Bust the Gap in Customer Services

During a romantic date in an August summer in 2008, while relishing a chicken tandoori in a restaurant in Old Airport Dhaka, I discovered a plastic cap of a mineral water bottle inside the chicken. It tasted like….plastic, with a touch of spice and chicken around it. The date was nearly spoilt amidst fear of health concerns and wrong choice of restaurant. I had no clue how to react, I summoned the manager, the waiter responsible, described the case to them, they said ‘sorry’, I said I would complain….I know ‘that person’, I am friends with ‘this person’, a bit of ‘hombi tombi’ you know…that’s pretty much it. The only good thing was, we left without paying, and ofcourse finishing the food, which had a bit of raw plastic in it. Like all other things in the life of a Bangladeshi consumer, I took this incident sportingly. I thought there is no point complaining, as who should I complain to? In a country where I don’t even trust the law enforcers in many occasions, who on earth would protect my consumer rights and why? That was new and news to me.

I have seen many feedback forms in restaurants and service centers of telecom companies, but I have never received any feedback on my feedback, to know if they have at all taken any action to implement my suggestions. I am more of the view that they put up all these feedback forms as a mere formality only, they do not intend to take it seriously, which Bangladeshi company would ever admit that it has taken ‘one’ customer’s feedback seriously and have consequently brought about a change in the way they do business? Never, rather they would claim it to be their own success and innovation.

However, if you think times have changed and its high time that we, as consumers, speak up and make sure our rights are protected and respected, then this article is for you. Check out the website of e-consumer, wonder if something could be initiated in the Bangladeshi context. Also, its worth checking out the website of GapBusters. Among other related service, this company offers ‘Mystery Shopper’ services. I am not sure if companies in Bangladesh, those especially in the services sector, apply Mystery Shopping techniques to evaluate and improve their customer services standards. I believe interested entrepreneurs could very much come up with an idea to set up a company such as this, either you take a franchisee of GapBusters or set up something in the context of Bangladesh purely. Get your business model right and become the ‘voice of Bangladeshi consumers’. Remember Mr. Rokon-Ud-Dowla? Now the time has arrived to give it a more formal shape, from a private sector initiative. So that next time you go for a good time at Pizza Hut and KFC or at a Grameen Phone Service Center, the staff should be on their toes to serve you well, after all….we, the customers, are the king. And I am sure there are scores of people ready to become ‘mystery shoppers’ to give their formal opinion about products/services and earn some quick money in form of a part time job.

Show me how you cook it for me

Only the most fastidious are likely to look up the health inspection records of restaurants before deciding on a place to dine. And even if they are curious enough to look, actually finding those records could be a chore, since they’re often buried deep within a government agency website. CleanScores provides a hassle-free alternative for hygiene conscious diners in San Francisco. Look up the name of a restaurant on CleanScores’s website and the first thing you’ll see is the score awarded to the eatery during its most recent health inspection. In addition to listing health code violations (ranging from major to minor), there’s even a graph comparing scores during its three most recent inspections, along with a form for visitor comments.

Two weeks back, I had the misfortune of discovering and tasting a boiled plastic piece inside my Tandoori Chicken at the Ananda Restaurant at Old Airport. Surely, I didn't pay for it and walked out yelling on the face of the apparently 'repentant' staff at the restaurant. I remember Bukhara introducing a 'see-through kitchen' policy at their premises at Banani. Inspite of surprise raids of Rokonman and his sidekicks, our 'creative' cooking gurus still are cooking up innovative dishes for us to consume and die eventually, while they keep on becoming richer. May be a third-party endorsement similar to CleanScores can put some sort of credibility in our minds, when we decide where to eat and where not to....in the restaurants in Bangladesh.