Eshin Direct

What a crappy day to run around town trying to wade through red tape. I don’t own an umbrella because they are annoying contraptions and do little to protect against the HK downpours. The only thing I know that is reasonably effective is big massive golfing umbrella but that’s bordering on the anti-social. Anyone familiar with the HK shuffle (i.e. this inability to walk in a straight line) will know that when the umbrellas come out, it’s positvely dangerous being a pedestrian.

The banks in Hong Kong also continue to unimpress me. You’d think business was booming and the economy dandy with the approach that they take towards acquiring new customers, let alone retaining them. Again, one bank did this great lip service to customer service while slaughtering the sacred bull. Two “greeters” who don’t do much apart from directing you to which ever queue you wish to spend your morning in. For business services, one bank had a desk and no queue to speak of. Being there was sometimes like watching a free for all.

And the HK folks have a go at the Mainlanders for not being able to grasp the concept of queuing.

Evidently not enough staff to deal with the influx of customers, which led to some comical situations of actually resolving customer issues in the queue. Of course, not so comical when it’s your business they are discussing out in the open. I regret that my initial encounter with one of the bank’s staff led me to snap at her during my query. When I followed up with her, another customer snapped at her in the way that only gweilos seem to ingratiatingly do. I realise I was wrong to snap at her since bad customer service can never be rectified by people barking complaints at people. If I really wanted to change something then things are usually taken on board more when you do it in a constructive way. Me mother taught me that a smile always helps.

It dawned on me that most customer service training and execution is pretty much like the “Irashaimasu” that gets screamed to you by every employee when you walk into Genki sushi. For those who don’t know Japanese, it means “Welcome!” and is customarily shouted at you in Japan when you enter a retail place or restaurant by that establishment’s staff. Here in HK, they do that in Genki sushi which is a Japanese chain. In most big places, it isn’t heartfelt and the people shouting “Welcome” neither care to welcome you nor do you feel particularly welcomed. Again, it’s because someone told ‘em to shout it out because it’s the done thing.

Lack of sincerity is often worse than doing nothing at all in my opinion.

But then you aren’t really in Genki sushi for the service.

Oh quit moaning Eshin, I hear you cry. I will because I have to sing the praises of the folks where I bought me Apple computer – Designer Group in Windsor House 12th Floor. Apart from waiting a week for my particular machine (I blame Apple for this), they’ve were actually very helpful. They’ve got nice seats to sit in while you wait and there’s even a coffee machine, although I guarantee you’ll be checking out the cool stuff they’ve got for Apples. What impressed me though was that I asked about anti-virus software and they actually recommended me not to use it on my OS. They said this even when a whole row of Norton Anti-virus boxes was staring me in the face. How’s that for an honest answer? If I went to Wan Chai I know I’d just be sold the anti-virus software and left to my own devices.

Now I’m not sure whether I can do without an anti-virus software of any sort but hey, it’s refreshing to see genuine customer service. That was the high point of my day.

That, and the impression I got that the bank manageress was sort of flirting with me at the end of our discussion.