chronovore | MS Japan is a different beast (Reply)

My friend in California had a problem with his brand new Xbox 360's power supply. Contacting support, he was put on hold for three hours (!!!), then told that he'd have to ship his under-warranty power supply to Microsoft's repair center and then receive a new unit only after the defective one had been received and processed. He offered to give a Visa number so that he should just receive a new power supply, then ship the defective one in the box in which the replacement had arrived; this method is Apple's standard replacement means. When I had to replace my defective PowerBook battery, they did this for me. But for MS and the power supply, no dice. Between the wait on Hold, the customer service representative's attitude, and the asinine shipping/replacement policy, he described his experience as the worst customer experience he'd ever had. I just sent him this, with regard to my non-RRoD 360 repair:

So with regard to my Xbox 360 repair, Japanese customer service triumphs again. MS Japan is apparently a different beast than MS USA's support system. I called MS Japan, got through immediately. They were not immediately sure what to do with my US Xbox, so they said "May we call you back?" Expecting that it might be a week before I heard from them again, I was stunned when they called back 40 minutes later and, after confirming mercifully few details, offered to send a guy out to pick it up from whatever location I liked (work/home) the following day during either of two 3-hour windows. "Just bring the main unit; we don't need the power supply, HDD or any of that." What about the shipping box? "We'll bring a shipping box."

The whole delivery, repair, and return delivery was handled C.O.D. (mine was not under warranty, and it wasn't the red-ring-of-death, 3-year warrantied problem) As promised, the delivery guy showed up with his own bubble wrap and special box which suspended the 360 in the middle of a larger box. I should have taken a picture; it was crazy cool, but simple. Off it went, on Friday at 17:00.

I wondered when I'd get it back, and if it would be the same unit or a new one. It must have arrived Saturday, been fixed Monday, and shipped Tuesday, because I had it on Wednesday morning. RMA'd, shipped, fixed, and returned in four business days. I may think of June 4 as Japanese MS Victory Day from here on out. I'm stunned.

Thought you might like to hear that things turned out for me, even if MS is still irrefutably evil.