Starhub vs TMNet

I went into an incidental Starhub vendor yesterday at Tiong Bahru, subscribed the student plan for 8Mbps broadband connection and return home beaming with the modem. The entire procedure? Smooth and slick... There is no stupid problems like "sorry, tak ada port kat you punya taman" or "tak ada port kenapa encik apply streamyx".

I was told that I will be able to access the internet by this morning, less than 24 hours...I plugged in the modem this morning, no signal and I called the service centre. The operator was very polite. He asked for some preliminary details and transferred my call to this highly enthusiastic technician who helped me troubleshoot the problem systematically and professionally in less than 10 minutes: Voila! I am good to go!

This, my friend, is what we call an excellent customer service and I rated 5 star! A result of open tender and competition among 3 giant telcos, which is unlikely to be found back in Bolehland. Moreover, 8Mbps for $32.10 vs 1Mbps for RM77, you do the maths. TMNet has so much to learn and a really long way to go...Nonetheless, here are some pointers that I hope our government-linked telco can humbly absorb for the benefit of millions Malaysian netizens, viz:

1. Upgrade current bandwidth to >2Mbps and consistently upgrade the speed in-line with the global trend. The world is forever moving forward and we should at least be at par if not more advanced.
2. Design more attractive plans (e.g. student plan) which suit different needs. And of course, with reasonable price.
3. Internal communication of the organization should be in sync. For example, the necessary facilities should be set up at the targeted residences before the marketing group send out their elite eagles to push for sales. As such, cases like this will not happen in future and in fact it shouldn't now.
4. Improve customer service in soft and hard skills. Technical competency is vital for successful remote troubleshooting. More importantly, please be polite instead of back-firing at the customers. I know that customer is not always right, but as a service provider, surely you should know that customer is king. Once, I had to shout out loud to embarass one of the customer service when I tried to understand how my father's internet bill in Johor was consolidated into mine "automatically" in the system and to check if they had double bill us. Instead of apologizing for the technical error, she mockingly asked me, " Ini hutang ayah you, you tak mau bayar ke?" I created a commotion and ranted about her stupid insultation and inefficiency, threw the money at her face and walked off and guess what? The Indian security guard opened the door for me and whispered in my ears,"Baguslah you bagi dia kau kau. Diorang nie memang slack."~wtf
5. Improve efficiency! This applies to all in the organization and the sub-contractors. I experienced waiting for more than 1 hour with just 3 person ahead of me. Why? Because 1 out of 3 counters is closed for no reason, the other two receptionists were chit-chatting while servicing their clients.
6. Do not outsource the hardware setup task to some bangla sub-contractor who may or may not turn up, or if he did turn up it's already so many months later. Please get someone profesional, qualified and trustworthy and to service us timely! My mom got a shock the other time when this sus barbatus suddenly appeared in front of our doorsteps with his toolbox, after months of our subscription. He looked as if he just woke up from a terrible hangover with messy hair, in his shorts and the best thing, he brought his 3-year old daughter. Of course, my mom wouldn't let him in.

These are some thoughts from my experience with TMNet. Come on, we are your most valuable assets, your CUSTOMER! We want to believe that you can do much better than this, just show us. Will you?

ps: some of the hate sites just for you, TMNet.
http://www.streamyxsucks.com/
http://geminigeek.com/blog/archives/2006/09/congratulations-streamyx-is-so-slow/

And suanie actually compiled a list of what the netizens have to say, LISTEN!!