Not so classy

This is the third post in the series of customer care. This one is a partly third person review. Today it’s the airlines Etihad Airways.

Quick background.

My parents flew business class on Etihad airways. One of the flights was more than 14 hours long. My mother (no she doesn’t have any medical condition that stop her from flying or eating crappy Airline food and stop having negative thoughts!!!) doesn’t eat onion or garlic in her meal. So I booked Hindu Jain vegetation meal for her.

On her 14 hour long flight she was offered a breakfast and that’s it. When she asked for more she was told nothing is available for Hindu Jain meal. She told them she can have fruits, bread, dry fruits and juice. So it was offered to her. All she was offered on a 14 hour flight was breakfast, fruits, juice, some dry fruits and bread. I believe people are served better food on shorter economy class flights. So this was the third party review. Because I don’t know how much food was served to my mother and what quantity.

But let’s review the customer care of Etihad. I dropped them a feedback on their official website and there was no reply. I assumed because there are more than million people airlines so who will take care of so many feedback. So I decided to call up the customer care. Being a global brand contacting customer care till less than 5 minutes to be connected to a representative. After telling him all the issue he said that because my mother has a special meal so and the crew carry just one meal per person. I asked him should I pack lunch for my mother and he said yes. The customer service representative forgot that my parents are flying business class and not economy. But none the less he took my compliant and seems to forward to his internal team. Not till date there is no update from them.

My rating for Etihad of
Customer Service = -/5 (i have not received the service so cant comment on this)
Customer Care = 0/5 (No Updates, zero follow ups and clueless customer care executives.)

Not So Quikr

This is post is second in the series of customer care. Today its the “Online Raddi Wala” www.Quikr.com.

Quikr has new feature where you can opt to pay for the product online and quikr will pick up the product and deliver for free.

I was looking for second hand cell phone for myself. After checking out the website and zeroing on a phone I called up the seller and agreed on a price. I paid the amount online and waited for the product to be delivered. It was almost a happy experience with till now.

After 3 days I called up the customer care for update. They said they have raised a request and someone will call me within 24-48 hours. Fast forward 3 more days and multiples call to customer care. The customer care has a very peculiar issue that the call if its not answered by a customer care executive in a minute will automatically be disconnected. you are lucky if the call gets connected at the first attempt. After umpteen tries and don’t know after how many calls to customer care, I am yet to receive a update or my money.

My rating for quikr of
Customer Service = 0/5 (I am yet to receive any service)
Customer Care = 2/5 (They remained calm and composed even through my shouting and angry rants)

For those who want to know what phone I was planning to buy checkout the link of the ad

Keep Counting

Lets take stock of our lives. When we are kids we used to go to the shop next door, which had the ever smiling uncle to cater to all your needs. I don’t remember seeing that uncle getting angry at us. He even used to send chotu with all the items. Reminds of something? For those getting nostalgic STOP!!!. Now we have “next door online store” who do all this and more with cheaper prices.

But one thing which I think is always a hit or a miss. The customer service. I will provide my take on various customer service I received from various “next door online store”

The first one for I want to take on is www.Musafir.com . My dad is coming to bangalore and asked me to book tickets for him. I thought lets try this new website musafir. I check the site and it was not displaying the prices of the airlines I was looking for. I was bored so thought of giving them a call and letting them know. But as the luck would be I got one of the best customer care executive out there. He was courteous, patient and knowledgeable given that it was midnight (yeah it was 11:45 PM when I called in, didn’t I said I was bored?). You rarely find good customer care executive in night shift. But boy was I wrong. Musafir team helped me find the best fare and even applied a discount code for me, which is rare. This agent was with till I have done the payment and once everything was done. He even called and confirmed If I have received the ticket.

One cute thing though, when calling out phonetic names for M instead of using “Mike” they say “Musafir”

Hope musafir keeps the customer care to top notch.

Musafir Customer Care gets 5/5

Keep counting the ratings guys.

Shopping Aur Mai

People ‘shop’ when there is a ‘need’ but do excessive shopping to spend money or to repair a broken heart.

When I look back , I find that,  i don’t fall in any of these categories. The shopping was done because it was needed but what I shopped for was more than the need! For eg. instead of 2 shirts that i needed i bought 4 because i liked them. If you remember my Last Post I had done lots of shopping. I am yet to find out if they were excessive or not.

So here is the experience i gained from my shopping spree for last few months

  1. If you find a “single piece” item “without price tag” (which you like) in a mega store(like shoppers stop, lifestyle etc.) try to bargain with the guy who is showing you the item and chances are that you will get it cheaper than the item’s original price.
  2. By any chance the sale person tell you the correct price take that item to billing counter and chances are that the billing person will bill you less than what the price is.
  3. When you leave the counter make sure to check your bill, the billing guys always bill for more than what you have bought
  4. Don’t buy anything in rush. You will either pay more, buy costly item, get some defective item, get cloths that don’t fit or end up leaving your card/cash at the shop.
  5. Don’t ever utter the price of item while its being billed. chances are that it will be billed wrong. (vary rarely)
  6. If you are buying anything online make sure to read the T&C of the offer. Chances are that you will not get the offer because you forgot to click the small red button on the page where it said “You are done, Click next to continue!” without ever mentioning anything about the red button.
  7. When buying alcohol ask the price before hand. Chances are that the price quoted will be more than the MRP.
  8. If your next door Kiranawala (Grocery Store) return the change more than what he should have. Tell him and give the money back. You will surely get extra attention every time you visit. 🙂
  9. Never ever listen to a sales person who talks too smooth. He will sell you the worst item in the store.

This is out of my personal experience. here are the instance when it happened.

  1. Bought a Louis Phillippe for 1200 the MRP i later found out was 1700.
  2. Bought 4 shirts of Peter England for 1200 in buy 1 get 1 offer. 3 shirts were for 600 and one (tag-less for 800)
  3. Paid 1600 for a 1500 Louis Phillippe trouser.
  4. Paid 300 extra for a top because saw the cost of smaller size top.
  5. The tag price for the deo was 120 but was billed as 1200
  6. I missed the gift because i selected the same gift where the rule was “The buyer has to select different gift for each purchase”
  7. I paid 1000 rupees for a bottle of VAT69 priced at 900
  8. Its common sense.
  9. I bought a polyester trouser for 1300 because the sales guy was too smooth.

so stop laughing at my plight and tell me any more tip that you have.