I encountered a very interesting problem today. Recently, I took another AVS member up on a trade; my a 5040 for his 4504. Well, all went well, we both have our units, and I expected it to take a few days for mine to pick up on its activation.
Except I couldn't activate it.
It kept giving me the "please check your account at blah blah blah" message, the one it gives when your monthly subscription is up and not paid for. The only thing it lets me do is 411 and 243 zones. Again, this was not unexpected. I was going to activate it and wait for a few days for it to take.
Except I couldn't activate it.
Some of you may have figured out why already, but for the rest of the class, I'll explain. You see, I couldn't activate it because IT WAS ALREADY ACTIVATED.
Not a big deal if its a lifetime activation, as the person who sold it probably took into account the lifetime sub in the selling price. But since this was a monthly sub, there was no way around it. The person who traded it with me, under no fault of his own, made it so that I couldn't do anything at all to it.
So I called SB (mind you, this is only about 5 minutes after I plugged it in. I act fast.) On hold for 12 minutes and explained my problem. They did the coolest thing:
They had to call the guy that I got the replay from to verify that he had indeed gotten rid of his unit so they could register it to me. They took my credit card info for my lifetime subscription and said they'd immediately run through the new 10 day grace period as I already had 4 units registered with them and I wasn't likely to be lying
Within three hours the grace period kicked in again, and an hour later my lifetime sub was on the unit.
So the moral of this long tale is:
If you buy a unit, and get a monthly subscription on it, and decide to take it back, please call SB or drop them an email with your unit's info to let them know you're returning it so they can 1. turn the grace period back on for someone else and 2. remove the activation so the person who gets it next can turn it on. Just think what would have happened if the person who got this unit wasn't *me* or one of *us* and had no idea what the zones codes were or anything, went through quick setup and then found their unit wouldn't work unless they logged into their nonexistent replay account.
So please, let SB know if you're returning an activated unit, even just a monthly subbed one. It will keep the number of frustrated open box buyers down
Except I couldn't activate it.
It kept giving me the "please check your account at blah blah blah" message, the one it gives when your monthly subscription is up and not paid for. The only thing it lets me do is 411 and 243 zones. Again, this was not unexpected. I was going to activate it and wait for a few days for it to take.
Except I couldn't activate it.
Some of you may have figured out why already, but for the rest of the class, I'll explain. You see, I couldn't activate it because IT WAS ALREADY ACTIVATED.
Not a big deal if its a lifetime activation, as the person who sold it probably took into account the lifetime sub in the selling price. But since this was a monthly sub, there was no way around it. The person who traded it with me, under no fault of his own, made it so that I couldn't do anything at all to it.
So I called SB (mind you, this is only about 5 minutes after I plugged it in. I act fast.) On hold for 12 minutes and explained my problem. They did the coolest thing:
They had to call the guy that I got the replay from to verify that he had indeed gotten rid of his unit so they could register it to me. They took my credit card info for my lifetime subscription and said they'd immediately run through the new 10 day grace period as I already had 4 units registered with them and I wasn't likely to be lying
So the moral of this long tale is:
If you buy a unit, and get a monthly subscription on it, and decide to take it back, please call SB or drop them an email with your unit's info to let them know you're returning it so they can 1. turn the grace period back on for someone else and 2. remove the activation so the person who gets it next can turn it on. Just think what would have happened if the person who got this unit wasn't *me* or one of *us* and had no idea what the zones codes were or anything, went through quick setup and then found their unit wouldn't work unless they logged into their nonexistent replay account.
So please, let SB know if you're returning an activated unit, even just a monthly subbed one. It will keep the number of frustrated open box buyers down