in Tampa, Fla., to handle its Xbox customer service. Harte-Hanks has worked with Microsoft on other projects, and Sykes handles customer service for Microsoft’s MSN Internet division as well.
Xbox repairs are handled by Solectron Corp. of Milpitas, Calif. A spokesman for Harte-Hanks declined to comment. The other companies did not respond to calls seeking comment.
O’Rourke said fewer than 1 percent of the Microsoft units have proved faulty. The company has seen no pattern of specific problems, he said, and has heard of no major delays with repairs.
"Overall, the performance of the system and the quality has been great, exceeding what our expectations were," he said.
Analyst Rob Enderle of Giga Information Systems said a failure rate of less than 1 percent — or about 10,000 units — can be considered a success, but he warns that a company’s response to those few customers who do have problems often is more important than how many units actually break.
"If 200 people have a really bad experience and they’re vocal, then the impression is the product’s bad," he said.
During the Christmas season, he added, any return that takes more than a week is "a horribly long time."
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