Buying a new phone at Singtel's Hallo Shop
I had my grievances
with Singtel before. So heading
to Singtel's Hello shop on a Friday evening 20:40 (twenty minutes before
they close) didn't seem like a good idea to conclude an relaxed Thai dinner.
Anyway Ida needed a phone replacement and we didn't find time during the
week. When you browse Singtel's store you keep remarkably undisturbed.
Undisturbed to a point where you could call it neglected. There were a
lot of phones on display and a rather pathetic kiosk system that didn't
really help to narrow down choices. Anyway if you want to make a transaction
to get a queue ticket and have to wait for the counter to call you up.
So we picket a ticket and were browsing the selection while waiting. Hint to Singtel: make it less confusing and provide a phone finder: select a model and show where it is exhibited. Also provide some good find and comparison features.
When it was our turn a young woman (salesman 8190) attended to us. She first asked if we already had a model in mind. Since this wasn't the case she helped us to narrow down the choices based on criteria she established with a few easy questions: No more Samsung (the 2 year old Samsung couldn't even associate pictures with numbers), flat design - no clamshell, good camera, 3G, big numbers and small enough to fit into Ida's hands. She used a external website (seems Singtel's own wasn't as feature rich) to compare various models. She even discussed upcoming models with us to make sure, that it wouldn't make sense just to wait a little longer. Once we narrowed our choice to 3 models she actually got 3 boxed with the original phones, so Ida could weight them and feel the keys and balance. There was quite some price span in the models, so one would expect the more expensive models would get all the praise. Not here. The sales girl used solely our criteria to match it to the phones regardless of price.
We settled on a Nokia 6280 in black. Once it was decided, despite the fact that we were well beyond closing time, she made the effort to copy all phone book entries from the Samsung (which would let go of entries only one by one) to the Nokia.
What a pleasant shopping experience. Can backoffice and support please take note?
So we picket a ticket and were browsing the selection while waiting. Hint to Singtel: make it less confusing and provide a phone finder: select a model and show where it is exhibited. Also provide some good find and comparison features.
When it was our turn a young woman (salesman 8190) attended to us. She first asked if we already had a model in mind. Since this wasn't the case she helped us to narrow down the choices based on criteria she established with a few easy questions: No more Samsung (the 2 year old Samsung couldn't even associate pictures with numbers), flat design - no clamshell, good camera, 3G, big numbers and small enough to fit into Ida's hands. She used a external website (seems Singtel's own wasn't as feature rich) to compare various models. She even discussed upcoming models with us to make sure, that it wouldn't make sense just to wait a little longer. Once we narrowed our choice to 3 models she actually got 3 boxed with the original phones, so Ida could weight them and feel the keys and balance. There was quite some price span in the models, so one would expect the more expensive models would get all the praise. Not here. The sales girl used solely our criteria to match it to the phones regardless of price.
We settled on a Nokia 6280 in black. Once it was decided, despite the fact that we were well beyond closing time, she made the effort to copy all phone book entries from the Samsung (which would let go of entries only one by one) to the Nokia.
What a pleasant shopping experience. Can backoffice and support please take note?
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Comments
Are they still running campaigns where they try to encourage hawker center operators to be nice to their customers, and speak proper English to people who obviously look like tourists?
I still love Singapore ... after all its a tropical island, allbeit with busy working bees instead of relaxed locals.
Posted by Slawek Rogulski At 13:52:10 On 05/22/2006 | - Website - |
However the Singtel shop was different. Once we got the idea, that service happens behind the queue ticket, things went nice. The sales girl attending to us was knowledgeable, knew about trends and fashions, knew where to find information that her employer didn't provide, did ask the right questions and didn't push for closure or a specific model. She even suggested, that if we felt the upcoming models would be a better fit to come back once they are available.
In short: her performance was world class and very pleasant. I also had the strong impression she did that because she actually enjoyed delivering this quality of service. And that was really outstanding for Singapore standards.
Posted by Stephan H. Wissel At 16:56:58 On 05/22/2006 | - Website - |
Posted by Slawek Rogulski At 20:12:16 On 05/22/2006 | - Website - |