Shop at holland village..sad facts of this society

[tan131]

A short stint in the service industry, I am usually not a person who grumbles about poor services in shops and all,prefering to give the benefit of doubt. However, what I experienced today is something which I feel has to be brought to attention.

Jus came back from "A particular shop" in Holland Village , which specialises in electronic stuffs to look for a notebook case. I have read from here and beyond about fair prices and being in the area, I decided to drop by with my friend to check it out.

Upon entering the front of the shop, I asked an employee about notebook cases. He told me to wait as he was attending to someone else. Fair enough, i queued up for my turn. However, after he finished attending to one, he proceed to another. That's where "MR Expat" turned up beside me. After he was done with everything, he proceeded to ask "MR Expat" what he wanted in a very friendly tone. My friend pointed out to the employee whether it was our turn as we came first. Turning to us and giving in the most rude and unfriendly tone, he told us we had to "wait" for our turn.. wait? i thought to myself..but wasn't we here first? anyway, beside being annoyed that the way he allowed "MR Expat" to jump queue, what pissed me off was the tone and manner he told us..

Explanations I would accept..but raising your voice in a shop and using that reprimanding tone is not acceptable..my friend is a girl for god sake..and she merely pointed out something to you.. she's not even demanding you attend to her first..

Anyway, i concluded, its either I buy something which cost more.. or simply bleach myself white to get fair service and attention.. I am beinging to understand why Micheal wanted to be white.. whether I would return to the shop? Let's jus say money is not everything and I would rather hand my money over to someone else which feels is worth it.. for me, i'm not returning..

Jus pointing out the sad facts of society.. as to the name of the shop.. i'll leave it blank ..

 

[glensky]

dont worry ill give them a piece of my mind...i live next to that store.:think:

 

[wildstallion]

Name the shop, I think I know which one your on about but ive been wrong before! Why are you protecting them??? Naming the shop may cause them to change their ways. I will never understand why people dont disclose the name :dunno:

 

[photografixed]

Name the shop, I think I know which one your on about but ive been wrong before! Why are you protecting them??? Naming the shop may cause them to change their ways. I will never understand why people dont disclose the name :dunno:

scared kana sue later how?

 

[spartacus.ret]

Name the shop, I think I know which one your on about but ive been wrong before! Why are you protecting them??? Naming the shop may cause them to change their ways. I will never understand why people dont disclose the name :dunno:

don't worry, there's only one electronic shop in holland village.

 

[wildstallion]

don't worry, there's only one electronic shop in holland village.

Ok, then I do have it right.

Ive found them to be a bit rude aswell, and Iam an expat (not a singaporean women like one person in particular seems to think!), I dont think they are just treating locals this way.

 

[Yih Yeong]

I have the same experience too. That was a few years ago when I bought my D70 from them. I never went back and never recommend anyone there (except my foreign visitors)

 

[digitalbuff]

I have had the same experience. They sort of attended to me only after i made it very clear that I wanted to buy a particular product immediately and I do notice that they treat expats very differently willingly explaining this and that feature, pros and cons etc.

The shop name is paris silk. They do have quite a good price though considering being in HV.

 

[couture.06]

dont be afarid to say out loud...what a bad service ! .....locals speak up ! or flash your money in front of their eyes !

 

[spartacus.ret]

I have the same experience too. That was a few years ago when I bought my D70 from them. I never went back and never recommend anyone there (except my foreign visitors)

why you so sabo one? you yourself don't go, then ask all your foreign visitors to go there! :devil:

 

[Phildate]

I think everyone knows the shop in question. The fact is, it gets extremely busy at times and if you don't try and get someone's attention, then you don't get served, no matter what the colour of your skin. Why is it so busy? Because everyone knows that you get the best price in Singapore there 99% of the time. No messing about, no having to bargain them down, just straight away offered the best deals. You also get good aftersales service should anything go wrong, always very helpful. For my non-technical friends, they have bought items, had them delivered and installed for no extra cost.

I have been shopping there for seven years and I know some of the staff on first name terms. They are in my good books because they managed to get me a 18-200VR lens before I went on a trip. I went to other shops who played on the fact that this was a hard to find lens and wanted to charge me $200 extra.

Sometimes I have seen their staff, whilst serving someone, ask someone else what they are after. Some call it multi-tasking service, others find it rude.

 

[gooseberry]

Sorry Phil, but your experiences at that shop, one could say, are a little biased since you are, as the locals would term, an 'ang moh'; 'cos if you look at it, tan131 says that the shop has preferential treatment towards expats, and then an expat comes and defends the shop for their good service. You may have a very good relationship with this store since you have been using them for a number of years, but don't let that blind you to how others may be treated by shop.

Being a foreigner myself, I have been to that shop a couple of times and have observed that they do give preferential treatment to expats/foreigners on both occasions when they were busy. Besides their prices aren't that great, the prices are fairly reasonable (not outrageous as some other places, they always quote without GST), but there are better places.

 

[tan131]

chill guys, i did not name the shop because i do not want others to be influenced not to go to the shope based on my experience alone..my intention here is not one to flame the shop. However, I think this is one problem in this society that needs to be highlighted.

Sorry Phildate.. think I got to disagree with u and be on gooseberry's side. I guess this like what gooseberry said, only seems to add strength to what I have experienced from them. There are two sides to a coin and two sides to a story. I must be fair and let them say their side.

Anyway busy or not, multi tasking or what, even my printer does things according to sequence and queue. Doesn't mean if I am buying something BIG and expensive or if I happen to be a special minority group (from their point of view) that I get priority.. this ain the A&E in a hospital.. anyway, not like my frd had not buy something "Epensive" from them before..if their service is going to be base on profits or "skin colour" (no offences to the expats community) then I think its mentally and morally wrong.. I'm definately not going back to them.. But hey, I'm not going to stop anyone cos its your choice

Cheers~

 

[overdodo]

Pricewise the place is cheap on first quote. I doubt this HV shop see face n quote price, unlike other shops i've been to.

Some places see face quote price, chop certain races, other places see races choose service standard.

This reminds me of the incident where certain individuals were told this brazilian grill restaurant (if i'm not wrong, its in a expensive neighbourhood as well) was full only to have expats walking in and served.


Live and let live
cheers


P.S I think in the first post "micheal" meant the (ex) king of pop right ? Cause it happens to be the name of an employee in the shop.

 

[glensky]

first of all there are two e.shops in holland village...secondly i always go there to compare prices w other shops since its just around the corner,but not even once i've experience being ill treated.in fact there was this time tat i was looking for a headphone and they have been helpful to contact the supplier to check the pricing..from sgd550.00 to 460.00 they gave me a 90.00 off.:dunno:

 

[Yih Yeong]

why you so sabo one? you yourself don't go, then ask all your foreign visitors to go there! :devil:

oh no lah... I am local mah. Whereas my visitors are foreigner, so they get some preferential treatment. I know cos I went with them a few times.

 

[tan131]

overdodo:

"Live and let live"- yeap, that why dun intend to tell anyone not to patronise them and yes, its the ex king of pop.. did i spell it wrongly? sorrie, not realli a fan hmmm.. dunno any employees in the store, even if i do, not me to quote names

glensky:

To be fair to the second shop, the shop i'm talking about is near a bakery..Well.. I was looking for a notebook carrier.. i dun think that cost much.. is that why I was given the cold shoulder? prices may be good (quoting from your experience) but service definately isn't.. why not get a frd who they don't know and go down on a day sunday like today.. ask for something not that pricy. Do take note who was here first before you and who came later.. maybe, jus maybe u will understand what I am talking about

 

[ianpaice]

Some of the shops in singapore are so bloody silly. Often, these ang mos and expats buy stuffs from you one time off only and return to their foreign homeland thereafter.

But the locals are here to stay and make one purchase after another and a good salesmen can keep his customers loyal for years with competitive pricing and good service. Just look at the custmers in TCW and Alan Photo, most of the customers are locals and are familiar faces, and these are the customers that feed the shops years after years without the need to use bad sales tactics.

 

[luddock]

I've had a similar experience in the Holland Village branch of Paris Silk too. It's largely patronised by expats and it's clearly evident that they receive preferential service... it is indeed a sad fact.

 

[ortega]

why are you all complaining????

go to SLS and all the shops give you bad service with good price
but our visitors get preferential treatment (not so good price)