You gotta love the level of service in Thailand. I know I do. They just keep making my life so colorful and help me release my bottled emotions. This edition of Thai Service rant is starring two female staff of Siam Paragon, 3rd floor gift section.

Earlier in the evening I had my eyes on a computer bag at a craft shop in Siam Square where you can decorate it with their iron-on felt characters. Unfortunately the shop didn’t have the color of the bag I wanted, so they suggested that I checked at Paragon, one of their department store booths.

So I did and there it was my beautiful cloth laptop bag in brownish cream with touches of grayish blue. I picked out a cute retro cat design, a few flowers and a letter K just to spice up its boring housewife look and headed to the shop girl.

I gave her my Paragon Prestige Platinum card, which should automatically give me 10% discount.

She: “We don’t accept that card anymore. We have a new policy now. You can get discount only if your purchase is B1,500 or more. Please go upstairs to the members lounge to change it.”

We recently received a letter from Paragon regarding this matter. I was aware of it. But the letter also said we did not need to replace the card.

Foolishly, I followed her instruction, dragging myself, my 2kg MacBook and my oversized handbag to the 4th floor.

With my suspposedly defunct card in hand, I fetched me staff who said,

“You don’t need to replace the card. It can be used with the new policy”

“But the shop girl downstairs wouldn’t accept it for discounts. She said I had to change it.”

“You can go down there and tell her the office said so. If she still refuses, tell her to call us.”

An effective display of authority right there. I was impressed. Well not for long.

I dragged myself down to the corner of my dream laptop bag again, headed to the girl and told her I didn’t need to change it. I showed her the card, and she gave me this response,

“Oh sorry. The old and the new cards are similar. This one doesn’t have gold stars.”

“ขอโทษค่ะดูผิด บัตรใหม่กะเก่าหน้าตาเหมือนกัน เออใช่อันนี้ไม่มีดาวสีทองๆ”

OK, I wasn’t so heated just yet. I waited at the shop while she went off with my debit Visa and my Prestige card. She came back a few minutes later, handed me the slip to sign and that’s when hell broke lose.

The price on the slip says B1,672.

Not only that they forgot to give me to 10% discount (as my total was over B1,500), the price for my stuff BEFORE the supposed 10% discount was B1,625. Tax is included in retail and they don’t charge service. How the hell did it even increase??

I confronted her. She gave me a blank look. I told her this was impossible and sent her back to the cashier to get it fixed.

Five minutes passed and there was no sign of her. So I went to the cashier myself and found her bickering with the cashier girl.

“Why is this total wrong? Can you cancel it?” I asked the cashier. No answer from the girl. She didn’t even look at me.

“Can you please get someone to check this? A manager?” Still no look or response from the girl. So..

“Get me the damn manager, could you please your highness?”

“ไม่ทราบว่าท่านจะกรุณาไปตามผู้จัดการมันมาหน่อยได้มั๊ยเพคะ?”

Yes I shouted that to her face.

After over 30 minutes of clueless discussion between the cashier and the shop girl, none of whom ever informed me of what was going on, when I asked I simply got a Please-Wait-A-Moment from these wonderfully nonchalant staff.

“We can cancel the purchase but we cannot cancel the payment from your card. We can’t reimburse you either. Please contact your bank. Here’s the number.”

“คือเราแคนเซิลให้แล้ว แต่วอยออกไม่ได้น่ะค่ะ ทางเราก็คงคืนเงินสดให้ไม่ได้เหมือนกัน คุณต้องติดต่อแบงค์เองอ่ะค่ะ ทำให้ไม่ได้”

“I’m sorry let me get this straight. I have wasted my time, and energy, for 30 minutes just to have you say that I have to fix YOUR problem myself? Get. Me. The. Damn. Manager.”

The manager came, picked up the phone and made a few calls.

“Your money will be put back in your account by tomorrow.” I asked for their names, the name of the person they talked to on the phone, and for my receipts and cancellation proof. But then I still had to ask, why on earth wouldn’t the cashier, or heck, the machine even realize that the card gives 10% discount? Why are the staff clueless about this change? How can you people work without communicating?

The manager went and fetched the cashier girl, who was asked to bring along the registry log. The manager took one look at the log and asked her, “You didn’t swipe the card twice and press that button did you?”

Looking totally emotionless at her boss and said, “Oh is that how you do it?”

“อ๋อ ต้องทำอย่างนี้ด้วยเหลอ ไม่รู้นิ”

I had the urge to take my G10 out and take a picture of her. Heck I wish I could video the whole thing.

And funniest thing, this whole time they still expected me to buy their stuff. The shop girl put everything in the bag and was just waiting for me to pay for it. Again.

“I really don’t think I want to give my money for that anymore.”

*Planning on translating this. It would be more effective in Thai. If all else fails, there’s still Google Translator.

I remember my friend once told me about the quick haircut service, QB, and that the acronym stands for “Quite Bad”.

Of course she was kidding but I mean it makes sense. The idea is “Just Cut in 10 Minutes”. How elaborate or careful can the hairdresser be when he has to whip up his entire beauty school training in just 10 minutes?

On Monday I had a perfect subject for my little experiment. The boyfriend, who hasn’t had a hair cut for a good few months, was slowing turning into a Beatle with his floppy bob it was getting very annoying so I took him to the one at MRT Sukhumvit. And for a man who hates spending more than half an hour sitting still doing nothing, i.e. in a salon, QB was a perfect solution.

QB looks more like a photo sticker booth than a salon. No, it looks more like a public toilet, the ones found on the sidewalk on Ratchadamri, than a salon. In the middle of the cubicle stands a chair, facing a wall with mirrors and shelves storing equipment.

The funniest thing is, you’re asked to insert a B100 note into a vending machine, which in turn will give you a queue ticket. But why the vending machine? It’s not like a mini robotic hairdresser is gonna come out from a slot. The hairdresser is right there, sometimes he’s even the one putting your note into the machine.

Then you sit in the cubicle, tell the guy how you want your hair done, how short how long, bangs or no bangs, shaver or no shaver, and then close your eyes and hope for the best.

After 10 minutes (well a little more because we made a lot of changes), the boyfriend came out looking like a 15-year-old ror dor student. Well it’s either that or a Dong Bang Shin Ki drag shag as the guy seemed to be aiming for before we started making comments.

The service is great for men, but I saw a girl waiting in line for a service also so I don’t know how they manage it. Because like they say, it’s just cut, no washing, no coloring, no blow drying, and definitely no styling. What is the damn point for a girl to even set foot in there?

Maybe it’s QB for the girls.

So I sent my roll of negative from my very first try on the 30-year-old Olympus OM-1 when I was in Phuket last weekend today.

I am extremely happy with the results. The process of getting these developed? Not so much.

If there’s one time I truly hate the famed Thai mindset of “mai pen rai” is when it comes to the topic of service quality–especially when you’re on the customer side.

I had my mom drop my film at Eastbourne in Paragon this morning as she was just shopping there. She called me when she was there because apparently their “fast, reliable in one hour” service is no longer applied for film developing since they moved out their machine. So I asked what would be the earliest that I could get my film and CD, mom asked them and got a confirmation, “Not later than 4pm”.

So alright. Fast enough. And I wouldn’t be done with work until 6pm so I asked my mom to go ahead and pay for the extra speedy service and I would get it after work.

I went there at almost 7pm, all excited to see my very first photos, shot on film with a real manual camera and not a Lomo toy. Extremely happy, I handed the slip over to them, which clearly stated the time of the drop off, the time of the pickup, and the price my mom had paid for.

A girl clerk came to me after checking the inventory and said, “I’m sorry but your film is not here.”

“What do you mean it’s not here. See I dropped it off today at 10am.”

“We don’t develop films here”

The heat started up a bit in the back of my head. The girl then went and fetched the middle-aged scrawny manager person, who then immediately realized what film I was looking for as, apparently according to him, no one does film anymore. Shouldn’t be too hard to remember.

“Looks like you’re going to get the photos tomorrow. The branch that develops our negatives is already closed, it’s 7pm.”

“Then why did you say I would get them back at 4pm at the latest? Why did I dish out that extra fee for your fast service? I chose to have this service with you and I expect you to deliver what you promise. Refund then?”

“Sorry. We cannot do refund for you. I will ask my staff to call the branch.”

The girl who apparently just realized what the workplace actually does, called the branch. And judging from the amount of “How are yous” *giggles* *giggles* “No, you’re crazys” *giggles* *giggles*, I bet her priority was clearly not concerning my film. After finally settling down her girly antics, she talked business, hung up, and came to us and said:

“They didn’t send the film because we didn’t put on the envelope where the film should be sent to after.”

I’m sorry. You guys just made it clear to me that I am still the only freak in your Bangkok customer base who is still shooting film, and you guys could not figure it out that the only roll of film that was sent to be developed once in the blue moon would be from the branch that sent it you and not any other?

“So here’s the thing. We forgot to write down that it was from Paragon.”

“And then? Isn’t this your fault?”

“Please pick up your film and CD tomorrow.”

So bad service and no refund and I should just go along. Oh no no no, you didn’t know Gnarly Kitty.

“I am not leaving until I get the confirmation from you that I will get my photos today, as stated in the slip, as I paid for.”

After a few exchanges of eye contacts to prove that I wasn’t kidding, they managed to get Giggle’s boyfriend, who’s also a staff, to take BTS to Sathorn to get the film. And that I would get my product 4 hours later than what they promised. Or yet, 7 hours later than what was advertised.

So I cooled it off with Dairy Queen Kid’s burger set with refillable Coke and a piece of ice cream sandwich. After I was satisfied gastronomically, it was time to get some emotional and intellectual satisfaction.

“Here are your photos. However you will have to pay B30 more. I charged you wrong at first, I thought it was a Digital-to-CD package, not Film-to-CD package.”

OK wait a second, when my mother handed you a ROLL OF FREAKIN’ FILM, you assumed it was a memory card and rang up the B30 cheaper package?

“OK, let’s see. I’m your only film customer of the day, probably of the month. You did not deliver what you promised. It was YOUR fault that it was late and it was YOUR fault that you couldn’t tell the difference between a roll of film and a memory card, and I’m going to have to pay B30 extra for the already EXTRA fee for a service that I did not get?”

“Fine. Here. Take it.” and he shoved the envelope onto the table.

“Nice.”

Don’t you just love Thai service?

You know what I think most security guards are? People who are not capable enough to be a cop and yet try to act like one.

I can’t count how many times I get into a fight with these ‘yaam’. Not because I’m doing something wrong, it’s always due to the fact that they seem to have a wrong impression of what the job entails.

Some of them are great, polite beings who actually make our lives better. And then there are the plain brainless self-absorbed idiots who have nothing better to do than playing cops with customers.

We got into the parking of CentralWorld today and as always at 6 o’clock it was pretty full. I told my friend to go to the Platinum area as I have the card. We saw an empty lot, pulled up, and a security guard soon approached our car looking like he owned the world.

He made a hand gesture of a rectangle. I gave him a visible nod before I started to reach for my wallet.

He came over and asked us to roll down the window.

As I was reaching for my wallet, he shouted into the car and said,

“มันต้องเป็นแพลตตินั่มน่ะ” (It has to be Platinum, you know?)

I said yes and told him I was getting it out of the wallet right now if he could just wait.

Then that piece of little human shit shouted back at us:

“มีกับเค้าด้วยหรอ” (Like you? Have a Platinum?)

That was it. I got out of the car and was ready to stunt his sorry face.

“Who do you think you are? What’s wrong with asking politely? There’s no need to be rude and insulting.”

“อะไร ดูถูก ผมไม่เข้าใจ” (Insulting? What’s that? I don’t know what it means.)

“A human like you don’t know what insulting means?”

Then out of the most ignorant randomness ever he stared at me in the eye and said.

“ผมเคยเป็นทหารนะ รู้มั๊ย” (I was a soldier, OK?”)

Haha. At home, army cadets wash drive our car and do gardening.

So I pointed to his ironed on badge on this chest, so close almost poking it, and said,

“Well, can you read this? It says you’re just a parking lot security guard, now. What are you gonna do to me huh, yaam?”

Since the ban on using the mobile in the car is getting serious, so I thought I'd get one of those Bluetooth headsets so I can look like I'm talking to myself.

Heck who am I kidding? I was actually just walking around Emporium when I spotted this awesomely pink thing that comes in an even pinkier necklace case.

So I wanted it. I asked to try to pair it with my BlackBerry first but they said no. But I could exchange or get refunded if it didn't work after I paid for it so I did.

Then I asked them to open it.

This quirky sales guy, probably fresh out of college, came to “assist” me. Obviously in charge of this mobile accessory section as he was the one the cashier girl called over to help me set up.

After taking over 5 minutes to open the case, he finally got it out and tried to turn it on. He pressed a button on its back and said to me, "can you search for its signal now?"

OK I'm no Steve Jobs but anybody would know if the bluetooth headset isn't flashing some signal, it is NOT "on". It was just cracked out of its packaging how could it even have battery in it at all.

"Oh no this model comes with a battery."

Then, excuse me, what is that bundle of wires lodged at the bottom of the package with something that looks like a charger?

"I don't think your phone has the bluetooth turned on"

Of course it’s always my fault. So I thought to myself. I'm gonna be calm. I'm gonna wait and see how this absurdity unfolds.

"Oh yeah sorry maybe it needs to be charged because there's a charger here. "

Well, duh.

So there he went, charging for another 5 minutes and came back with a know-it-all smile.

He held down the button. There was a glimpse of flashing LCD then poof! it went off again.

"I think it's on now. Can you search again?"

No it wasn't on and he didn't believe me. So I searched for the signal in front of his face and there was no "iTech Bluetooth".

Finally convinced that maybe he didn't really know much about what he was doing, he called his supervisor on the phone.

"Oh it has to have flashing blue and red lights? Oh you don't have to press the button down?"

Sigh.

Then came the most tech-intelligence revealing answer ever from this so called electronics dept sales person. He didn't even turn to me and ask. He just took one look and probably thought what he was saying next would be the most interesting thing he'd have said all day. He was probably asked by the supervisor what phone I was using and he just proudly blurted out and said,

"Oh she's using the iPhone."

Like kill me.

Thanks for that call otherwise I would still be standing there waiting for that guy to try to act like he knows what he's doing with this electronic device thing. So yeah, I finally got it paired now it was time to test it.

I put the piece in my ear and held up my BlackBerry keying in my mom's number to test the call, then he approached me with his phone and said,

"Can I have your number so we can test call?"

Please shoot me.

~

Sent via BlackBerry® from AIS