More Complaints

While we're on the subject of complaint letters, here's something else I wrote a while back.

On the whole, I have usually enjoyed my visits to KBox. Generally, the service and facilities at most outlets are more than adequate.

However, there is one particular branch which seems to tarnish the reputation of your successful chain.

Among my various group of friends, we have come to the conclusion that your Tampines branch is a disgrace to your operations. This is mainly due to the remarkably un-customer friendly attitude that most of the staff there seem to have.

Here are a couple of incidents that have led us to that conclusion:

1. Over a month ago, a group of six of us arrived at the Tampines branch at about 1.30 am on a Friday evening / Saturday morning. We were under the impression that your branches operate until 3 am. However, the receptionist on duty gave us a sour look when we asked for a room, as if we were a bother to her, and turned us away, saying that they were closed. Unfortunately, this wasn’t a very good lie, because we could plainly hear singing going on inside, and there was no reason the branch would be closed so early on a weekend night. We checked the operating hours on a poster downstairs, and it stated very clearly that the branch operated until 2 am. We left, disgusted.
   
   
2. About a month ago, a group of five of us returned to that very same KBox. We were willing to give it another chance, so to speak. We arrived at about 9 pm, and were told that we could only have the room until 12 midnight, because we hadn’t made a reservation. This was a surprise to us because we’d always been able to just show up and get a room till closing at other branches. If I recall correctly, it was a weekend night as well. We asked if there were empty rooms available after that, because we wouldn’t mind switching rooms if necessary. We were told to wait and see. At 11.45 pm, we were told abruptly that our time was up and we had to leave. We asked the receptionist if there were any other rooms available, and were told there were none. This was obviously a lie because we had seen many empty rooms on our way out, and people were still walking in off the street. We called the branch at Marine Parade to ask if they had any rooms, and they said that they did. This furthermore increased the doubt in our minds, because if such an established branch had rooms available on short notice, why wouldn’t the Tampines branch have them (especially since the Tampines branch was bigger)? In the end we continued at the Marine Parade branch and ended up paying double for the night, once at Tampines and once at Marine Parade.
   
   
3. This is copied from a post that my friend has on his blog about his experience yesterday afternoon. I feel it would be better to let you read it in his own words:
   "I was at K Box Tampines with my juniors today for some KTV. I was warned before that it really sucked in terms of service. I was willing to give it another chance. So it started off with no one attending to us for around an hour. We had to go out and ask them to get drinks for us. It's a bloody big labyrinth at KTV Tampines and all the f***ing workers are lost in it, finding where they skived was tough. They were all unapologetic with their mistakes, epitomized by this one f***er who demanded us to pay the bill who behaved like we owed him money. In the end, everyone wasn't feeling too good about that place and we vowed never to go back there again unless absolutely necessary."

In view of these incidents, I hope the management at KBox will look into the practices of this particular branch and make changes if necessary. I realize that not many people will step forward and complain about bad service, and usually I’m pretty tolerant of it if it’s a one-off thing, but the incidents show that the terrible quality of staff at the Tampines branch is an ongoing problem.

And here's the reply I got:

Thank you for your email dated December 16, 2004.

I have already made a thorough investigation regarding the poor service you received when you visited our Tampines K Box recently.

Firstly I would like to apologize to you for the inconvenience it had caused you. The incident was most unlike our usual standards of service and courtesy. I am sorry for the Time Duration incident you had experienced with our member of staffs in Tampines, this is due to the high turnover rate for rooms during the weekends and the empty rooms that you saw was newly painted thus the pungent paint stench still lingers in the rooms that is why we closed the section off. Our service staffs probably do not know how to explain it to you. I regret to tell you that some of our staffs are inexperience and they are especially poor in their explanation or speech.

I have already sent your feedback to the Outlet Manager and he had taken the necessary actions with the service staffs. The receptionist and service staff who were rude to you and provided you with the wrong information have been called in for review; they also expresses their regret about their attitudes and our management has issued a warning letter to them.

My management is very concern with this problem that you had experienced. We will scrutinize the performance of our staffs at Tampines.

In order to provide an excellent service to our customers, I hope you could give us some time and your patience. Our management is seriously looking into the Customer Service area and giving training to our staff in this aspect. We hope that they will learn from their mistake and cushion disappointment to our customers.

We seek your understanding with the above matter.

I will enclose 1 complimentary voucher for 2 COMPLIMENTARY DRINKS VOUCHER that you may use at any of our K Box outlets as a token of appreciation for your valuable feedback. Please furnish me with your name and mailing address.

If I can be of any further assistance to you please do not hesitate to contact me at info@kbox.com.sg. I will be looking forward to your reply and hope that you continue to patronize K Box for karaoke sessions. Thank you.

With warmest regards,
Geraldine Tay
K BOX KARAOKE
Marketing Executive (Guest Relations)
Office: 6334 3113
Fax: 6334 6823

Gee, thanks, I always wanted complimentary drinks.

Funny thing is, all the subsequent emails I sent them got bounced back because their "mailbox was full". Might I be on the blocked senders' list? Might I also suggest they check their emails for grammatical errors?