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Pizza Hut in China Severely Lacking in Customer Service Skills
By Fred Andrews
As a foreigner living in China I have experienced first hand the meaning of "culture shock". One big thing I have noticed about living here is the HUGE lack of customer service. One would think that going to a western restaurant chain like Pizza Hut that you would experience a slightly higher level of customer service. I recently found out that not to be true. We ordered a half and half pizza. One half was deluxe which included pepperoni and a few other ingredients. The other half was just blank but we requested pepperoni to be added. The last time we went to this Pizza Hut we ordered the exact same pizza except they forgot to put the pepperoni on the blank half. I specifically told the waitress that this happened last time so to be sure and write CLEARLY what this pizza was supposed to be like. You can guess what happened! Yep! No pepperoni again on that side! Normally one would be very angry at such incompetence but after living here for 2.5 years I just laugh now. I think I have become numb or something because this stuff seems to happen daily. Anyways, they took the pizza away to remake it and it came back correct the 2nd time. Now here's where the customer service goes down the tube. When the bill came they billed a full 9 RMB (chinese currency) for the extra pepperoni topping on the blank half. However 9 RMB is the price for pepperoni on a WHOLE pizza. Logic, of course, dictates that if a topping is put on half a pizza then the price should also be half as only half of the product is being used. This has never been a problem at Papa Johns Pizza which is also here. So this expectation is by no means a cultural difference. I called the waitress over to explain that the 9 RMB charge wasn't fair because the pepperoni was only put on half the pizza. Now here's where things get annoying. The waitress proceeds to try and spit out mindless excuses, of which she has no idea. Her first explanation was that the cook put pepperoni on the whole pizza. I had to explain to her that the other "deluxe" half already comes with pepperoni, so it's not fair to charge for an ingredient that is already included in that half of the pizza. Once I shot that ridiculous excuse down in flames she proceeds to try again by saying the cook put twice the amount of pepperoni all on the one half. Again a complete farse because there was about 1 pepperoni per slice of pizza on that half, by no means a double serving. This is the type of thing one experiences on a regular basis in China. People spit out mindless information that they have no idea about. For some reason saying or admitting that you "don't know" is unacceptable. Instead it's better to make yourself look like a liar or a cheater by spitting out ridiculous unfounded junk? I don't know why, but that's just the way it is here. This is by no means an isolated incident let me assure you. I realized I was wasting my time talking to the waitress as it was unlikely she had the authority to edit the bill, so I asked for the manager. I tried using the logic of mathematics to explain to her what a "half" is etc. By this time I was angry so I know I was being condescending and insulting, I do admit. However, I was completely right and I was losing my patience. The manager wasn't budging. I asked her if she really was so stupid that she wouldn't be willing to sacrifice 4.5 RMB for the sake of keeping a customer happy? Would she prefer to defend her 4.5 RMB at the expense of the 1000s if not 10,000s of RMB that we would spend over the next few years of living in China? Does she really want us to boycott the restaurant and never come back? Turns out yes, she was that stupid. To make matters worse after my friend paid (she was treating us and decided to give up) the manager came back and yelled something AT ME. I didn't quite understand (my chinese isn't perfect), I was just in shock that anyone would be SO lacking in customer service so as to actually yell back at a customer. WOW ! So there you have it. Customer service here is nothing compared to back home. Even if I was wrong (which I wasn't - other pizzerias here have no problem with charging half for ingredients on half a pizza), back home the restaurant wouldn't be stupid enough to sacrifice a customer's future business for the sake of a couple of dollars, even if the customer is wrong. But things aren't like that here. Some how that logic doesn't exist here. |
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Thank you for sharing this well written intel, Fred. Customer service should be one of the most important functions of any business.
Keep up the good work.
Best wishes.
Frederick
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