Square Enix: A Response About Bad Customer Service
Surprisingly, someone at Square Enix yesterday responded to me through their Twitter account. In a string of direct messages — which I could not respond to; hint: If you DM people on Twitter they cannot respond if you’re not following them — the company apologized for not dealing with the broken Play Arts Kai Armored Batman and promised to deal with the problem immediately.
Now this isn’t a new promise. Back at NYCC last year their customer service rep promised to handle the issue. And this was after repeated attempts to contact the company about the broken Batman went unanswered. They never followed through, even though I was told directly at NYCC that the problem would be handled after the show.
What will happen next? I honestly have no idea. The company has now promised twice — once in person and once in DMs on Twitter — to take care of this broken toy. At this point I don’t know if there is anything Square Enix can do to reclaim me as a customer. As I said on Twitter, broken toys happen. No big deal. The issue here is that the company has, so far, failed to stand behind their product and failed to provide anything but bad customer service.
I’ll let you know if they do something besides the messages on Twitter.
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It always sucks to hear that a company that I used to respect treats someone this badly. Like someone on Twitter said, no response is the worst response of all. I’m still hoping they come through for you in the end, but at this point all I can say is, “Not cool, SquareEnix… not cool at all.”
Your sad tale of broken old Batman is why I’ve never bought any Play Arts Kai figures, across the board, and never will. If a figure is supposed to move, and it’s not a model kit, then it shouldn’t break out of the box, or when it’s moved around. It should function like it claims. These figures are not $5 gashapon, they’re a bit of money. And if it breaks and they won’t replace it, or play games with you like Square Enix is, then you shouldn’t buy anything from them again.
This has been a typical problem with a lot of Japanese/HK toys for almost a decade now. Companies cheaped out on the quality and customers bought into it hard. It’s why my collecting of Japanese stuff has gone almost 100% vintage- the new stuff is just not the quality you’d expect for the price, and QC is almost non-existent. It’s tiresome when things labeled “action figure” or “die-cast robot” are not accurate or pushing the barriers of those terms, and should be labeled “poseable model kit” or “plastic robot with die-cast joints” to be truthful. People just don’t complain about this stuff like they should, and when they do, they’re called “whiners” or the classic “It’s only toys” argument comes around. That’s BS. If you buy a Blu-Ray player, and it breaks as soon as you plug it in, are you a whiner for bringing it back to the store and asking for a new one? Are you a whiner if you write an honest but harsh review of said player online? Are you a complainer if the company who makes the player tries to make it impossible for you to get a replacement product, or ignores your requests for a replacement? No, you’re just being honest with fanboy blinders off, and standing up for yourself as a consumer. And it seems the US companies have noticed how customers will tolerate the bad QC and bad communication from companies. They have not just taken Japanese marketing styles and techniques, they’re swiping their Asian counterparts QC too, which is a huge shame.
Bandai has one of the best CS departments I’ve ever dealt with. An email on Monday always results in a solution and a tracking number by Friday, even with the language barrier, worldwide.
Hot Toys used to have an amazing CS department, even better than Bandai. When the Aliens Marines came out and one of the helmet mics was broken out of the box, they overnighted a new helmet and a short letter of apology. And all it took was one single email and photo on my end. Now that is above and beyond the call of duty. Things are very different now since all that Iron Man and Batman money, and like 3A if you don’t live in HK and something breaks in the box, you’re pretty much out of luck. It’s time people stood up for themselves, and demand that companies making this stuff do the right thing, no matter what, or the problems will continue and grow as time goes on.
@RZ – 3A is still the worst for me when it comes to customer service. The level of arrogance and “we don’t care” they display led me to just sell off a good chunk of their toys and stop ordering. That $300 cowboy and horse set is still sitting in the box broken; the company wanted me to ship it back at my own expense. WTF?
And that’s after I constantly hear from others how 3A shipped them new arms, legs, whatever when stuff arrived broken. And they didn’t have to mail the toy back to 3A.
Who in the hell is gonna ship a giant statue and 12-inch scale action figure to Hong Kong for one broken part?
Yeah, 3A just doesn’t give a damn.
@ Phillip – Arrogance is a good word to use with 3A. I bought two Berties the year they launched. One had some nasty paint globs (not part of the figure design, just uncharacteristically sloppy, obvious mistakes) and both had broken right arms, I didn’t even remove them from the box. 3A dodged me for months in emails, and the only way they offered to fix it was me sending the figures back for a partial refund at my expense using their preferred carrier and service (which was $40 more than EMS!) because I reported it to them too late, when it was them not returning emails for four months. I sold them for parts at a $200 loss. Needless to say that’s a bandwagon I won’t join.
I’ve never personally heard of anyone getting replacement parts from 3A, other than October Toys forum guys. I hear a lot of stories like yours and mine though, Phillip. And a lot of people love 3A so much they refuse to believe stories like ours. Its a shame as I think they’ve gotten worse quality and no one has the guts to ask for a repair or replacements.
wow. the same arm broke off my armored batman. i was disappointed. i fixed it myself by hot glueing the shoulder swivel. as long as the ball joint still moved, i am happy with it. it would be nice if customer service did fix the problem, but i am not holding my breath.
@rupertvalero – There must be something about that particular joint that makes it so weak. I wonder if Square Enix has stopped using that style of joint these days?
@figurefanzero – If they actually follow through on the (four) messages they sent me on Friday then I will give Square Enix another shot. What has been frustrating is I have have all three of the Play Arts Kai Deux Ex action figures sitting unopened in storage; after the Batman experience last summer I just didn’t bother opening these because I didn’t want to be frustrated again.