RIM needs to look at the Playbook registration process and followon support

Question

First, this post is NOT about the pros/cons of the Playbook.
Second, it is NOT about the quality of support I received, which was very good.
It's about the Playbook registration and the need for support during or right after that initial registration, as I experienced yesterday.  It's a it of a story, but necessary to understand what I went through.
I have a PB-32 I setup last December, and did not need help during the registration.  That PB was to goto my wife as I also have an HP Touchpad.  Then the 64gb PB went on sale and it was too good to pass up.  The 64 was going to my wife and I would get the 32 after setup and transfer of her stuff, some of that process is the subject of other posts.
During the IPL of the 64 where it asked for Country, I ran into communications problems and RIM's page would not load.  Others had the same problem, so I believe the site went down for a short while, as it came back an hour later.  When that cleared, it asked for the usual info, specifically my Email address.  So, since I wanted to put her 64 on her account, and later CHANGE the 32's email to mine, I re-registered her as a new account.
Couldn't do it.  Duplicate account exists.  So I called general customer support too find out how to change the email registration for the 32 from the wife's to me, so I could register the 64 to her.  The automated help line wanted the serial # before anything else.  But the s/n on the 64 beside the USB/HDMI ports is unreadable small, and it wasn't up to see it on screen.  So, in desperation, I keyed in the 32 s/n.  That worked. 
Now she could help, but not! 
News Flash.  YOU CANNOT CHANGE YOUR INITIAL REGISTRATION INFORMATION. Anytime ever, for any reason.
The only way to re-register the PB is to first do a security wipe and start over.  Yeah, right.  The thing is, the old registration remains in the system, and will not allow you to register another PB as a new registration using the same Email account.
The second dumbest thing I ever heard.  If you sell your PB after a wipe, you will not be able to register a new PB with your same email account.  If you change ISP and get a new email account, you can't change your PB registration to it either.  I ended up registering the 64 to me, and leaving the 32 registered to the wife, not quite right, but acceptable.
IPL of the 64 took over 2 hours!!!!
Next, the 64 kept dropping the WIFI every minute or so for 2 - 3 minutes.  The 32 and Touchpad sitting beside it kept motoring on.  The WIFI signal strength on the 64 was low, about -87 to -93db, the 32 was about 5 to 10db better, so maybe there's a hardware problem.  So I called support again, but this time the 90 day support line.  This time I had the 64's s/n so I entered it in prior to getting a human contact.  First thing asked for.... the serial number.  So why key it in in the first place?  Then my name.  OK, but he could not find my registration info. 
Well maybe it takes over an hour for RIM to post the data, but no, the INITIAL REGISTRATION DOES NOT TRANSFER TO THE 90 DAY SUPPORT DATABASE.  Ya gotta register for it separately.  Third dumbest thing.
Sensing a bit of desperation in my voice, he offered to register me over the phone, otherwise I got to do it online.
So we continued... next question "What city do you live in?"  Toronto, Ontario. 
"What country is that in?"  Keep in mind RIM is a Canadian company in Kitchener Ontario, about a 2 hour drive from Toronto.  My question to him was "What country are you in?"  The reply.... "Central America."  Yes he had a bit of accent but that's not unusual in this country.  You would think that part of the RIM support staff orientation training would include a bit of Canadian and world geography.
Finally the registration is done, but not quite.  The system will send me a confirmation email, to which I need to respond before we can continue.  Five minutes later, the email is there, and I respond.  First thing the confirmation page asks for.... My email address.  OK back to the support guy.
Can't find my registration.  We waited about 10 minutes and finally, he asked, "what is the problem?"  No, my reg did not come up on his screen.  I explain the dropout problem, but at that time it was up and running.  The fix was to delete all my WIFI profiles (just the 1 here) and reset the PB.  Then connect and save the WIFI profile.  That did seem to help, as the 64 stayed connected for over an hour before it dropped out for a minute.  I'm going to get a new and better WIFI router.  I was on the phone for an hour and 10 minutes this time, of which, only 15 minutes was problem definition and solution.
I'm not going to pontificate what RIM needs to do to, but it needs to do something about a user changing his registration data after the fact and needing only the initial registration data to qualify for the 90 days support.  And it needs to transfer that registration to the support line real fast, as the IPL and immediate setup are potentially the most problematic.
Oh, and make the serial number large enough to be seen by a 67 yo with glasses.
Done
jgb

Answer 1

Agree it is a pain in the but I know that you can use the same bbid on 2 playbooks.
Be a Shepard and not an iSheep.