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Showing newest posts with label Feedback. Show older posts
Showing newest posts with label Feedback. Show older posts

Tata Motors taking me for ride.

Tata Motors is absolutely taking me for ride. Literally!!

I have booked Tata Manza Saffire (Silver color) from Goyal Motors, Patiala. I was promised a delivery of vehicle in 20-25 days, which comes to March 24, 2010.
Well, the stipulated time period is about to elapse and I am yet to get a call from your dealer (which for me represents the company), and that when they have taken booking amount from me.

Nonetheless, I called up Salesman (Robin) to confirm the delivery of the vehicle but to my amazement, he was clueless about the delivery date. I called him 3-4 times and every time he told that he has to confirm it from his senior. In my fourth call,  I urged him strongly to inform me about delivery date. Then he put me to some team leader (Sandeep Puri). He was equally clueless and gave me some excuses of non-availability of car on the said delivery date. Then I requested him for the next earliest delivery date but he said that he will call me in exactly one hour to give me a confirmation. That one hour never passed.

After making five calls and spending almost 30 minutes on phone, with their salesman, I was able to get a delivery date for my vehicle.

After struggling to get delivery date from saleman (Robin), I am now struggling to get my car. Saleman assured me that I will get my desired car in my desired color on March 25.

Then on the morning of March 25, Salesman again called that he cannot give me a car in Silver color. Only car that is available is in White color, take it or leave it. My choice. He passed on the phone to his superior, Mr Bhupinder Singh (apparently branch manager), who also arrogantly told me that they cannot do much and this is the only car available and I can take it or leave it. 

Are we going back to Ford era?

Contacting Tata Customer Service is another obstacle race. There are fancy customer care pages all over their website but you cannot actually find any email id wherein you can lodge your complaint. They have comment box on their website but it restricts complaint to only 1000 words.

On one hand we have Apple CEO, Steve Jobs, who flaunts his email ID like his iPhone and on another we have India's most respected group which does not even give email ID of its customer support.

I called call centre number on their website. A polite person gave me the number of Regional Manager (Karun Grover). I called him and he transferred my call to someone who further gave the phone to one  of his colleagues (Shivangi). She promised me to give some solution in a couple of hours. She did call me as promised but with no solution. She gave me a dhobi list of reasons and problems why it cannot be done. She wanted me to settle for some other color but why? I chose this color after a lot of deliberation and I want only this color. 

Such pathetic service from a brand which makes India proud in designing Nano. I think Tata Motors feel that Indian common man will be happy to get cars at cheap prices and customer service can be compromised. But I think this is not true. Times are changing. Product development can be copied easily, but good customer service can go a long way in making a brand indispensable. I think I just made the biggest mistake of my life by booking a car with Tata Motors. I am not sure if I am unlucky or it is part of Tata Motors DNA.

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Tata Motors Blooper on Customer Service

 
Dear Various Teams at Tata Motors,

Team at Tata Motors have done commendable job in designing low cost yet beautiful Nano. They have also done great job in turning around JLR. Team has also done some commendable job in making efficient and spacious cars like Indica and Indigo. Great work by every member of this team.

But they faltered at one place. It is not their fault actually because committing this fault requires less of brain. They have faltered in designing customer contact support form.
 
 
 
The above form is available on Tata Motors website wherein customers can voice their concerns, submit their complaints and give some suggestions to top management.

However, they have committed one mistake in this form. Mandatory field is Registration Number of car as issued by state governments once customer owns a car not before that. Now in ‘complaint area’ dropdown, there options of pre-sales and delivery. If a prospective customers has any issue with pre-sales process of the company, how is he supposed to fill in registration number. If customer has some problem in getting the delivery of his vehicles from Tata dealer, how is he supposed to put registration number of car.

I have absolutely no clue.

It seems this page is designed by some IT geek, who gave live demo to a guy sitting in a cabin wearing a suit and tie and sitting away from real action happening on ground.

I showed this blooper to some of my colleagues and their first reaction was ‘This link looks like a formality from Tata Motors’. I decided to validate their statement and posted a complaint from their ‘Contact Us’ form. And waiting to see whether I will get some kind of response or not. Will keep you updated.

I really wish someone from the team, who regularly interacts with customers and is aware of things that are happening on ground, have used this form diligently before rushing it to on their website.

I hope it gets rectified before more customers like me start encountering this strong wall, which makes customer feedback process difficult.

PS: - Yes, I am having problem with Tata Motors delivery process and a stinking post on their shoddy customer service is just brewing up.

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Another Improve-Toilet-Story and More...



Delhi airport has improved a lot and become a lot more swankier than it was. One of my NRI cousins also gave me this feedback.

But feedback received by airport management companies asks them to improve on certain areas. And guess what tops the list. Toilets.

Travelers want toilets to improve in terms of cleanliness and upkeep. Valid demand.

There are some other suggestions as well like ATM machines, mother-care center, announcements, etc. One suggestion is to have plants inside the airport. Plants? Yes, plants. They should plant trees and we Indians will take care of irrigation ;-)

Shifting focus from Airports to Airlines. Richard Branson (I love this guy and I would love to work for his group) has given an interview in which he has a suggestion for other airlines to stay afloat (apart from taking help from Governments).

On asking what other airlines can learn from Virgin Airline, he quipped. 

I don't really want them to learn anything. I'd be delighted if they carried on exactly as they are. They basically should get out a clean white sheet of paper and start again. Most of them are beyond repair. They got far too big and have management groups that don't care about customer service. The experience the traveling public gets on those other carriers is pretty dire.

Continue with your layers. Add more layers. Still not enough, add more layers. Increase your distance from customers. Let customers suffer while you pocket huge salaries. And when customers start ditching you, you run to Government for bailout.

Your competitors know your future. Unfortunately, you do not. 

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Flow of feedback


In old ways of doing business the flow of feedback between organization and customers was controlled and it was one way. Onus was on an organization to listen to customers. If company wants to take feedback they will provide ways and means to the customers like feedback form, call center numbers and customer service email ID.

In case company believes that whatever they will churn out, customers will lap it up then they decide not to listen to customers. In case products are not meeting expectations, customers cannot do much about it. They may speak to few people, they may stop using the product but information will  halt there. Information will not reach to heights where it can cause potential damage to a brand or an organization.


But everything is changing now. If companies decide that they do not want to listen, customers will use social media to voice their concerns. They will raise their concerns through blogs, social networking sites and Twitter. No organization can run or turn their back towards customers. Also, organizations need to keep their eyes and ears open all the time and keep monitoring these online discussions.

One such case of monitoring conversations, I discovered on this site . Sushil found an error on Tata Xenon website and tried to contact them. But feedback form on their website was not working properly and he could not give his feedback. Sushil decided to write a post about his experience and wanted to highlight the concern to Tata Xenon team. Tata Xenon team responded on his blog and thanked him for his feedback. Good to see that Tata team was monitoring conversations and not sleeping.

Sleeping is not an option any more. So is not listening.
PS:- One more conversation which any brand would not like to ignore.

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Hate tax or overweight opportunity


Ryan Air has decided to levy a ‘fat’ tax to passengers who will not be able to fit into the seat without removing separators and are not able to fit into the seat belt. When you first read it, it sounds funny. But Ryan Air says that it is passengers who want them to levy this tax on overweight passengers as it is uncomfortable for the fellow passengers. Fat passengers spill over to neighbor’s seat!

As it goes with customer feedback, you have to listen more than your ears. All customers are looking a comfortable ride irrespective of their size. Some customers feel uncomfortable if an overweight person is sitting by their side. This is not airlines fault. Adding extra tax may turn away many potential overweight customers. This 'fat' tax may turn out to be a 'hate' tax which could cause a potential damage to Ryan Air.

Most of the companies provide good service when customers do not have any specific need or want. True service skills are tested under conditions where customer is asking (or worse he could not articulate what he wants) something specific. And when you start addressing a particular need (said or unsaid), you start delighting your customers. You create zealots who will swear by your service and brand.

Ryan Air can make a separate sitting area with larger chairs especially for fat people. I do not know how many fat customers travel with Ryan Air. But I guess one or two rows of such seats should do. And charge extra for that seating area. Customers will readily pay if value is shown to them and might start loving it for taking good care of them. God knows, Ryan Air becomes a favorite airline for fat people.

Take away point: No extra tax will benefit you if you are not understanding the needs of your customer.

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Making it easier of customers

 

Today I went to a Café Coffee Day (CCD) for a cup of coffee with a friend. On entering, I saw a customer shouting at cashier. Being a customer service person, curiosity of what happened and how cashier is going to handle the whole situation, I went straight to the billing counter. As the story unfolds, there were two reasons why customer was irate:

  1. Customer ordered coffee and he was not given any bill.
  2. Customer waited for over an hour for his order but he was not served. Reason – service people forgot to process his order.
Customer wanted to speak to someone senior. Cashier reluctantly provided number but he was not picking up the phone. Customer wanted to register a complaint but there was not complaint register. After observing the whole episode, I thought CCD has failed to implement some basic steps of customer service.

According to a study, 96% of the customers do not complain at all and they simply shift to another service provider. And customers who complains they actually committed to the brand. CCD should make it easier for the customers to complain or give feedback. This can be done

  • By providing complaint/feedback book at the café
  • Phone numbers of customer service/senior managers should be displayed
  • Feedback/suggestion forms should be available
  • Email address where customer can register his concerns
It is not necessary to implement all the above mentioned steps but make sure what ever steps are put in place, they should be followed religiously. Acting on the feedback is also important and that will be discussed in some other post.

Regarding my coffee, CCD forgot to process my order as well. I guess it was a bad day for them.

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Customers Wanted...Dead or Alive


"The longer companies refuse to accept the influence of consumer-to-consumer communication and perpetuate old ways of doing business, the more they will alienate and drive away their customers"

A quote from tell3000




This is true every sarkari company. Most of sarkari companies in India are run by men. These worldly wise men think they know each and every thing and they need not to listen to customers. Well only time will tell!!!

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