NTUC Fairprice promises to investigate after staff is criticised for not being able to understand English
SINGAPORE: NTUC Fairprice has promised to conduct a thorough investigation after an employee at an outlet’s seafood booth allegedly butchered a customer’s order after not being able to understand the English language.
The disgruntled customer, TikTok influencer Datin Amy Tashiana, visited the FairPrice outlet at City Square Mall on Tuesday (21 Mar) to get some fresh seafood and encountered a Chinese employee who was unable to comprehend what she was ordering. The employee, whom Amy claims is a Chinese national, only spoke in Mandarin and could not understand anything in English.
Amy had instructed the employee to descale and clean the fish, and also remove the fins. However, due to the language barrier, she received the fish in a condition which was not what she had asked for.
Amy approached a FairPrice team leader about the matter, who defended the employee saying that she has trouble communicating. Amy replied that the staff was unable to communicate at all, therefore not making her a right fit to work there.
The team leader accompanied Amy back to the fish booth and helped to explain how the customer wanted the fish to be cut. But Amy said she again received a subpar product as the staff had entirely cut off the tail of the fish, instead of cutting off the fins like she wanted.
Amy told The Independent Singapore: “With all prices increased everywhere and got such service, especially in NTUC so I had decided to publish the video.”
NTUC Fairprice has responded to press queries and revealed that it is aware of the incident and the video. The labour movement-linked supermarket chain acknowledged that Amy could have had a better shopping experience and promised to conduct a probe into the issue.
Inviting Amy to contact the organisation to provide more details, NTUC Fairprice said that they run training programmes on food preparation, safety and cleaning to ensure employees have the skills and knowledge to handle and prepare food safely.
It added that customers can return or exchange unsatisfactory fresh food products at the same branch they bought the products from, under its ‘Freshness Guaranteed’ measure, by presenting their receipts.
While NTUC Fairprice promised do its best to give all customers a pleasant shopping experience, it reminded customers that they are also expected to provide mutual respect to their employees.
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