{"id":51695,"date":"2013-12-06T09:57:53","date_gmt":"2013-12-06T07:57:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.whalecottage.com\/blog\/?p=51695"},"modified":"2013-12-08T19:56:58","modified_gmt":"2013-12-08T17:56:58","slug":"hi-sweet-service-and-pick-n-pay-va-waterfront-sour-service-award","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chrisvonulmenstein.com\/blog\/cape-town\/hi-sweet-service-and-pick-n-pay-va-waterfront-sour-service-award\/","title":{"rendered":"hi Sweet Service and Pick ‘n Pay V&A Waterfront Sour Service Awards!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"hi<\/a>The Sweet Service Award<\/strong> goes to hi, a new outlet with an odd name I discovered in the V&A Waterfront, and which belongs to The Foschini Group (designated by a TFG circular logo outside the store). \u00a0 I was looking for a new iPhone cover, and priced those at Vodacom (who have an irritating new queue numbering system, except that the number issuer was not at his post) as well as at the Apple store, both of these stores being out of stock of iPhone 4s covers. \u00a0At hi the cost was only R149 for a reasonable looking cover. \u00a0I also found a car charger for the phone at R99, something I did not know existed until I saw a guest using one last week.<\/p>\n

\"Pick<\/a>The Sour Service Award<\/strong> goes to the new Pick ‘n Pay in the Waterfront, which had been open for five days when I popped in to have a look on Monday, incentivised by a massive insert in the Sunday Times,<\/strong> which reflected excellent opening prices, my favourite perfume ck one costing an unbelievably low R399 for the 200ml pack. The new store is in the underground parking area, having trebled in size, now having an in-store bottle store, a clothing section, more electrical appliances, and a Clicks-like cosmetics section, with brands including Revlon and L’Oreal. \u00a0There are three sets of doors, and coming down the escalator one is inclined to enter on the right. \u00a0There is no signage to show that it is the Exit. \u00a0A security person merely pointed left, and did not speak to indicate which of the two remaining doors was the entrance. \u00a0One enters at the bakery side, and I saw a lovely farmstyle bread. \u00a0Pre-priced packets lie nearby, but have other bread names and prices already marked on them, but were not for my bread type. \u00a0A sign above the bread counter invited one to have the bread sliced, but I was told that the slicer has not yet arrived! \u00a0A Bakery Manager came to my rescue, and the bread was perfectly cut by hand while I was shopping. \u00a0I then headed for the cosmetics section, to find the ck one, and it was at the opposite end of the store. \u00a0There was only one staff member in this section, and she did not know where the perfume was. \u00a0She could not help me with lipstick prices either, as they were not marked on the shelf. \u00a0Wilmia, a friendly Customer Service advisor dressed in red, sent me on my shopping way, saying that she would find the price, and that she would find me, quite a feat in such a large store, but we did connect again. \u00a0The lipstick was not on the system at all, so she made up of a price of R89, saying that I should tell a till operator that. \u00a0I had less than 10 items, so found that queue, but it was not clear how long the queue is, snaking around impulse items which were so dreadful that it was no challenge to resist them! \u00a0Two of the seven ‘express’ tills were not manned. \u00a0The lady who rang up my purchases was doing the best she could, but told me that the till bell in the ‘express’ section does not work. \u00a0There were no managers to be seen. \u00a0 The lipstick ‘deal’ caused a problem, as a supervisor had to approve it – without a bell no one could be called. \u00a0I had bought fruit, and not seeing a weighing section, I assumed that they would weigh this at the till, as Woolworths does. \u00a0It was the wrong assumption, so my till operator had to weigh the fruit herself! \u00a0The biggest challenge was asking about the parking – if one spends R150 or more, one gets 1\u00bd hours\u00a0parking for free. \u00a0The only problem is that the staff have no idea how it works, and there is no information in the store about the parking discount and how it works, and one is not told about it proactively by the till operators. \u00a0One receives a small slip with a barcode when one has shopped for more than the specified amount, \u00a0and is told to go to the parking pay machine (the staff weren’t sure if it was the one closest to Pick ‘n Pay or all of them), enter the parking ticket, and then scan the barcode slip underneath this – the only problem is that the Pick ‘n Pay name is minute at the space where one must scan it. \u00a0It was a relief that it did work where I had parked, on the opposite end of the parking garage. \u00a0It is clear that Pick ‘n Pay opened far too early, not having trained its staff. \u00a0It felt like chaos management, and no managers were to be found when we asked for assistance with the parking ticket. \u00a0Anyone suffering from claustrophobia and that is allergic to poor service should stay away from this Pick ‘n Pay branch. \u00a0I did not find the quality of the merchandise, e.g. the cold meats, the breads, fruit, etc to be of any better quality than at any other Pick ‘n Pay, which was my expectation from the pre-publicity. \u00a0I heard from a supplier that they realised that they were short staffed the day before they opened, and threw more staff from other branches at the store on its opening day. \u00a0This sentence from the Pick ‘n Pay website sounds completely unbelievable with regard to the new store: \u00a0‘Our dedicated team of researchers travelled to the world\u2019s culinary capitals to find out the most popular lifestyle and food trends, and then tailored them for a South African market<\/em>‘! \u00a0Pick ‘n Pay’s Tweeter picked up some of my feedback but did not ask for more details. \u00a0They Tweeted on Tuesday: ‘You will be contacted with feedback from the store management team shortly Chris<\/em>‘ – I am still waiting to hear from them!<\/p>\n

POSTSCRIPT 5\/12<\/strong>: \u00a0Despite this Sour Service Award and the outstanding feedback promised on Tuesday, there was no reaction from Pick ‘n Pay today via Twitter or any other communication medium!<\/p>\n

POSTSCRIPT 6\/12<\/strong>: Store Manager Mark called with an apology, and a positive attitude about what we highlighted in this Sour Service Award, including getting a bread slicing machine (they have since removed the slicing sign); making the fruit weighing, which is hidden behind a column, more visible; having a supervisor on call near the 1 – 10 item tills; putting Exit\/Entrance signs above the doors if allowed by the V&A Waterfront management; and having a better way of communicating the free parking benefit to its customers. \u00a0Lipstick prices have now been marked on the shelves. \u00a0He fed back that the response to the ck one and other perfume brand promotion has been fantastic, his store having sold the most in the country.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0WhaleTales Sweet & Sour Service Awards<\/strong>\u00a0are presented every Friday on the WhaleTales blog.\u00a0 Nominations for the Sweet and Sour Service Awards can be sent to Chris von Ulmenstein at\u00a0\u00a0whalecot@iafrica.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\u00a0WhaleTales\u00a0<\/strong>newsletters on the\u00a0www.whalecottage.com<\/a>\u00a0website.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Sweet Service Award goes to hi, a new outlet with an odd name I discovered in the V&A Waterfront, and which belongs to The Foschini Group (designated by a TFG circular logo outside the store). \u00a0 I was looking for a new iPhone cover, and priced those at Vodacom (who have an irritating new […]<\/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":[3,124,266,248,1590,892,21,19],"tags":[18025,32378,22719,6360,22717,6839,15198,2848,957,15409,22718,283,1152,32373,1771,22720,171],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\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