[$$$] Target to charge for video game setup service???

Wow, I'm in the wrong job, man:

Target to charge idiots $99 to set up their game system

From later this month, the retailer will install new games consoles for customers. The charge? A mere $99. Because looking at the instruction manual is just too damn hard.

We should set up a JC-version. We'll undercut Target and charge $89

 

If they can't set up the console, they're going to have a problem beating games.

 

wow... i don't really know how to describe what an utter ripoff that is.

 

Hasn't Best Buy had something similar for awhile?

 

Apparently those color-coded red, yellow and white cables are too complicated for some folks, especially when there are corresponding holes of the same color on every TV set out there.

 

Yes. Which makes me wonder how many people call up the Geek Squad and actually inquire about "how to set up a console". They wouldn't do it, and charge, if there was no market for it.

At least, I don't think they would.

Either way, if I really thought this was an issue, I would have done it years ago. And...so would many other gamers. 100 bucks a pop for setting up a system? I set up my PS3 in 4 minutes with internet connection. My 360 was less time. Really? With HDMI cables it's as simple as plug and play. And for standard definition users, it's even easier.

This is sad.

 

Not bad ideal to make money. You could also carry along in your work truck extras like controllers, cables, cable extensions, power strip, ect.. in case the end user needs to buy a second controller or longer cables and what not. This could be quite profitable.

 

Some people really need this.

I hate when people try to return a system because it "doesn't work" when they really just couldn't be bothered to set it up right.

 

If you can get away with it, I've got nothing wrong with doing this.

Seriously, if people are dumb enough to require this then they deserve to pay extra.

 

Maybe it's like how some shops adjust clothes for a small price. I bet back in the day when everyone fixed their own clothes they were like: "you're charging how much to take up trousers?!"

But yeah, it's funny.

 

Well, it's not necessarily a bad idea, especially when you consider that a lot of people have more than one thing hooked up to their TV at any given time: cable, DVD/Blu-Ray player, internet access, plus a variety of other stuff, not to mention more than one console. That can make getting all of them to work on one TV seriously complicated.

 

Working there, I can confirm this is true (actually it rolls out this Sunday).

The setup includes such difficult tasks as plugging in the console, creating up to 5 user accounts (including signing up for XBox Live / PSN), and other essential tasks the mouth-breathers can't seem to figure out by reading the bloody manual.

Yeah, I'm going to sell a lot of these...

 

We do the same thing with Geek Squad at Best Buy. Yes, to us it's completely worthless, but the Wii has attracted a new type of consumer that has no idea how these things work. It's hard for them to even fathom the idea that the system and the games come separately, let alone how to hook it to their TV.

Best Buy knows, as I'm sure Target does, that this is a very selective "product". Very few people will do this, but enough to make it worth having.

 

I don't think I've even opened the manual for my 360 or my Wii. Even if you don't know what you're doing, it's a simple matter of plugging in the cords into the only hole on the machine they fit in.