Tesco DVD Rental (Tesco DVD Rentals)

Member Name: annadivall

Product:	Tesco DVD Rentals
Date:	12/08/08 (23 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Cheapest package I could find, Clubcard points

Disadvantages: Doesn't tell you if titles are available immediately

I am a Tesco DVD Rentals subscriber. I have a 2 disc unlimited package, which means that I have 2 DVD's at home at a time and, when I return any, they are replaced by post immediately. Unlimited means that this is continuous. They have different packages where you can have more or less DVD's at home at once or limited packages, which means you get a maximum number of DVD's per month.

The package I have is £11.97, which is the best price I can find for the same package from all the providers.

Almost all the online DVD rental companies are now powered by Lovefilm anyway, so there's not much difference in them apart from price! I did sign up for a free trial with Amazon, which was about 50p cheaper, and to be honest I did prefer their system slightly (will go into more detail in a sec) but they were taken over by Lovefilm and the price went up so I went back to Tesco.

The way it works is that you have a rental list, which is a list of DVD's you'd like to watch. You can select a priority for each DVD from high, medium and low. When you return a disc, they aim to send you one of the highest priority they can. Most of the time the titles you have on high priority are the ones you'll get, unless you have a really recent release or extremely popular title. The reason I preferred the Amazon system was that you still had a list but you could specify exactly where in the list you wanted each title (they were all numbered) and, this is the main advantage, they showed whether the titles were available straight away. I'm not willing to pay the extra just for this though!

The other advantage you have with Tesco is that you earn Clubcard points on your subscription price - not many but it all adds up.

I find that it's really efficient. If I post a DVD back to Tesco one day, it usually arrives with them the following working day and they post a new one that same day, which means I can receive it the next working day - a total of 2 working days between returning and receiving. It doesn't always work out so quick but it's never much longer.

You can always check your account online to see what titles you have 'at home' at the time, which will show what new ones have been shipped and the dates everything was shipped.

If a disc is lost in transit, you just need to let them know. You have to allow at least 4 working days but after that you can report the disc as missing and they'll send the next one out. If it's one you were sending back to them, you have to also complete some details about when you posted it but I've had this happen and had no problems at all.

Similarly, if you receive a disc that's damaged or unplayable, you just report it to them via the website. They offer to replace the disc with another copy of the same title or to send another title. I recently had a film that was mostly watchable but near the end it started jumping and parts of it were unwatchable. I managed to skip through some bits that wouldn't play and got the overall idea of what had happened. As I'd seen most of the film, I didn't want the same title again but I reported it anyway so that they will hopefully take that disc out of circulation. I asked for another title instead and they posted it the very next day without waiting for me to return the damaged disc. I thought this was very good service.

Overall, the catalogue is very extensive, hardly anything I've looked for is unavailable, the service is excellent and contacting them and getting help is easy and painless. Highly recommended.

Summary: DVD rental made easy