It is easy to get used to how the
wonderful return process work in the USA. In most of the stores that we
frequented in the USA such as Costco and Kohl’s, the return policy was very
lenient. Costco pretty much took everything back no questions asked while
Kohl’s allowed returning as long as you had the receipt. In fact, even online
shopping options such as Amazon.com have fairly lenient return policies. The
only place we hesitated to return stuff in the USA was Walmart where although
the returns itself usually went smooth, one had to deal with a long line.
Returns are still very much a
foreign concept in India. Although retail store staff generally claim items can
be returned if not used, in a practical sense, they make it very hard to do it.
In some cases, retail stores even attempt to misguide you in such a way that
you loose your return privileges. This is what we experienced with our first
and last shopping experience at Kalyan Silks: We shopped for a silk sari at
Kalyan Silks, Ernakulam and mentioned clearly upfront that we were shopping for
a sari that is going to be a gift. I checked the ‘what-if’ scenario – should
the selection fail to please the receiver. Kalyan Silks informed me that the
return policy is very generous (exchange to another item of like value) as
customer satisfaction is a high priority with Kalyan Silks. The staff checked
our price range and helped us arrive at a decision without hurrying us. We even
enjoyed complimentary coffee while waiting for the bill. So far, so good…
The ‘what-if’ scenario proved true and we went
to exchange the item with the receipt and the promotional gift intact to
facilitate an easy exchange. The staff confirmed the exchange policy again.
Imagine my dismay when the Showroom Manager informed me that Kalyan Silks policy
does not allow return of a sari if the blouse piece is detached. I protested
for I had neither detached anything nor had asked anybody to detach anything.
The Showroom Manager pointed out the following:
- The staff is trained to obtain customer permission prior to detaching a blouse piece.
- There is no resale value for such an item from Kalyan Silks point of view.
In this time and era, when a
customer is spoilt for choices, if the above response is the best a Manager can
muster as response to appease a customer, they have quite a long way to go to
reach anywhere near US standards. We left after seeking input on how to give
feedback online. They provided a couple of email addresses reluctantly. We
gathered a few other email addresses by searching online and sent out an email
elaborating on our experience. Surprise, surprise – every single one of these
emails bounced saying “mailbox quota exceeded” or some such message – oh, well…
Last Updated: 05/2012.
No comments :
Post a Comment