GameFly wins in United States Postal Service dispute

by Alexander Sliwinski on Apr 21st 2011 5:20PM

GameFly's two-year dispute with the United States Postal Service concluded with the Postal Regulatory Commission agreeing that preferential treatment was given to by-mail movie services like Netflix and Blockbuster.

Gamespot reports that the PRC plans to remedy the issue by having the USPS establish two parallel rate categories for roundtrip DVD mail. This should prevent GameFly from incurring a fee for avoiding automated sorting machines -- which have a higher probability of breaking the contents being shipped.

Contacted for comment, GameFly told Joystiq: "Overall, we are pleased that the PRC found that the basis of our complaint was legitimate. We need to read through and consider the entire document before we would be in a position to elaborate."

[Thanks, Steven]

Source: Gamespot

Tags: GameFly, United-States-Portal-Service, USPS

Reader Comments (40)

Good for Gamefly. I've heard that their service isn't too good due to games taking too long, but maybe much of the cause is because of USPS. Hopefully this will help their business.

@ch3burashka Games only take 2 days to get to me and they typically ship 1 day prior to release dates. So you get new games 1 day later. I love it.

@Weiji

You are probably close to a Gamefly distribution center, which is lucky for you. I used the service for a year and games never arrived that quickly. In fact, the long wait times were the reason I canceled. So anybody else reading your comment should understand that "results may vary."

@ch3burashka Unfortunately it's an inventory problem. After having Gamefly for 5 years I recently canceled it, their quality of service has slowly degraded over the years. Waiting for games to be available was costing too much money.

@ch3burashka

I like the service but unfortunately if you want new releases you have to have the new release item in your queue at least 3-5 business days before its scheduled to release and also making sure to not have any other games in your queue that they might ship to you while your queue is empty for a week.

@Weiji
my turnaround time was 5 days.

@Peffse
Yeah, I had to wait 3 to 5 days for my games and *never* got newer games that were sitting at the top of my queue, ever. Heck, even a lot of the older games got shipped to me out of order on my queue because of lack of supply.

@ch3burashka

Took around 4-5 days for me to get a game from them after they said it shipped. That, plus the "rushed" feeling I had while on the service, and my growing dislike of the used game market, caused me to cancel my sub after over a year.

@ch3burashka

I for one have been thrilled with Gamefly. For 18 a month, I am getting 2 games, and havent bought one for a good long while. Since January, I have played every major title and it hasnt cost me nearly as much as buying them would. Best of all, I have typically gotten them 1 to 2 days after launch, which is fantastic.

@ch3burashka - The main issue as far as I can tell is the USPS's unwillingness to train its employees to use FastTrack on all Gamefly parcels. FastTrack essentially involves USPS scanning your discs at the local hub, which tells Gamefly that they exist in the system. At that point, Gamefly will ship out your next disc. For someone that lives < 2 days away from the shipment center, it is essential that the next disc is shipped as soon as possible, which FastTrack facilitates.

With FastTrack, my turnaround time is more like three days. Without, it is more like six. That makes a huge difference in my enjoyment of the service.

I feel like the post office should have delt with this sooner. They already have less mail going through and they should have looked at GF as a growing customer. Nothing I like better than to see that orange and white envelope in my mail slot.

Wow, that picture really tells the whole story. Why should the USPS have processes set up to support specific companies, as opposed to general parcel types?

@copa
Because as a market actor it needs to provide services that support the needs of their customer base?

If this means I will get my disks faster, then yay!

So did this have too do w/ the fast return thing they started using a while back?

Will they lower their prices now?

@Mr Hett I'd prefer it if they fixed their game queue and actually shipped titles in the order you put them as opposed to whatever they want.

@Faceless Troll
If I remember correctly, they ship first according to what you want, in order, or if they can't, they ship according to availability.

@darksied That's what they claim they do. But it's not what happens in practice. I've had numerous titles that were marked as "available now" in my queue, but instead of shipping the ones I had put first they shipped something further down the line for no apparent reason. It happened often enough that I canceled my subscription because of it.

@Faceless Troll maybe just put the games you really want in your queue.

@Faceless Troll Im calling bull on you accusations sir......

@gordeaux

I do that and go weeks with no games, no way!

@51O Andy

You can call BS all you want, but the same has been happening to me for months. It's gotten so absurd that I have taken to copying my queue to a Word doc the day that they record my latest return. Without fail, for the past two months, I have gotten games far down my queue while games much higher sit at "Available Now."

And before anyone throws out the asinine argument about only putting the games you most want on your list...Yeah sure and then I have to spend two weeks getting emails from Gamefly telling me to add games onto my queue because I don't have anything listed.

Gamefly has some strengths but right now, but their process is fundamentally flawed. It still saves me money at this point, so I'm staying subscribed. But I imagine once I burn through the backlog of games I've wanted to play for a while, I'll be ending my sub.

@wardo

I felt compelled to mention that this type of activity happened to me as well when I had a Gamefly subscription. And you're so right about them pestering you to jam up your queue. Netflix does the same thing. They understandably think if you have a bunch of titles in there, you'll keep the account longer.

I just wonder when they are going to make it so video games are considered Media Mail.
Let me get this straight:
No matter what the subject matter of BDs, DVDs, CDs, or books, as long as they aren't video games or software, they are considered Media Mail.

What a great system!

I'm surprised that sign is spelled correctly. Most people/businesses use an apostrophe in DVDs. DVD's? What do they have exactly?

Also, how is their packaging any different than Netflix's?

@SuperWoody64 It's bigger, made from thicker material and uses cardboard inserts.

@SuperWoody64 They have a cardboard sleeve to protect them. IDK if weight effects the cost or anything.

I love gamefly and they have saved me thousands of dollars but it takes way to long to get a game. If I send a game back monday I get one back Saturday. And that's best case scenario. Hopefully this will speed things up.

@evergleam

It also depends on where they ship your games from.

@evergleam when i had gamefly i had them within two days

So does that mean they can loose the Webby's now?

This is good news for them, since I used to use gamefly and it would take forever to get games.

But honestly, if I were them, I would be looking into what can be done about games NOT getting to their destination. I once didn't receive my game, and I know others who tried it and didn't either. It's disgusting how some of the USPS people just pocket some of the games, or tear the packaging to shreds and the discs drop out.

They probably do the same thing Netflix does and provide new customers with preferential treatment in terms of who gets what first. People are less likely to cancel if they are around for a little while with great service and then just get decent service. A lot of businesses take advantage of customer habits like that.

Gamefly is very different from Netflix. Their envelopes hold a protective cardboard sleeve, which holds another game sleeve. It's thicker and heavier, but offers more protection for media that costs more and needs more insurance against damages.

This isn't gonna lead to lower prices, but it could lead to GF investing in more marketing and stock for growth. If they have more discs on hand, they could get their queue issues straightened out, and even turn around faster on shipping discs out.

I wish GameFly would just make physical stores already. It'd be cool to have a specialty video game rent store. But I get this strange feeling it'll end up like GameStop. Selling used games n' stuff. ...huh.

Been a Gamefly member for 6 years. It does take a little while but if you play through 2 games a month it is worth it. Plus if you get a game the say it is released you can usually keep it for about $20 cheaper then new.

having been a former gamefly subscriber, i wish they'd just go out of business and evacuate their position in the market so a more competent organization could take over.

with the current industry pricing, the public needs a viable rental option, but gamefly just isn't it.

however, should the industry adopt a $39.99 price point for triple-a new releases i'd expect to see the used and rental market shrink to marginal levels.

@fid I'd like to see netflix expand into games. I get much better turn-around time and always get what I want from them. GameFly, not so much.

I love the service. Been a member for 5 years...3 games a month plan for $30. For a new release I usually mail back a game on a Thursday or Friday - clear out the queue - put the new release I want at the top - delivered by the following Wednesday. For older releases that are in stock, I'm averaging about a 3 day turnaround. **within 100 miles of distribution center

If you grab a new release right out of the gate and decide to keep it, you save ~$20 compared to purchasing at the store. They're end-of-the-year sales are great too.

GameFly wins in United States Postal Service dispute

Reader Comments (40)

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:28PM ch3burashka said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:55PM Weiji said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 6:06PM GentlemanWrath said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 6:40PM jsx said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 6:58PM lessthankris said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 7:26PM Peffse said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 11:32PM beano311 said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 8:50PM R Planteer said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 10:06PM DasMadHatter said

Posted: Apr 22nd 2011 11:50AM BananaBoat said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:31PM Dirty said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:35PM copa said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:58PM DenebSwift said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:33PM Enigma7ic said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:34PM StormChaser91 said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:35PM Mr Hett said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:51PM Faceless Troll said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:52PM darksied said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:56PM Faceless Troll said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 6:21PM gordeaux said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 6:29PM 51O Andy said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 6:50PM mairondil said

Posted: Apr 22nd 2011 9:29AM wardo said

Posted: Apr 22nd 2011 6:59PM Dr Toboggan said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 7:40PM Amish Gramish said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:49PM SuperWoody64 said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:52PM Faceless Troll said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:53PM evergleam said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:50PM evergleam said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 6:16PM Bubbameister33 said

Posted: Apr 22nd 2011 11:45AM bshido said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:52PM Marco le Polo said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:54PM darksied said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 6:10PM DenebSwift said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 5:58PM Mike Sylvester said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 6:08PM The Only Girl said

Posted: Apr 21st 2011 6:25PM cheez said

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