Yeah I’m thinking for US and Canada they’re not too bad, as the repair place they give me a number for is US West Coast (which is the only other answer I get if I select warranty issue - and the devices screen says no service centres available in the UK, except to take it to Currys who won’t repair / replace it out of warranty which their systems say it is).
For the UK, we get this response (which doesn’t work as I can’t ask for a refund or replacement as their system incorrectly has the warranty expiring on 16th March when it actually expires 1st June as UK law is from when I bought it direct from Amazon):
Other options to contact them seem to have gone - a few years ago it was really easy to talk to a support person to get something resolved.
I kinda think I’ll keep my Series X but I won’t be getting Helix anymore - I’ve got a powerful PC and I can fix that myself, whereas Helix I can’t guarantee Microsoft will fix shit in the UK anymore.
I’ll still use Game Pass as I’m stacked and I’ll take as much free crap as I can from Microsoft Rewards, but I’m done with Xbox if they can’t be bothered to support anyone outside North America, which is stupid as the UK is their second biggest market as far as I was aware.
I’ve calmed down enough that just not getting Helix is my move lol, I usually when I’m unfairly treated I cut the company out like a cancer (one employer and numerous companies so far) but I have to work with Microsoft and I’ve too much Game Pass stacked I can’t get a refund for, so I’m being more rational lol.
EDIT: Weirdly, Amazon may actually have a solution - I can’t send it back to Microsoft due to their warranty date mistake but Amazon do have a repair option to send back - just got to hope they don’t try and charge me due to Microsoft’s incorrect date, but I can prove the Amazon sale date at least
I would suggest cutting out 1st party contollers, and just getting 3rd party instead.
Between most of the new controllers having either Hall Effects or TMR sticks and 2 back buttons listed as part of their features. There’s only one reason to ever get a controller from Xbox at this point, as they don’t offer as many features.
Throw in the fact there’s no way to set our dead zone to help with stick drift, for a non elite controller in the accessories app. It just makes 1st party controllers something you buy for how they look.
Really hoping Amazon get it picked up Tuesday (for free, fair enough to them) then send it to Microsoft - I’ve got to put a copy of my invoice in so it’ll prove the purchase date, and hopefully they’ll provide a replacement in which case I’ll use that till it dies then maybe go third party (I don’t really play games that need back paddles but it could be useful now I think about it).
I bought two £90 Xbox official wireless headsets too, they’re nice and good quality - one for gaming, one for work but it doesn’t work well with Teams - which is so stupid given both Teams and Xbox are Microsoft, instead I replaced it with a £90 Turtle Beach headset which works brilliantly with Teams.
It’s just nuts, accessories surely make them more profit than consoles etc yet the support and quality are really not great…
So what’s the trouble with using tje Xbox headset with teams? Disconnecting? Or just low sound issues? I wonder if that’s something we would need to adjust in Windows settings?
It just often wouldn’t recognise the microphone until I disconnected and reconnected it a few times, while on my newer work laptop the microphone would often not be detected at all.
I tried all the usual stuff and got out Infra Support team involved - it turns out the headsets they most have issues with when using Teams from our staff are Microsoft ones, to the point as a company we buy Sennheiser instead.
Both headsets did it, and I tested it on two different laptops, and we tried with all our device management stuff off too - when I looked it up, it turns out the Xbox headsets aren’t actually Teams certified, unbelievably.
Nah not all of them, seems the Xbox wireless headset in particular has an issue as it’s not really certified for Teams - their simpler ones (like the cheap wired ones) are fine.
But they are the most common ones our helpdesk get complaints about, particularly out of all wireless sets
Speaking of, I just checked my headset in the accessories app and while it said no update available I was able to selected it and an update started. So there’s clearly something going on with the UI currently, at least with the accessories app.
This had to be my best run yet, cleared the second level of Inlaid Library West Wing without ever feeling like I was in any danger. And Another has got to be my favorite modifier right now.
I really really hate how they’ve changed this with support. I’m desperately hoping Microsoft sees this as an issue. I had this problem with rewards a while ago where it just kept bouncing me between the chatbot. Eventually I got pushed to an Xbox engineer specialist and that person was like, “What? Why’d you get sent to me. We have a rewards team specifically for those issues that can get you your points back if there’s been a problem.” (this was when they just started rolling out the GP quest changes and they were bugging out for me). After that the problem got resolved. It’s baffling because another company whose AI chatbot I use was actually a better experience purely because I could use natural language instead of “keywords” nonsense and it instantly picked up that I needed to talk to a human where the prior system would have me just keep selecting categories and options even when my specific issue didn’t fit under them. It really reminds me that copilot is itself struggling compared to other AI models. Yeah, down with these LLMs, but at the very least I’m more okay with the one that is useful in how it recognizes it can’t help me vs the one that has me chasing my own tail like a dog. It is really frustrating because not too long ago Xbox support was just goated. They were really helpful and understanding of issues. Now it’s difficult to even reach them. Maybe we just need to make a stink online. Put it on the insider feedback Friday or reporting an issue on any Xbox experience. Put it on Sharma’s easy fix list to improve Xbox customer service.
Yep it does seem now like they’ve removed all the humans from support completely, or at least outside North America - it’s hilariously inept as they don’t appear to have told the chatbot, so it continues to say “if that doesn’t work, contact us” when there is no way to do so as it’s now the guardian, with the screenshot above one of the few times it actually admitted “sorry yep you’re shit out of luck”.
The big problem is, who’s going to blow maybe £1000+ on a new console if there isn’t a decent local repair / replacement service?
Back in the 360 days, one of the two 360s my housemates and I shared had RRoD - it was sent off and returned within a week, fixed, with full online tracking, and we were able to reach them by both email and telephone.
Now given their only support partner in the UK is Currys - who aren’t a terrible retailer, but in the USA it’d be the same as being told Best Buy is going to fix your console themselves. It’s not comforting as it’s a known joke they’re not the most knowledgeable, and you’ll be dependent on the warranty on Microsoft’s systems being right - which in my experience seems to be the day it was sent to the retailer, not the date of purchase with no bloody way to get that updated.
It seems until they start losing customers in droves they won’t change anything - corporate customer service was crap until they started losing cloud and AI customers to rivals, and now they’ve invested in teams that do corporate outreach and help with issues.
Until then, every time a normal consumer interacts with their services outside the US and Canada, they’re likely to lose a customer and make one angry enough to write bad reviews on all the retailers - meaning eventually their sales outside NA will start to decline even more than currently.
Unfortunately I doubt it’ll happen fast enough to help me - why on earth would I upgrade my Series X to a Helix and use it over my PC I can maintain myself, if I can’t guarantee I can get my expensive new console fixed if it’s more of a sealed box than a PC, and given Microsoft might have the wrong warranty date on it?
I’m not going to risk being left with a £1000 paperweight after 9.5 months (how long my controller warranty is according to the Xbox site, despite UK law).
It’s just a controller, and yes if Amazon can’t get it sorted I can just buy a new one cheap enough, but it’s definitely impacted my buying a much more expensive item and lost them one guaranteed next gen sale.
Helix will be the first generation I won’t get to play - I joined in the 360 years but also had an OG Xbox we played Fusion Frenzy and original Halo on - but I’m one of the last Xbox people I know left standing in the UK, with the rest on Ones or at best getting a Series soon, I doubt I’ll be able to try it elsewhere either.
Maybe nostalgia will grab me by launch date or they’ll fix support, but sadly it seems my Series X will be the last Xbox console I play and I just have to be glad they now release on PC too where I can use my stacked Game Pass and fix things myself…
I remember when they announced that third parties could repair series consoles and those were huge wins for repairability. Maybe the secret plan was to make it all DIY. Two steps forward three steps back. If Satya is serious about improving how customers interact with their consumer products than improving customer support is a must. Guess we’ll see.
I don’t see Asha fixing this anymore. It’s quite sad, the console isn’t available at all in the big stores either. Hopefully a huge improvement with Helix.
That’s where the PC environment comes in imo, they build one version with Xbox’s tech and can distributed to every store on PC without needing to do specific optimizations for hardware. I also thought there was talk about the certification cost going down or away before, but the game would still be certified so it would still take longer to arrive on Xbox PC than steam.
Hardware is another issue, one that will be a hard sale in Japan like it already is, but the fact that the next Xbox is a Console PC hybrid maybe what makes the difference. Because instead of just buying a console, they will buy a PC that is a Console.
Xbox just needs to make enough of them; maybe even change the way they do things and actually make more to store in warehouses.
That is the thing they talked about a lot at GDC. Make on version with their new GDK and it’s free if you do an Xbox port. This version will work on ‘every platform’. That’s the goal, anyways. Offer Playfab and all its offerings for ‘free’ if you make an Xbox port in the future.
