I periodically have a look at Zip.ca to see if their plans more closely resemble Netflix, so far they weren’t as good a deal and not worth it vs just dropping by the local video place. With their most recent plans I think they finally have something that’s good enough value for my taste (5 shipments for $18.95). Is it just me though or is this something like the third variation of plan lineup they’ve offered in the last year?
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I’ve been on this plan for about a year now. I’m not sure it’s new.
Strangely though, in the last month, they’ve been sending me 3 dvds at a time instead of 2.
I also have DVD rental places close by, but Zip has a bigger repertoire, with more interesting and “obscure” movies.
for me the advantage is selection: you just can’t beat their catalog. and convenience: never another late fee!
m: I couldn’t swear on the timing but there definitely wasn’t a plan with 5 shippings for that price at various times I looked. Which is probably why you’re getting more, yours was upgraded and there’s a new one ;)
h: well, no late fees but if you wait too much you’re not using the full plan and are paying more than otherwise so you don’t realize late fees but the result is the same.
My club actually has quite a bit of selection but I only drop by when I’m so tired I can’t do anything so 80% of the time I rent easy to watch movies. I’m hoping this will let me line up shit I want/should see and when they just happen to arrive here I’ll watch them, more than I would have gone and picked them up.
(That behavior of course might not necessarily make sense to others.)
I checked and it turns out I’m getting an extra movie (3 at a time instead of just 2) because I’ve gathered some reward points by rating movies and letting Zip know in advance when I’m returning movies. It pays to be good. ;-)
They’ve had that 2-disc rental plan for some time, but it previously had a shipment limit of 4 instead of 5 discs – I think it changed in Jan 2006 when they introduced the limits on the previously unlimited 4/6/8 disc plans.
Martine, they were having some problems getting people the discs they wanted from the top of their ZipLists at the end of last year, and recently while they’ve been working on fixing that they’ve been sending some extra shipments from the top of the list to some customers who’ve had particularly bad results. Unless you actually redeemed your reward points for an extra shipment slot the points probably aren’t the reason.
Thanks for the info David. I’m pretty sure you’re right, what I had in mind was the 4 shipment plan, that would make it $5 each which doesn’t make sense vs local place.
I could have sworn it was more recent than January 2006 but I guess time flies.