{"id":39005,"date":"2012-12-28T01:21:46","date_gmt":"2012-12-27T23:21:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.whalecottage.com\/blog\/?p=39005"},"modified":"2012-12-31T16:32:18","modified_gmt":"2012-12-31T14:32:18","slug":"woolworths-sweet-and-cape-town-tourism-sour-service-awards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chrisvonulmenstein.com\/blog\/cape-town\/woolworths-sweet-and-cape-town-tourism-sour-service-awards\/","title":{"rendered":"Woolworths Sweet and Cape Town Tourism Sour Service Awards!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The Sweet Service Award<\/strong> goes to Woolworths and Candice Bull, its Food Technologist: Perishables, who has walked the extra mile since we reported the 5 cm bone in the chicken sandwich bought at the Gardens Centre branch of Woolworths last Saturday. \u00a0Candice was the only person on duty at Head Office when we called on Monday, our Twitter feedback not having resulted in any reaction over 48 hours. \u00a0She requested that I drop the packet and the bone off at the nearest Woolworths branch, which I did at the V&A Waterfront. \u00a0The person I gave it to did not tell me that he was going on leave, as was the person he delegated the responsibility to get the packets sent to Head Office. \u00a0Yesterday Candice went to the branch herself to collect the packet, but it was nowhere to be found! \u00a0When I sent her the photograph, she identified the packet and sandwich as being from their Woolworths Caf\u00e9, made by Tribeca in-store, and passed the matter on to them.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The Sour Service Award<\/strong> goes to Cape Town Tourism, which we called yesterday to enquire about car rental for a Whale Cottage Camps Bay guest. \u00a0The staff at the information centre were inefficient in answering the calls, the calls being dropped five times between the switchboard and the Information Centre. \u00a0Finally we were put through to the Kirstenbosch branch (not being told so) due to the overload on their Burg Street branch staff, and Yolande\u00a0Young promised to search for a car to rent as soon as she had finished with a tourist sitting at her desk. \u00a0When we had heard nothing from her after six hours, we called, and she told me sweetly that she was still getting back to me, and that there were no cars available anyway! One wonders how Cape Town Tourism can offer such a shocking service for tourists visiting our world class city. Not surprising was to hear from the switchboard operator that all the Cape Town Tourism management is on leave, and that the most senior person on duty is the secretary of Mariette du Toit-Helmbold, the CEO of Cape Town Tourism, who is not available to her staff, being on holiday in Pringle Bay! \u00a0Despite a Tweet about the poor service, Mrs Helmbold did not call or ask one of her staff to do so!<\/p>\n

POSTSCRIPT 28\/12<\/strong>: \u00a0Shehaam phoned from the Customer Care division of the Woolworths Head Office, and apologised for the incident. \u00a0She did explain that the Woolworths Caf\u00e9 at Gardens Centre is not operated by Tribeca, but by Woolworths itself. \u00a0They will be training their staff in deboning chickens again, she said. She promised to send a gift voucher by sms for the inconvenience, but it has not yet arrived. \u00a0Philip, a store manager at the Gardens Centre branch, also called to apologise, and invited me to fetch the voucher from the branch should it not arrive by sms.<\/p>\n

POSTSCRIPT 29\/12<\/strong>: \u00a0Not having received a response from Mrs Helmbold to our Tweets and to the Sour Service Award, we sent her an e-mail with the blogpost link. \u00a0This is the reply we received, interesting in that the switchboard did not even know that Ms Nzima Soci (the Executive Manager: Financial and Corporate Services) is the Acting CEO of the company during Mrs Helmbold’s holiday! She told us that Mrs Helmbold’s secretary Elana Theunissen is running the operation!:<\/p>\n

“Thank you for your message. \u00a0I am currently away on leave and will be back in the office on Thursday, 10 January 2013. Should you wish to have urgent or immediate response to your mail and\/or assistance, kindly note the following arrangements: \u00a0CTT Acting CEO for end December to mid-January period: Nzima Soci; Mzunzima@capetown.travel<\/a> \/ 021 487 6800; \u00a0CEO Office \/ admin assistance: Yolandy Lakay; Yolandy@capetown.travel<\/a> \/ 021 487 6803; \u00a0Media enquiries and comment: Skye grove<\/span> <\/span><\/em>(sic)\u00a0(<\/span>PR Manager); 079 368 0764 \u00a0Wishing you a blessed and peaceful festive season. \u00a0Tourism greetings”!<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

POSTSCRIPT 29\/12:<\/strong> Mrs Helmbold has responded, at 22h00 this evening, requesting that the complaint be addressed to one of her managers! \u00a0As CEO she is ultimately responsible for the quality of service offered by her staff. \u00a0She has also demanded a proper complaint, not accepting the content of the Sour Service Award, even though we sent her the link by e-mail, and wrote “COMPLAINT ABOUT POOR SERVICE FROM CAPE TOWN TOURISM”<\/em> in the Subject Line!:<\/p>\n

“As requested via Twitter, you are welcome to direct your complaint in writing to me and Enver Duminy, Executive Manager Tourism Services, will follow up. He is responsible for the CTT VIC network and will respond in line with the complaints procedure<\/span><\/em>“.<\/p>\n

POSTSCRIPT 31\/12:<\/strong> The promised Woolworths gift voucher arrived today, three days later!<\/p>\n

The <\/span>WhaleTales Sweet & Sour Service Awards<\/strong> are presented every Friday on the WhaleTales blog.\u00a0 Nominations for the Sweet and Sour Service Awards can be sent to Chris von Ulmenstein at <\/span>info@whalecottage.com<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0 Past winners of the Sweet and Sour Service Awards can be read on the Friday posts of this blog, and in the <\/span>WhaleTales <\/strong>newsletters on the <\/span>www.whalecottage.com<\/a> website.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Sweet Service Award goes to Woolworths and Candice Bull, its Food Technologist: Perishables, who has walked the extra mile since we reported the 5 cm bone in the chicken sandwich bought at the Gardens Centre branch of Woolworths last Saturday. \u00a0Candice was the only person on duty at Head Office when we called on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false},"categories":[3,124,266,22,21],"tags":[17929,85,32378,12896,14521,1408,88,340,17950,8739,10538,32373,1771,171,16568,17938,17951],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t