Just wanted to share a nice little story from the world of EA customer relations in the Great White North. As most of you know by now (and you should, we Canadians are nothing if not whiners!) us Canucks had to wait more than a month to get our hands on Rock Band after it was released in the US. The reason seems to have had something to do with a limited number of peripherals, and EA decided it best to focus those all on one country instead of spreading around the love. Turns out the release of Rock Band wasn't the only time they did this.

Remember the broken strum bar fiasco? Well it turns out that replacement guitars were focussed on US customers as well, because those of us with broken guitars in Canada who decided to go the quick route and have a hold put on our credit cards to get a new guitar were left holding the bag for a few weeks wondering where the hell our guitars were. Then, on January 11th, I got the following email;

Hello,

I know that many of you have been waiting for quite awhile, but we have good news.

All Canadian RMAs placed before January 9th, have shipped!

You should see that your RMAs have all been updated to Parts Shipped to reflect this. Depending on where in Canada you live, you should receive your replacement item within the next six days. If you have not received your new peripheral by January 16th, please contact customer support at www.support.ea.com. Be sure to create a new incident rather than updating your RMA incident to prevent any possible issues.

In appreciation of the patience of our Canadian customers who placed an RMA prior to January 9th, we are not requiring customers receiving this set of RMAs to return your faulty peripheral to us and we will also be removing your credit card hold within the next few days.

Thank you again for your patience as we build and improve our Canadian Rock Band warranty program. Please accept our apologies for the wait and any inconvenience.

EA Customer Support

So you see? Good news after all! In addition to receiving a brand new guitar at the end of last week (although it does seem to have something broken inside -- I hear a rattling I don't like) I get to keep my old broken one, which if the internets are to be believed, can be fixed pretty easily. Now if only I can tape them together and make a kick ass double axe..

Thanks EA! It's not often that a company makes good after dropping the ball, and they've done that in spades. Kudos sirs!

Comments (2)

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written by Muffin Man, January 24, 2008

At least you have Rcok Band Still not out here in the UK. And I'm going to continue to whine about it until it's out!

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written by Ryan Hewson, January 24, 2008

Hey Jim you'll have to hit me up in RB when you getcher axe back.

No big surprise that EA is bending over backwards now to accommodate everyone, particularly since Activision announced that Guitar Hero has made a b-b-b-billion dollars worldwide. It is a tricky item, peripheral-wise. No one's really attempted such a complicated bundle before.

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