The Last Jollibee Delivery. Ever.

Is there no refuge left for the concept of truth in advertising? I'm talking to you, Jollibee.

(Photo courtesy of worldstopbrands.com)

You have made it a point to be THE Filipino brand to aspire to, emulate, look up to. Your numerous awards seem to testify to your success. (I was planning to list your awards here in my post but when I looked at your website, you had too many awards to even fit here.)

How is it that you achieved all those, yet cannot deliver a basic promise? The use of the term deliver is deliberate because that is precisely what this post is about: your delivery service.

I should qualify it as your horrible, inept, and inexcusable-given-your-reputation delivery service.

In all your advertisements, posters and other publicity materials, you advertise this service as "30 Minutes Guaranteed". On the few occasions that we call your service, you have always been late and are never on time. 

We have received numerous "200 pesos gift certificates" from you, as this is your self-imposed "punishment" for being late, with regards to your 30 minute guarantee. And always, without fail, your riders have an excuse to rationalize their way out of giving the certificates: the order was dispatched late, the building was too confusing, he ran out of gas, etc.

None of those excuses can be attributed to the customer. You yourselves announced the 30 minute guarantee, it is your obligation to see it through, or the DTI should bar you from placing those guarantees in your promotional materials, and no one else should be blamed for it. Don't blame the roads, the building, or the cat...what's next, the dog ate our orders?

We recently (and might I add, foolishly) ordered breakfast meals, calling 87-000.

We placed the order around 9AM. This was confirmed by your call center because the last one - out of 4 call center agents I talked to for this single transaction - gave me a rundown of the important times. She said the order was listed as being received at 9:01AM.

The first call center agent - the one who received and placed our order - mentioned that there was a technical glitch of sorts - I didn't really care to hear the specifics - and the 30 minute guarantee would now be replaced with a 45 Minute Guarantee or we would get the 200 pesos gift certificate. ( I actually appreciated the fact that she said it upfront.)

9:49 AM

I call up the second call agent to confirm the time, and she said it was 9:49 AM already. That is 3 minutes already apart from the 45 minute guarantee, but I am not unreasonable, I wasn't planning to ask for the certificates, even though I was entitled to - provided the order was given that very instant. The agent then said she would ask the store assigned to our area - MCS or Makati Cinema Square - to call us up and update us on the status of the order.

No such call came.

10:15 AM

I call up the third call center agent, asking first for the time (10:15AM), and I ask her where our orders are and why hasn't anyone from the MCS Branch called us to advise us of what was happening. She said that she would place this in a feedback form and would again ask the manager of the MCS Branch to call to advise us. Again, I am a reasonable person, I know the call center is not to blame, as they are only transmitting the orders and not the ones actually preparing the orders.

No such call came.

10:34 AM

I call up the fourth call center agent, asking for the time (10:34AM). I repeat my questions but this time letting her know through my voice as well as my words that I am not happy with what was going on. She repeated the same spiel: feedback form, and she would ask the MCS Manager to call.

I said, "Look, two of you from the call center already said that they would ask the manager to call, and no one has called us yet to advise us what was going on. You are my third followup and the fourth call center agent I have talked to in a span of two hours. I will need your name this time so I can factually check up on who called at what time and why is that branch manager not responding."

She gave her name and wanted to drop the phone as quickly as possible, I could tell, as she began slurring her words, talking too fast.

10:42 AM (By My Laptop Time)

Food arrives. I tell Arthur that he should probably talk to the delivery rider lest I say or do something inappropriate because of my frustration.

Still no call from the branch manager at this point.

When Arthur comes back in, he has a frown/grimace combination on his face, and I knew the ordeal wasn't over.

The driver relays that the computer system is down in MCS and that they were doing things manually, accounting for the delay in all the orders. So Arthur was ready to pay, getting our orders, and when he asked the rider for the gift certificates, since we were obviously way out of the 45 minute guarantee, he replies:

Naubusan kami ng gift certificates, eh. (We ran out of gift certificates.)

Arthur gets the order, and tells the rider that he should get the gift certificates from the branch and give it to us because that's what Jollibee promised. Then and only then will we pay for the food.

As we were finishing our meal and discussing our incredulity of Jollibee's service (11AM by this point), the MCS Manager decides to call us.

Arthur asks what time the call center agent asked them to call us, and the reply was 10:01AM.

So Arthur says, "10:01 AM pa kayo inabisuhan na tawagin kami, ba't ngayon ka lang tumawag, 11AM na?" (You were advised to call us at 10:01 AM, why are you calling so late, at already 11 AM?)

The manager replies that it's because of the manual system, and everything is delayed.

So Arthur asks what the purpose of the call.

"We just want to inform you that your order is on the way."

I don't even know how to respond to this, and I'm glad Art fielded the call and not me. 

From 9:01AM, we waited until 10:42AM to have the food delivered to us.

Talked to 4 call center agents.

Three of them told me we would get a call from the branch, none came.

The rider had no gift certificates.

The manager calls up at 11AM to tell us our "food is on the way", when we were almost done eating.

And to top it off, some of our orders were missing.

This is YOUR idea of "World Class" Service, Jollibee?!?