…it’s a fee we charge you for the service of restocking your video if it was returned late!
Entertainment: Industry Article | Reuters.com: The ‘no late fees’ program launched Jan. 1 at Blockbuster’s 4,500-plus stores in the United States. Dallas-based Blockbuster is the nation’s top video rental chain.
Under the terms of the new policy, consumers get a weeklong grace period to return movies or games after their due dates. But their accounts are automatically charged the full retail price of the title (minus the initial rental fee) if they keep the item for more than a month. If consumers return the title within 30 days after the grace period, they are charged a restocking fee of $1.25.
Got that? If you rent a movie, it’s due in seven days. If, after seven days you don’t return it, you have another seven days to return it. If after fourteen days you still haven’t returned it, Blockbuster sells it to you for full retail price ($14.99-$39.99, typically). If between fifteen and forty-five days you decide your don’t want to buy the movie, you can return it to Blockbuster. They will refund the full retail price, but charge you $1.25 to restock the movie. In other words, if you return a movie 14-45 days late, it costs you $1.25, and you may as well not return the movie after 45 days, because you’ve bought it. But it is not a late fee.
(I’m not crying over this. It used to be $3 per day after five days, so you’d pay the equivalent of purchasing the movie at the 10-28 day mark. I’m crying over the ads that say “no more late fees” but you’ll still be out some dough if you return a movie late. It’s not the act, it’s the lying that bothers me. I also don’t care because in five-to-ten years, broadband will make this all irrelevant.)
