Monday, January 13, 2014

Complaint Letter to Charles and Keith on Poor Customer Service

Update 3: Aug 7, 2015.
This page has been consistently viewed by hundreds of people throughout the period. Not sure how many people changed their mind from buying C&K, tell me please if you are one of those!

Update 2: Jan 15. I got a reply from C&K, as following. The tone of this email is the right attitude as a merchant. We as costumers didn't ask for anything difficult, but the staff kind of pushed all responsibilities away and just tried to protect himself. Maybe he faced some unreasonable customers before, but assuming all customers are bad people is just plain wrong. Maintaining basic courtesy is the bare minimum for a service staff to have. I hope C&K will do better after this.

Thank you for writing in your valued feedback to us.

We deeply regret to learn of the unpleasant experience you had experienced while shopping with us, please allow us to apologise for the inconvenience this may have caused.

Your feedback has sincerely brought us concern with the less than desirable service from our staff, and as such, we will be reviewing our internal channels as such behaviour is not acceptable in our operation standards.

Please allow us to apologize on behalf of our service staff, Domic for the lapse in service while performing his frontline duties. We are looking into this matter and will send him to undergo retraining and counselling if necessary.

In view of this, we would like to thank you for sharing your experience with us, as it is only with such constructive feedback that we can strive to maintain and improve the level of service provided to all customers.

On another note, please bring your defective bag to any outlet you prefer to do an exchange.  Do let us know which outlet you prefer so that we may make the necessary arrangement with our colleagues for your visit to do an exchange.

We sincerely look forward to your valued and continuous support for Charles & Keith and to have the opportunity to welcome and serve you better in future.

Hope to hear from you again soon.


Yours sincerely,

David TAN (Mr)
Senior Customer Service Officer
CHARLES & KEITH (SINGAPORE) PTE LTD


Update 1: I sent the message to C&K's Facebook page, and got a very polite message telling me to their customer care department via email. Very big company, very customer focused.

Recently I bought a bag from Charles and Keith (C&K) in the Suntec Store. However upon the first use, the bag already giving us some issue. Thinking this is Singapore, I brought the bag to the store where I bought it. However what I got is anything but good customer service. Here is the message I sent to C&K customer care department. Will update the blog if they respond.

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Dear C&K,

   Hope this message finds you well.

   I am writing regarding to an issue that I have had on C&K handbag that I bought as wedding gift to my wife. Please find the attached PDF file for images and description. [NOTE: I will share the issue of the bag in a separate blog post]

   On Saturday (Jan 11), I and my wife had taken the bag to the purchasing retail store at Suntec, and I would like to commend on Domic, the assistant shop manager, as a valuable asset to C&K. He has performed exceptionally well in protecting C&K's interest. Details follow:

1) Blame the customer: When we showed him the issue, Domic instantly said something like "You are not supposed to carry heavy things in the bag". My wife didn't bring anything unusual and she has been taking the same items in a lot of other bags, including the S$10 ones she bought at roadside, but so far only C&K bag has such problem. If C&K bags really had a weight limit, why don't this communicated clearly so that consumers will know beforehand?

2) Disown responsibility: After he opened up a new bag in store and found out the new one didn't have the issue we raised, Domic intelligently shifted the responsibility to the head office. He quickly asked us to come back again on Monday and managed our expectation by repeating: "I don't know, it depends on our head office. They need to see the bag first. Nothing can be done here. I cannot commit anything. I don't know"

3) Act blur: It was a good 20 secs where we stood face to face, and Domic, chose to remain completely silent. So finally when I asked him for a name card, he fumbled a couple of drawers for a few minutes, walked to the back of store, and couldn't even find _any_ name card. This is nothing short of impressiveness. C&K has an SOP, no?

4) Customer will exaggerate: Since my wife would fly abroad in two days, we asked if we could call the numbers directly. He said direct calling is not an option, because the description would be exaggerated. The issue is, he himself and the staff there already have seen the bag in person, why can't they help to describe the issue to head office if they think we customers would exaggerate??

  I understand products do and will have defects. In fact, we just wanted to check if the current bag condition was normal, and what could be done to fix that. We didn't ask for anything unreasonable, and instead, how about some sympathy and help? For example, offer to take down our numbers and help us to liaise with the office? It is appalling and disappointing to see such lousy bag and defensive customer services coming from a Singapore brand.

This shall be our last purchase in C&K.