First time we took MAS Firefly and unbelievably, the staffs are very friendly and easily approachable. The cabin staffs were helpful and courteous. Felt very comfortable traveling with Firefly.
The only bad experience would be the pre-flight booking procedure and the rigid policy not allowing change of name on the ticket. I am not apt in the security procedures involving passenger travels by flight -especially after post9-11, so I'm guessing that the difficulty in asking for simple name change could be due to security procedure. Otherwise would be unacceptable to me.
Friday, May 31, 2013
Monday, May 13, 2013
Firefly updates - amendment to flight information
Tried the ticketing office again to inquire about amendment to flight information. Our helper no longer work for us and we had to change name for a replacement helper on the ticket.
The staff informed us that name change on the ticket is no longer permitted. When pressed for suggestion or alternative, there is none - suggesting that the ticket we are holding is as good as garbage.
I called CASE Singapore to ask about protection under Lemon law. Unfortunately, Lemon law covers only goods but not services.
All in all, consumers are left handicapped in a lopsided airline vs consumer deal.
The staff informed us that name change on the ticket is no longer permitted. When pressed for suggestion or alternative, there is none - suggesting that the ticket we are holding is as good as garbage.
I called CASE Singapore to ask about protection under Lemon law. Unfortunately, Lemon law covers only goods but not services.
All in all, consumers are left handicapped in a lopsided airline vs consumer deal.
M'sia airline Firefly, "your call is important to us", that is why...
I'm being put on hold for > 30 min with constant advertisement announcement on the background with firefly music to deal with. It sort of adding fuel to fire for being made to wait that long.
In comparison to calling other ticketing numbers, the latter's call went through faster. Unfortunately, to make amendments to your booking, they directed us to call the "important" call center (+60378454543).
Your call is important to us, our agent is unavailable being repeated several times and adverts announcement being included in the waiting tone fumes me...
If indeed customer's calls are important, the company should have placed more emphasis on receiving these calls. Failure to do so only reflect how important these calls are to them.
In comparison to calling other ticketing numbers, the latter's call went through faster. Unfortunately, to make amendments to your booking, they directed us to call the "important" call center (+60378454543).
Your call is important to us, our agent is unavailable being repeated several times and adverts announcement being included in the waiting tone fumes me...
If indeed customer's calls are important, the company should have placed more emphasis on receiving these calls. Failure to do so only reflect how important these calls are to them.
Friday, May 10, 2013
Re: 5 reason to avoid Singapore?
http://voices.yahoo.com/five-reasons-not-travel-singapore-south-6691622.html
Come on. You should have written a more believable piece. Then it would have been commendable.
2 days for someone who admitted never been to Singapore is sufficient to form such elaborate perception? Unbelievable....
In my opinion, you had a bias to begin with. You knew about the political scene in Singapore, you knew about the author who is being charged in court, you knew about all things else (very likely, from your reads about Singapore).
You are being unfair to your readers who assumed that you had a good piece to share about what genuine 5 reasons that made you didn't want to visit Singapore in a short time as 2 days.
Only after reading the whole piece that it occurred to me that you were unfair, partial and subjective in this writing.
Wasted my time looking to find an interesting story here... What you did was regurgitating other people's perception about Singapore with a bit of "genuine" first time visit to the country.
I hope you will improve on your next piece for the sake of preserving your integrity as a writer.
If you wish to stick to your biased view on Singapore, do the courtesy to change the title to, "5 reasons I dislike Singapore".
Come on. You should have written a more believable piece. Then it would have been commendable.
2 days for someone who admitted never been to Singapore is sufficient to form such elaborate perception? Unbelievable....
In my opinion, you had a bias to begin with. You knew about the political scene in Singapore, you knew about the author who is being charged in court, you knew about all things else (very likely, from your reads about Singapore).
You are being unfair to your readers who assumed that you had a good piece to share about what genuine 5 reasons that made you didn't want to visit Singapore in a short time as 2 days.
Only after reading the whole piece that it occurred to me that you were unfair, partial and subjective in this writing.
Wasted my time looking to find an interesting story here... What you did was regurgitating other people's perception about Singapore with a bit of "genuine" first time visit to the country.
I hope you will improve on your next piece for the sake of preserving your integrity as a writer.
If you wish to stick to your biased view on Singapore, do the courtesy to change the title to, "5 reasons I dislike Singapore".
Thursday, May 2, 2013
Overpopulation: super long queues at NTUC (and others)
It's time. Adopt technology to alleviate long queues at check outs. Allow existing counters to cater for certain shoppers, but instal automated checkout booths for tech savvy shoppers.
When you have more people adopting the tech, then slowly decrease the old fashioned counters.
Although I still prefer person-to-person interaction, it's just not doable in a megacity. We hardly have time to say hello at check out counters here, due to long queues and exhausted cashiers (who dealt with God-knows-how-many customers per day).
So, when will NTUC (or other shopping malls) implement more self checkout booths all over the country to alleviate long queues?
When you have more people adopting the tech, then slowly decrease the old fashioned counters.
Although I still prefer person-to-person interaction, it's just not doable in a megacity. We hardly have time to say hello at check out counters here, due to long queues and exhausted cashiers (who dealt with God-knows-how-many customers per day).
So, when will NTUC (or other shopping malls) implement more self checkout booths all over the country to alleviate long queues?
Tuesday, April 30, 2013
If government wants to impose on maid (domestic helper) industry...
Just consider overtaking (or get involved) in the industry. Don't just throw policies at it and sit back waiting for another opportunity to introduce additional policies (only when something goes awry).
In my opinion, most of the policies in place protects helpers rather than both parties. This could have been a direct consequence of few cases of mistreatment (if not abuse) of helpers by irresponsible employers; but the blanket policies affects all employers (to the extent of being seen as skewed towards more protection to helpers than employers).
Not all households with maids are rich. Most of them have both working parents (with kids). It is a need, rather than want. So please don't assume households with maids are spoilt (and hence a tendency by government to wean this habit).
Cost of living in Singapore is high. It needs both parents working to lead a comparable comfortable lives as Singapore's neighbours. To own a home of two bedrooms (2+1) is not an easy task. To care for a kid is not an easy task. To care for elders are not easy task (considering the ripple effect of previous single child policy leaving most older generations with just a kid or two).
Is it possible for a household earning sgd 3k or less to break away from being at the lower rung of society? There is no saving (how can this household invest other than via cpf?), no free medical care etc... if even a single member of this household is afflicted by cancer or accident (needing surgery), the whole of the family's bank savings would be exhausted (hence there is mentality that if you are sick here, it's better to just die fast). Talk about insurance, the premium for whole household cost how much? How encompassing is the coverage (or how efficient is the buffer to prevent depleting a household's saving comes disaster)? How many households with sgd 3k or less have all their family members covered? Can a single medisave (from a single parent working) covers four or more family members (being considered here are older gen, spouse, and next gen)?
If there is kiasu mentality in Singapore, it is due to environmental factor triggering to the innate mechanism for survival and hence a behavioural changes catered for "fighting for survival". To propel next gen to leave the lower rung of society, both parents need to work in order to achieve this. That is a sacrifice from a family unit who planned for having kids and who planned ahead for their children's education. We are this type of family unit (although I realise there are other types who are more laid back).
Now, when we lament that less families nowadays are having kids, what are the problems or circumstances leading to this? Are they spoilt because these households only want handouts from national coffer? Could dangling more carrots help?
In my perspective, if you subject family units to a less conducive environment to have kids - you get just that... less kids. No matter how much extrinsic factors (e.g. viagra, good mood music, delicious food, or carrots etc.), you just get a short-term placebo effect. Once these subjects realise it's not working, they revert (or remit) to original state.
It's just too darn stressful to have kids. Who in their right mind would want to subject innocent children to stressful environment?
More returning to maid (aka domestic helper). Governments of countries catering domestic helpers are doing the right thing to protect their maids from being taken advantage by middlemen (aka agency). Not all agencies are bad, but some are and measures are taken to help prevent helpers from exploitation. Good for them.
In comparison, Singapore is not helping protect employers (aka households) from being victimized. To as salt to injury, why are we being imposed levy when the cost of having maid is getting higher and higher due to measures taken to protect helpers. Shouldn't Singapore be protecting needy households as well? Don't be misled by sensational news about the NS brat being pampered to the extent that his NS bag was carried by his maid. Instead, act on information based on statistics. I dare you to disprove that majority of households took maid for wants rather than needs.
In my opinion, most of the policies in place protects helpers rather than both parties. This could have been a direct consequence of few cases of mistreatment (if not abuse) of helpers by irresponsible employers; but the blanket policies affects all employers (to the extent of being seen as skewed towards more protection to helpers than employers).
Not all households with maids are rich. Most of them have both working parents (with kids). It is a need, rather than want. So please don't assume households with maids are spoilt (and hence a tendency by government to wean this habit).
Cost of living in Singapore is high. It needs both parents working to lead a comparable comfortable lives as Singapore's neighbours. To own a home of two bedrooms (2+1) is not an easy task. To care for a kid is not an easy task. To care for elders are not easy task (considering the ripple effect of previous single child policy leaving most older generations with just a kid or two).
Is it possible for a household earning sgd 3k or less to break away from being at the lower rung of society? There is no saving (how can this household invest other than via cpf?), no free medical care etc... if even a single member of this household is afflicted by cancer or accident (needing surgery), the whole of the family's bank savings would be exhausted (hence there is mentality that if you are sick here, it's better to just die fast). Talk about insurance, the premium for whole household cost how much? How encompassing is the coverage (or how efficient is the buffer to prevent depleting a household's saving comes disaster)? How many households with sgd 3k or less have all their family members covered? Can a single medisave (from a single parent working) covers four or more family members (being considered here are older gen, spouse, and next gen)?
If there is kiasu mentality in Singapore, it is due to environmental factor triggering to the innate mechanism for survival and hence a behavioural changes catered for "fighting for survival". To propel next gen to leave the lower rung of society, both parents need to work in order to achieve this. That is a sacrifice from a family unit who planned for having kids and who planned ahead for their children's education. We are this type of family unit (although I realise there are other types who are more laid back).
Now, when we lament that less families nowadays are having kids, what are the problems or circumstances leading to this? Are they spoilt because these households only want handouts from national coffer? Could dangling more carrots help?
In my perspective, if you subject family units to a less conducive environment to have kids - you get just that... less kids. No matter how much extrinsic factors (e.g. viagra, good mood music, delicious food, or carrots etc.), you just get a short-term placebo effect. Once these subjects realise it's not working, they revert (or remit) to original state.
It's just too darn stressful to have kids. Who in their right mind would want to subject innocent children to stressful environment?
More returning to maid (aka domestic helper). Governments of countries catering domestic helpers are doing the right thing to protect their maids from being taken advantage by middlemen (aka agency). Not all agencies are bad, but some are and measures are taken to help prevent helpers from exploitation. Good for them.
In comparison, Singapore is not helping protect employers (aka households) from being victimized. To as salt to injury, why are we being imposed levy when the cost of having maid is getting higher and higher due to measures taken to protect helpers. Shouldn't Singapore be protecting needy households as well? Don't be misled by sensational news about the NS brat being pampered to the extent that his NS bag was carried by his maid. Instead, act on information based on statistics. I dare you to disprove that majority of households took maid for wants rather than needs.
Saturday, April 27, 2013
Changi airport, beware... no printer
Don't go to the airport leaving behind (or missing) printouts important for departure or else you will be stuck.
My maid had a printout for ICA clearance for her flight home. She handed the document along with her e-ticket. After check in, the document was no where to be found. Asked the staff at the desk for help as we had the pdf copy in our email. The only suggestion was go to service counter on the lower floor for printing because there is no service at Silk Air counters.
At the customer service centre, the staff needed the pdf on a thumbdrive for printing. We told her it's accessible in our email account and asked if there is any computer terminal with printer. There is none.
Asked for alternative; the staff suggested business centre at Crowne Plaza. Went for it and that didn't work.
We ended up missing the flight and had to pay penalty for no-show at ~SGD150. The next available flight is next day at 7.50am. Good, that mean we'll have to travel from far west to far east early in the morning with a year old baby just to send of our maid....
It's our mistake to have lost the printed document, but what irks me about the whole thing afterwards were the following:
- Can't the customer service help us with this simple request as to print a document? We are more than happy to pay nominal fee for the service...
- I can't believe that the whole of Changi airport is lacking a simple computer terminal with printer. Are you kidding us? At least provide a service counter with such access! What a disappointment.
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