China Esquire

I had spent about 3 weeks in China, traveling from Beijing to Shanghai, with a number of stops in between. After that, my wife and I headed to Hong Kong and Macau.

After spending this much time in China, Hong Kong reminded me much of the west when it came to one important aspect: customer service. ( Silicon Hutong wrote up something about service in Hong Kong a few months back) Imagine the difference where a waiter actually comes to serve you, as opposed to a restaurant or cafe where you need to call the waiter for anything. (Practice calling “fuyuan” in a loud voice) After finding service even at higher end Beijing and Shanghai establishments to be disappointing, Hong Kong was a breath of fresh air.

What surprised me was the level of customer service in Macau (a.k.a. Vegas in China). I expected the same. I was wrong. I spent some time at the Grand Lisboa, a fairly new hotel and casino run by SJM. I was fairly impressed by the multi-level casino there, as well as the fact that they had a separate Texas Hold ‘Em room. Other casinos only have mostly Bacarrat. (Caveat: I do not gamble at all) It’s very Vegas-like, and they even have Stanley Ho’s large 218 carat diamond on display there. Overall, I thought the place was very nice inside. (The outside reminds me of the Rio in Vegas and leaves something to be desired–the Sands and the Wynn were much more understated and classy)

We were eating a meal at the Noodle House at the Grand Lisboa. And apparently the restaurant has a policy: do not allow customers to keep bottled water on the tables. Even the water bottles that are provided by the Grand Lisboa hotel. Rationale? It doesn’t look nice and they want to keep an upscale image. (I also note that the restaurant isn’t really all that upscale and that it is a complete delusion) So what happened? The staff offered us hot water… or you pay for tea. Everyone opted for hot water except me. I preferred colder water. I was kindly poured a cup of hot water and asked to remove my bottle. Which I refused to do because I would have nothing to drink then.

As the meal came closer to an end and the water in my bottle was slowly diminishing, one of the staff had the bright idea that they could just take the bottle and throw it away. Right in front of me. Even after I glared at her a little for taking it. No apology. Nothing. Just the standard line, “you aren’t allowed to use a water bottle”.

I decided to do the American thing instead of the Chinese thing in response: I asked for the manager instead of allowing them to save face. And I told him that this was unacceptable customer service. He told me that everyone who didn’t want hot water could have opted for cold water. Funny, this wasn’t offered to me. And I let him know that. He said that it was my responsibility to request it. It wasn’t. That was something that should have been offered instead of bottle thievery. Lesson #1: do not blame your customers for poor customer service.

Once I pointed that out, he apologized and blamed the staff. It’s summer and the staff there are a lot of temporary workers–college students looking to earn money. And he attempted to distance himself from their error. I noted that it didn’t matter–this is supposed to be a first rate casino in Macau and that they were responsible for training all employees properly. Lesson #2: do not blame your staff for poor customer service, particularly if you didn’t train them properly.

The manager must’ve known that was a lame excuse. So he laid down what was the bottom line for him: the boss said no water bottles allowed. That’s why it was taken from me. And because the boss said no water bottles allowed, that’s why none were allowed. It didn’t matter that the staff didn’t offer any alternative. (Bill Dodson has done some posts on the lack of Chinese innovation, as well as other blogs–many note that there is a Chinese stubborn adherence to the orders of a superior without any desire to question or improve) He might as well have said, “this is the Chinese way.”

And so I told him, “you tell your supervisor that you either need to train people to offer cold water instead of taking water bottles away or tell him that they need to learn customer service–which is that the customer is always right.” I hope this manager told his boss my comments. I doubt he did.

Overall, I was pretty shocked at the lack of customer service in Macau. I expected this in China, but not in Macau. Sure, it was better than the mainland.  But that’s not saying much frankly.  If Macau wants to attract more foreigners, the casinos better learn to shape up.

Anyways, enough ranting…

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