Tuesday, August 19, 2008

December 23, 2006: One day trip to Singapore (Airport)

I had to make decision to go to Singapore to pick up the equipments for Margono Hospital. Selvi and I have monitored the shipments for the whole week.
Integra has done some mistakes!
My concern now is that Christmas is coming, people and office will have their holiday.
Even IndoExpress, our freight forwarder is off on Friday, Jan 22. Another change of plan then.
I asked them to prepare things before their day off so when I'm in Singapore nothing's gonna go wrong.

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So,

It's time to go to Singapore, pick up the goods, and deliver them to the hospital. I couldn't sleep the whole week thinking what will happen during my trip.

Once I arrived at Changi, first thing to do was to call Birkart (our other forwarder), and check if everything is OK. I saw free public phones but (this is silly) I didn't know how to use it although I have read the instruction.

I went to exit door, found a seat, thinking what to do. Called Rose at Birkart, with my cell phone (I can imagine how much the figure on my next month bill).

I asked her the progress of the shipment. I and Selvi knew that we took a risk to come here, but I have pushed them for shipping it on time.

Rose told me that if I take the goods out of their office I must pay 5% GST. I was surprised, because my boss told me that he picked up Thermage machine from IndoExpress without paying the tax because it didn't go out of airport area.

Rose said her office is not in Change airport area.

Decided to have my lunch first, bought Burger King, I forgot the name but it was good. It has mushrooms in it. Then I took a taxi to go to Birkart's office.

It was far from airport, I thought it was in the same area. I see the situation now.

Arrived in Birkart office, looked for Rose. She was a nice lady, she's malay.

The goods worthed around EUR 20,000. I didn't have any money to pay 5% tax (although I can reclaim it at the airport). It wasn't required so office didn't give me much money.

Then I asked Rose to check status of the shipment, goods were still in Taiwan, . Yesterday night it was in Taiwan too, no progress????!!!!

Those were the most important goods I need.

While there were some disposable goods (small package) already arrived at IndoExpress office and have been delivered to Birkat office, Rose could not release it as she didn't know how to prepare the permit without me paying the GST. My goodness! I called IndoExpress in Indonesia, Rose called their Singapore office. No one there, it was 2.30 PM. All Birkart people has gone home, it was holiday season, it was Saturday. Only Rose and her colleague (she asked to) stayed.

I waited for any progress, seems nothing happened. Suddenly Rose's colleague scolded me, asked me what my company wanted them to do, etc, and what didn't make any sense that she had bought movie tickets and would be late because of me.

I was under HUGE pressure thinking about us failed to deliver, got scolded with some stupid reason given!

What the he** lady! You don't talk like that to your customer! I'm your customer, and you gave me a selfish reason: you were late to watch your movie. What a

I work in a service business, I sacrifice my personal things for my clients!

I stared at her. Didn't know what to say in English! I was sooo upset. Fortunately Rose was still helpful, I felt bad because held her at work at this time. But we didn't have any choice.

I called Selvi, said that we have done our best but we didn't get any results today.

I really want to scream loudly!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
How come this can be happening? It's like my nightmare come true.

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Went to Changi airport with a long face.

While waiting for my flight, I tried to enjoy Changi facilities and services.
Had some snack, yeah,....never forget my dear tummy :)
Took some pictures. They had a live music in the lobby of departure hall, playing Christmas carols.

My dinner was on 2nd floor, had Hainamese chicken and rice.

Flew home


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I went back to Jakarta empty handed. Must report to boss, to our partner, and to the hospital. We can't afford to pay huge amount of penalty, USD 35,000! It doesn't make any sense.
The key is to negotiate things.

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