Wednesday, 20 June 2012

Bad customer service: Endure or not?

I have been through such a tiring day last night. I didn't sleep enough for 2 nights before (I think 3 hours in total, the rest i was just drifting back and forth) so it's surprising that I could keep my eyes open and not be cranky. Here's the deal, I've been met with very unpleasant situations within a day.
First, I went to the train station and asked them about "how frequent was the trip the train makes" in English. I hadn't spoke my national language in 3 years since i started my college, so being so rusty in it I used English, since it's suppose to be the "second" language in the country. The staff there looked at me with a very confused expression, rolled the word "frequent" with his tongue and turned to an older staff and asked "What's frequent?". I almost laughed. For the next couple of minute, the older staff took charge of answering my question. Okay, this i don't mind.
Second case, I wanted to buy tickets for the train and it was during peak hours so the whole place was roaring with noise. I couldn't hear the staff say 4.80 for the ticket so I kept asking him(like 3 times) until he shouted(or roared-more like it) 4.80 in a very rude manner. I was annoyed seriously, I know it's tiring cuz it's peak hour and there are many customers in line and he's tired too but really, is that necessary? Being the calm and patient person I usually am, I let it go.
The third case was the worse, I was prepared to get off the train at my station. When it stopped I saw everyone getting off but the door to my coach isn't open. I thought it will in a few seconds but then I felt the train move. That was when i started to panic and ran for the door to the next coach. By that time it was too late and i was stuck in the train till it reached the final station. There was a boy also who was stuck with me and my friends in that train. He went to tell the conductor and he told us that we can get off at the next station but the next train will be at 3am (it was 9am). I called some acquaintance who knows the area well and they told me not to get off cuz it's a dangerous place during the night. I listened and stayed. When we reach the final stop, the boy insisted on complaining to the train management to pay for our trip back to where we were suppose to get of. (I seriously wanted to just go home cuz i have test the next day & i'm too damn tired and let this go) But he's persistent and hee wanted go go back with us. So i had no choice then.
After a few attempts of negotiating with the top dog, one of the woman employee came out and started talking very rude to us, saying that it was technical problem so we can't blame then and expect them to pay AND we should have gotten off at the next stop cuz they'll definitely find a way to bring us back. I let the boy did all the talking since it wasn't necessary for me. Since she was so rude, the boy lost his temper and shouted back at her to talk politely. Her boyfriend (who i suspect was a security guard there-he wasn't wearing uniform tho) was nearby and he heard AND you know what comes next. Of course the need to feel defensive was there (the girlfriend was then playing the nice girl, trying to pull him away) and the boy and that man shouted at each other till they finally looked like they were going to punch each other THEN i stepped in and explained why we didn't want to get off the next station, adding that we were unfamiliar to the place. They calmed down and the girl agreed to talk to her boss again. It took another hour to sort this matter and when she finally came out looking teary, she told us the management agreed to pay 3/4 of the cost to get back with a cab. (I told her on the way that they have two options, pay 180 or 48 since i got two ways of getting back- they chose the cheaper one of course). When they were talking to the cab driver, the woman turned to us and apologized for losing her cool and she bla bla bla (I feel kinda sympathetic for her cuz it really wasn't her fault and the management was scolding her and the boy was pressuring her and studying organisation psychology made me more understanding of her position) Her boyfriend was standing somewhere close like a hawk to be ready to jump into a fight when he was needed. But of course he wasn't needed, we were just all tired and we got no willpower to turn this into a bloodshed. The bloody journey to the final station took us 2 bloody hours so of course i just want to crawl back home and take a nice warm shower and get to bed.
In the end i got home 30 minutes before midnight and I just couldn't care less about studying for my test and went to bed, wet hair and all. The 2 sleepless night and tiredness of the day finally caught up with me.


So yeah, that was my experience with bad customer services in a day. I heard from some friends that the train company I was using has really bad customer service since a long long time ago. For the last case, we might need to travel back using our own money which was totally unnecessary if we were to get off at the right station and living with a scarce student fund make it impossible for me. I am really patient when dealing with these situation but there are times when i get annoyed too. If someone were to be in my position, would they have endured this kinda treatment? I know what some of my friends would do and it's not going to be pretty, that staff's pretty face might get ripped off. And i also know some of people would just let go. But that's unfair isn't it? It wasn't our fault. If we don't do anything about it, this would happen all over again and they wouldn't feel any remorse. So to endure or not? Yesterday I endured two times but the last we didn't. At times there are need to endure and there are times we can NOT endure, we just need to evaluate the situation ourselves. Is there any need?
 I hope i won't have to face this kinda situation ever again, I'm too tired to go through it all over again.

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