Thursday, April 22, 2010

UPS Sucks Most :)

I just got screwed over by UPS - as I have been a few times before.  In short - I have never ever experienced UPS to deliver anything on the promised and "guaranteed" time (guarantee in UPS marketing lingo means nothing really).

As an interesting experiment I did a bit of Google research.  First DHL (which I always had good experiences with):


Ok - so around 101000 results on that one.  Let's try FedEX:


It would appear as if FedEX suck 4 times more than DHL.  Finally let us try UPS:


Yes - UPS sucks nearly 9 times more than DHL.

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Funny Business Strategy

Just had quite a funny conversation in Low Yat.  First I should probably take a second to explain what Plaza Low Yat is.  It is the biggest IT shopping mall in Kuala Lumpur.  Something like 6 floors with nothing but IT related products.  The problem is and have always been that they got 2-300 shops selling EXACTLY the same at EXACTLY the same price.  Not a single shop there has got anything out of the ordinary and I am fairly sure that they all use the same one or two suppliers.

I have for a while been on the lookout for Hauppauge's HD-DVR (a video capture device).  For some reason however, Hauppauge have completely disappeared from all the shops, so this have turned out to be a bit tricky.

One shop in Low Yat specializes in AV equipment, it is even called Ace AV Solution (yes solution - not solutions).  I asked the owner of this shop and he just went "no, don't have lah".  Naive as I am I tried to push it a bit, going: "Well, you're supposed to know about AV equipment, why don't you get?" and his response was that he was so busy.  I asked him: Is business good at the moment and he went: "Oh no, business no good lah".  My final comment was something along the line of: "Well, perhaps if you bothered calling your uncle in Singapore and have him ship up the product that I am willing to buy you would make more money".

Needless to say that nobody in Malaysia could be bothered, so I just ordered it from Amazon.

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Lunch Deal (?) in Changkat Bukit Bintang

No matter how many years I spend in Malaysia I will never understand why it seems perfectly acceptable here to cheat your customers and treat them as if they were idiots.

I just went out for lunch and was walking along Changkat Bukit Bintang when I passed Twenty-One.  Twenty-One is the kind of place I would normally never visit.  I seriously dislike that kind of fancy looking places that tends to be all makeup and very very little substance.  But in this case my eye caught an add for their lunch deal that really appeared quite reasonable at first.

The lunch menu is kind of Italian inspired with some pasta dishes and a sandwich or two. Prices ranging from 9++ to 16++ including one drink (they had different choices) and this is - in that area (or anywhere else for that matter) quite a good deal.

I ordered a Pesto Chicken Sandwich with Ice Lemon Tea for 9 Ringgit (+5 % government tax, + 10 % service "tax").  Here is what that looked like (after I had one bite - didn't occur to me to snap a picture before as I was pretty hungry).




Not bad for 9++ Ringgit - not bad at all - that is until a bit later.  Unfortunately at this point the experience went downhill quickly.  The waiter - who was by the way very nice, attentive and polite - asked me if I wanted another drink and I accepted one more Ice Lemon Tea.

It is important for me to stress that while drinking my second Ice Lemon Tea I actually wrote mk. I of this post - and that was all high praise and full recommendation from my part.  Unfortunately my opinion changed a lot when I was presented with the bill:


WTF!  They charge me 9 Ringgit for a lunch INCLUDING ice lemon tea and then they have the fucking nerve to charge me 10 for an ice lemon tea without the set lunch.  I asked the waiter why they didn't just serve me two set lunches in that case, and he said that sure they would if I had ordered it.  Well prick, call me naive if you must, but since I felt quite good about the experience up to that point, I just didn't imagine they would be that big cheats.

Twenty-One managed - over five minutes - to go from a place I would have highly recommended to a place I would encourage everybody to avoid - simply because they are complete assholes and find it acceptable to cheat their customers.  That I cannot stand and will not accept.

No wonder they say thanks on their bill - but I would recommend the following change:


In short - avoid the place!  When I left, the waiter said: "see you again soon".  Well, I wouldn't bet on that if I were you!

Monday, April 5, 2010

Get Your Priorities Straight

A "friend" of mine just emailed me one of those quite sick Japanese spy-cam clips of girls getting their top pulled off and groped in public.  Now, they are pretty sick and boring, but one thing struck me big time.  All those girls where sms'ing when it happened and not one - not one - dropped her phone.  Incredible.