Isn't this same situation possible on PSN?  You use an email account for PSN as well, so what if that email gets deactivated for inactivity since almost all email services do this?  Would your PSN account fail to login and cause you to set up a new one and lose all your trophies?  Most likely yes.  Stop trying to make this look like an isolated MS/Passport problem.

Here's a tip to all the people complaining - when you sign up for a new service, use a real email address! There's a reason when companies ask for your email, it's one of only 2 fields they require you to CONFIRM. email and Password, because these are the 2 bits of information that they NEED to be right. Signing up for a service you want long-term with a throw-away email account is roughly the equivalent of pounding on the keyboard and clicking "remember me" when selecting a password. Eventually you're going to wish you hadn't done that.

Ring O Death=Good CS?

@ Jereel

You can only have one gamertag associated to any given email address for XBL. I have two kids that I had to create email accounts(gmail) for just so they could play on live. Then there are the instances of people opening new accounts with different gts. I have NEVER checked either of my kids emails. So there are cases where the one "real" email account is useless.

OT: No matter how anyone tries to justify MS' customer service shortcomings, IT STILL SUCKS! Just admit it's horrid and hope that it gets better.

Again, this is not a customer service issue.  It is, if anything, a design flaw, but the same is used for PSN and other services.

eventho said:

Ring O Death=Good CS?

The RRoD is not related to CS.  It is a hardware failure.  However, Microsoft has done a great job to ensure that the CS dealing with RRoD is top notch and painless.

Microsoft Defense Force... Assemble!

Seriously, a user had a bad experience with a service.  Nothing new here.

Do I get to be the head boss of MDF?  That'd be sweet! Although I own a PS3 so I'd have to sell it due to the membership rules

@ nightsurge

I guess I'll go off-topic then. Microsoft's customer service sucks!

Okie doke, me too.  Verizon's Customer Service SUCKS!  Apple's customer service SUCKS!  Sony's customer service sucks!  Come to think of it, pretty much all customer service sucks for the majority of people, so stop compaining and live with it.

If the guy called back, he would have gotten a different answer. I'm quite suprised that some CSRs may be of poor quality.