Dear Editor,

Is customer still king? That was the mantra all businesses in Jamaica should go by as they do in other parts of the world. Maybe this will elicit better customer service.

Pizza Hut in May Pen is a newly opened restaurant with freshly trained staff, but in my opinion the worst customer service. I cannot identify the workers by name seeing they were not wearing name tags.

Recently I went with a cast from a local drama group to celebrate having done well in our recent live production at the May Pen Baptist Church in Clarendon. To begin with, the security, instead of helping with the door when persons are exiting with boxes of pizza, and greeting incoming customers, was seen leaning on the wall behind the barricades for the line to the cashier.

The cashier was most unpleasant! She had a filthy attitude, despite me trying to crack a joke, thinking that she was just having a bad day.

We ordered three ‘Amazing 4’ pizzas to feed some 20 people. Not knowing the number of slices that come in the large pizza, we assumed it was eight. We asked the cashier, but she did not respond.

We attempted to order another, seeing that we were short on slices. When the first three came we decided to cancel the fourth immediately as the order was placed. The cashier was blue with rage. I had to beg her to do the refund before the pizza was made, despite them having one person on ‘make’ station, and the second was four tickets ahead.

She reluctantly went for the manager, whom I begged for additional napkins. She said they only issue two napkins with each large pizza and that is company’s policy. I continued to explain our situation and that we would like the cast to have napkins. She said the best she could do was offer six additional napkins. We stared at the pack of napkins on the counter and had several thoughts. Among them, this is ridiculous!

I cannot be spending $2,000 on one pizza with 12 slices and receive two napkins. There is no logic behind the policy because they issued us 20 single-use plastic cups, but refuse to issue biodegradable napkins.

I went to the neighbouring KFC to beg some napkins and told them that we had a large group. The server gave me a handful of over 17 napkins. No questions asked!

I went back to the server to show her that I had to go to KFC for napkins when we were dining with them. One worker attempted to tell me she was just following the policy while the laced-face cashier decided to neglect the customer she was with to take me on. She belted, “Annuh KFC dis, annuh KFC dis!” She didn’t even know that the two restaurants are franchises of the same company, Restaurants of Jamaica limited.

Thank you for saving the evening, KFC.

The point of this letter is to lodge a formal complaint about terrible customer service that Jamaicans are facing. People in management who are making these policies are inconsiderate of their customers. This cannot be.

Customer service in Jamaica needs to change and customers must be valued. Customers ought to be respected as a part of our 2030 vision if we intend to make Jamaica the place of choice to live, work, raise families, and do business. Standards must be set against exploitation and to ensure decent customer service and our right to redress.

NN

Clarendon