Exactly. Coinbase seems more and more like a starter science kit -- I used them to buy my first 10 bitcoins because it was easy, then realizing how hard it was to buy more at certain times, and not being able to keep money in your Coinbase account (all transactions get drawn from your bank account and take X days to clear before you can actually do anything with your BTC and when you sell BTC they get deposited into your bank account) took its toll. I now deal solely with the exchanges (MtGox, CampBX, BTC-E) - it's so much easier, and I think people also fail to realize there's a markup with using coinbase too.
Actually there are additional costs to using Mt Gox and other exchanges as well.
Aside from monetary ones, I know from experience that Mt Gox has horrible customer service. The size of their operation does not match the level of customer service required. Granted, banks suffer the same but at least they have B&M presence.
Sorry to hear that - agreed, it seems like the best support for all these exchanges is to not need it, because good luck getting a response. I've even seen situations with BitInstant where e-mailing them is pointless, but starting a reddit thread in r/bitcoin is the best way to get a response. This needs to change if Bitcoin is going to be the currency o the future.
