- Joined
- Jan 18, 2010
- Messages
- 7,177
- Points
- 48
Do Sinkie really expect others to be a sitting duck while you complain every fuck thing and get away with it?
You make sure you can take it if it ever backfire before you complain.
You make sure you can take it if it ever backfire before you complain.
Full text:
The SingTel Sabotage
I lost my job, thanks to SingTel.
My friends will know that I have been making a lot of complaints on the SingTel Facebook page the past year. Over time, I have actually reduced my posts because I realised how futile it is.
Yet, on one very busy work day, I received a call from my boss. She asked if I had posted on SingTel’s Facebook page before, and I said yes. Then she went on to say that I have listed the agency as my workplace and it is shown on my profile. I was surprised, because I don’t even recall updating my profile work location. I don’t bring work into Facebook, so that caught me off guard.
Turns out she was right. SingTel complained about my posts to the higher-ups, and I am no longer allowed to work at that agency.
In one act of sabotage, SingTel has successfully cut an important source of my livelihood, and denied me work at a place I was happy in.
Something stinks about SingTel.
As it happens, and agency that I work at for quite some time now services the account. I realised only later that my work location as updated because of one ex-colleague. He added me as having ‘worked with’ him, and I okayed that because I thought it was a friendly gesture.
Turns out that that would be my only Facebook interaction with him. And yes, he worked on SingTel before.
To the agency I must apologize, because while I wanted my freedom to express my unhappiness with SingTel, it should not be associated with the agency. As a freelancer, I earn my keep from helping agencies solve creative problems, not cause them.
For me the line was very clear: I am a paying customer of SingTel, so when SingTel does not provide services as promised, I have the right to complain.
But for SingTel the line is as faulty as their reception, and it now looks like every one of their suppliers/vendors/agencies better watch out, because they will twist you into submission if you dare complain about them.
SingTel, I have an F-word for you.
That F-word is FEEDBACK. If you can't handle open feedback, don't put up a Facebook page.
I have basically endured most of the issues above, providing strongly-worded feedback on their Facebook page. And as far as I can recall, I did not resort to expletives until they did this:
SingTel used an automated voice advertisement.
Yes. They were too cheap to hire telemarketers. And inane in their brain enough to believe that any breathing human being would sign up after hearing an automated voice message trying to sell a product (which happens to be the awful AMPed). I received a call from a strange number that delivered just that. A pre-recorded spam from a telco I pay on time every month.
Few things get me as riled up as telemarketers who think it is okay to randomly waste other people’s time for their own profit. Now I get an automated one from a telco whom I am PAYING ON A MONTHLY BASIS.
And because I could not give direct feedback to an automated voice call, I hung up and posted angrily on their Facebook page.
And guess what. They had the cheek to send an automated SMS to push the same crappy product 1 minute after I hung up on them. To say I was furious would be barely scratching it.
If anyone must fault me for poor choice of words during that rage, I was just trying to drive it in their thick skull, since being civil didn’t seem to work out for them.
I am not alone in my complaints. Just go to the SingTel page (click ‘Posts by Others’) on any given day and there will be people complaining. Link here: https://www.facebook.com/singtel?filter=2
Why should I pay you, $ingTel?
I don’t work for you, SingTel. You’re supposed to work for me. My income does not come from you – I am hired for other accounts in that agency. Your income comes from paying customers, and I am one of them.
And yet, now I find that every SingTel user has to ask these questions:
- Is SingTel scouring through each and every Facebook user to see if they are affiliated with whoever is working for them?
- Are they sifting through your internet use right now?
- Why are they spending time backstabbing their customers instead of solving the many reception and operation issues that they have?
Every SingTel consumer needs to know that consumer protection is nearly non-existent in Singapore. When you don’t pay 100% of your bill they can cut your line and make you pay hefty penalties. Yet when they give you poor reception you still have to pay 100% of your phone bill.
Even when IDA, the governing authority, stepped in to address the poor reception issues, SingTel was given a fine so tiny that it could be earned back within a single hour. Not a single cent of that is going back to the customers. Since then I have decided not to post any more as it is pointless – until the job loss incident made me write this note.
A public closure.
This whole incident was a huge setback to me for several reasons. Other than substantial income loss, I missed out on the chance to keep working with my friends in that agency whom I have built rapport with. There were projects in there that I was actually looking forward to doing. In my last project there I even managed to sell through two sets of ideas which the client loved – but I will have no opportunity to follow through.
I fell into depression during this period.
Frankly, I’m not sure what good this note would do, but since Facebook is the medium which SingTel has cowardly stabbed me in the back with, I will use the same medium to reply – but in public.
Setting this to public means it would be seen by my current clients, and also affect future freelance possibilities. But I think I need that closure to close this chapter. If it means life diverts me to a different industry, I will go along.
So to my current clients: If you happen to read this: I hope that by now I have garnered enough work brownie points to survive what potential negative backlash that may come.
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To the agency: I am deeply apologetic to have unintentionally linked the agency to my comments. I really am commenting only as a SingTel customer.
To my friends: Those who supported me with words of encouragement, hugs, and righteous anger – I thank you all. It means a lot to me. For those of you who are my friends but still work in that agency, please do not like or share this post as it may be misconstrued as going against SingTel. It’s not worth it while you are there. I know I will become the scapegoat for many things and it will be more difficult, and I am sorry for that.
To the public: Be careful what you write on Facebook. If you must comment on SingTel’s horrid service, do it anonymously to protect yourself. Help me share this to warn your friends about how SingTel conducts its business against its customers. Thank you.
