Take a bow Air Vistara!

Last month I was traveling from Mumbai to New Delhi by Vistara airlines, as I was traveling to Agra. After getting down from the plane and after collecting my checked-in bag, I got into the car arranged for further travel from Delhi airport to Agra. By the time we reached Noida, I realised that I had left my Kindle e-book reader in the flight. Just to be sure, I checked my laptop bag, but did not find the Kindle. It was then confirmed that I had left it in the flight. The same carrier was to fly to Srinagar from Delhi, and the chances are it might have already left Delhi by this time.

Immediately, I called up Vistara's call centre. The person on the phone was very courteous and sounded very professional. He took down all the details. He confirmed that it would take at least 3 to 4 days.

Since nothing happened for 3 days, I called up the call centre. I was also a bit nervous since I was not given any complaint number. To my surprise, the person on the phone could locate my complaint only by taking down my name, flight number and date of journey. He did not need any other details. He said that their team was working on the issue and that they would need some more time. I was asked to call up again the next day.

The next day when I called up, there was a different person on phone. He also could locate my complaint with just the basic details. he asked me to note down a phone number. My experience with customer service and call centres in the past has not been good, so I was a bit irritated when he asked me to note down the number. However, he assured me that this was the mobile number of a person at the security office of Vistara at New Delhi airport, and that he had my Kindle with him. I was requested to go and collect it from him.

I told the guy that I live in Mumbai and at the time of the call I was in Mumbai. He said I should tell this to the person whose number was shared with me, and he would arrange to send the Kindle to Mumbai.

When I called up the guy in the security office at New Delhi airport, I had to only mention my name and he said that he had my Kindle with him. I told him that I was a resident of Mumbai. He immediately said he would send the Kindle through the next flight and confirm to me. Within 15 minutes, I got an email from this gentleman confirming that the Kindle was shipped to Mumbai. The mail was addressed to his colleague in the security office at the Mumbai airport. The phone numbers of that colleague as well as mine were mentioned in the mail. I was asked to carry the boarding pass and a photo ID with me when I reach there. The arrival time of the flight was also mentioned in the mail.

After some time I called up the person at Mumbai. He immediately recognised me on the mention of my name. He asked me when would it be convenient for me to visit the airport. At the agreed time, I reached the airport and went to the ticketing office (as instructed) outside the Mumbai airport and inquired about this person. The person at the booking window asked me why I wanted to meet this person, which I mentioned. He asked me to wait for a minute and called up the office inside the airport. After talking on the phone for a minute or so, he hung up and told me that someone was on the way with the Kindle and asked me if I wanted a glass of water or something.

Within 15-20 minutes someone came out with the Kindle nicely put in an envelope. He asked for a copy of the boarding pass and my photo ID, which I handed him over. He then requested for my signature on a form (confirming the receipt of the Kindle).

When I thanked the person on the counter, who had placed the call, he said, "Sir, we should thank you for patiently waiting."

I was amazed at the whole experience. It was not just an individual, but the whole system - entire staff that was professional and courteous. They were nice, prompt and exhibited that they meant "The customer is king".

Take a bow team Air Vistara. When two great institutions - the Tata group and Singapore Airlines get together, you create a world class company.

Why should someone help you achieve YOUR goal?
		Amit Trivedi
“What is your objective?” asked the consultant to an entrepreneur. The answer was: “I want to create wealth for myself.” The entrepreneur was clear about how much wealth he wants to create and in how much time. We are quite aware of the importance of having goals. Here is an example of someone who has clarity about what he wants to achieve and has also put the deadline to the dream. As Zig Ziglar has famously said, “Goals are dreams with deadlines.” The consultant praised this entrepreneur for goal clarity, but asked a very pertinent question, “Why should someone help you achieving this goal of yours? What is in it for them?” Think about it. When an entrepreneur sets out to start an enterprise, it is done with a purpose. Very often entrepreneurs confuse between building a business and generating income. If income generation is a goal, the entrepreneur cannot focus on building a business, as setting up a business takes time. One has to forgo income for some time, until the venture turns into a self-sustaining business. Till that time, the parent (entrepreneur in this case) has to look after the baby often sacrificing one’s own pleasures and even basic necessities sometimes. Building business will allow one to create wealth over a long term, earning income will help one sustain in the short term. It depends on what type of person you are. Some people can handle enormous amounts of risk. They can start focusing on building business even when there is no income in sight. The other category may first want to stabilize the income and then focus on building an enterprise. When you set your goals, please make sure where is the customer in the goal. If your goal specifically and explicitly spells out what you plan to do for the customer, the customer will help you achieve your goals. However, it is just your own goal without any reference to what you can do for someone else, ask yourself, “Why should someone help you with YOUR goal?” The goal that this entrepreneur has set for himself has something lacking. This is a goal of an entrepreneur, who is setting up a business. The business has to do something for the customer in order to be profitable and to sustain for long. Still, the same customer is missing from the goal. Wealth creation would be the result of the goal one has set. All the best! *The author runs Karmayog Knowledge Academy. He can be reached at amit@karmayog-knowledge.com. The views expressed in this article are author's personal views. Source: http://www.ftfoundation.com/English/expert_talk.html

Is India fast becoming a seller’s nation?

We all have heard the great India story – one billion customers, growing wealth, increasing income, even faster increasing spending. Wow! How the hungry Indians have transformed into hungry for more! This is probably the biggest developments of the 21^st Century. But this development seems to have come with something else. We are fast becoming a seller’s country.

I will share some specific experiences and for that I will need to take names. I can’t help it as real experiences have real companies with real names.

The other day, I had gone to pay my Reliance phone bills and I complained about frequent call drops. The response was very “matter-of-fact” – the person at the counter coolly told me, “Yes sir, GSM phones have that problem.” I also mentioned about the speed of internet connection (I have a wireless broadband connection), that in spite of having a broadband connection, I get the speed of a dial-up network. The guy was quick to seize the moment. He suggested I go for an upgrade to the newly launched 3G connection by paying only Rs. 2,600. He assured me that this connection can get faster speed.

This response prompted me to write this article.

These guys are trained to sell. Their performance is also measured in terms of sales numbers and not in terms of customer happiness or satisfaction. If you have a complaint, it will be logged into the system and then at a later date and time someone will get in touch.

The other leading mobile phone service provider – Airtel – is even better than Reliance. First of all, I have been a slave to the number that my erstwhile employer had allotted to me. So many people know this number; I cannot afford to change it. This is what the cell phone companies are banking on, probably. To their respite, the regulator also accommodated their lobbying (sorry to use this much-maligned word) long enough to introduce MNP (mobile number portability). My experiences with Airtel services are known to many of my friends and if I start writing all those experiences, it may turn out to be a small book. I would only like to narrate what is relevant to this article.

1. Go to www.airtel.in and what you’ll find is: if you are a customer with a problem and you want to find where and whom to contact, you will surf through the site and as the Ariel detergent ad says, “dhoondte reh jaaoge.” However, if you are an investor, you can simply click on a link right at the top of the home page. A single click on that link and you will be greeted by Mr. Mittal himself. The company is candid in telling us where the priorities are.

2. I lodged a request for starting voice mail services. Nothing happened for some time. On repeated follow ups, I was told that there is some technical glitch and company’s engineers are working to resolve that. After around 3 months, finally I was told that they do not offer voice mail services in Mumbai. With that I understood that the chapter was closed. One fine day, I receive a message that I had a message in my voice mailbox. Now, this is how I got to know that the service had started and that I was a privileged one to get it.

Tata AIG General insurance takes the cake. I had an insurance policy, which was renewed. I found that the renewal premium was higher by Rs. 3 from the previous year. Now, that surprised me. What the company had done was a stroke of ingenuity (however unethical it may be). They adjusted the base premium upwards such that the gross amount after Service Tax was almost the same as the last year, when the service tax was reduced from 12.36% to 10.30%. This 2.06% of service tax benefit was comfortably absorbed by the firm, without any notice to policy holders. When I followed up with the firm, the officers replied that they are free to revise the renewal premium without any notice to the policy holders. They agreed that they might have sent renewal notices with the old premia rates, but they were sorry about it (such a lovely word, this sorry is). I also got a written reply to my written complaint, where the officer started with "Let us explain ..." followed with no explanation whatsoever. A wonderful practical joke. Nevertheless, I had no time to follow up then and I gave up. When a year passed and the next renewal date came up, the call centre (sales) executives were quick to call up for renewal reminders. When I kept asking them about the status of my complaint, the calls stopped but were replaced with SMS messages that said, "we are unable to reach you ...". Someone had a very nice process of sending SMS when the customer is not available through phone, but the system was abused in case where the customer was insisting about resolving a pending issue.

I can go on and on, but let me not bore you with the details. I have such experiences with Nokia, HP, Dell, RCI, and HDFC; to name a few. When I share the experiences with my friends, I get to know they also have such issues.

What is surprising in almost all these cases is that the number of sales outlets is extremely high but the services centres are very few. The sales outlets are right on main roads, the service centres – you guessed it right, or maybe you already knew – very far off and generally off the main roads.

Is it suggesting something? Even at the cost of sounding too negative, I think, there is a message: dear customer, these companies seduce you as long as you are a prospective customer. The moment you purchase the product or service, you are not exciting.

In the process of getting more of everything and getting everything now, dear customer, you have lost a very powerful weapon of self-defense you had – choice. And the companies know that.

Rocket Singh – Salesman of the Year will always be in short supply.

Whoever said “customer is king” was dead right. Look at the kings in the democracy – by the way, I am referring to the erstwhile kings and not the Hindi of the word King (Raja).