Chris Gomez presents... ENGINE ALPHA

I am very disappointed by this voucher from Groupon. It says "[Up to 53% Off] International Buffet Dinner at TEMPTationS, 5-star Renaissance Kuala Lumpur Hotel from RM60. Pork-free. Limited Groupons" in the title.

I am flying into Malaysia tomorrow just to take my friends out for dinner, after making sure each of their schedules were clear. Friends whom I haven't seen in over 4 years since leaving Malaysia.

So I check for a confirmation in my Groupon account history and I see this:

Everything looks good. It's going to be a fun and memorable evening. I print out the voucher:

Now I am all set for tomorrow. All I need to do is fill in an online reservation form on Groupon and wait for an e-mail confirmation.

A short while later, I receive the e-mail. Cool! You'd think I am all set for tomorrow, right? Nooooooooo...

The e-mail (as per below) says I paid for the "(Weekday Only) RM 60 nett for Asian Fusion Buffet Dinner at TEMPTations, Renaissance Kuala Lumpur Hotel. [ Monday to Thursday ]."

I make an international call to the hotel, at my cost of course, to clarify this the details on this voucher. The staff who takes the call isn't able to explain much well. I could sense she was feeling a little uncomfortable and not wanting to put any stress on her, I ask if she could pass me on to her manager. She passes me to her manager named Zulaina (I hope I spelled the name right).

I repeat this whole story again, yes via an ID phone call at my cost, and she tells me that this voucher is indeed for the Asian Buffet (AB).

I tell her, "No the ad says it's for the International Buffet (IB) and as far as I am concerned I paid for the IB".

Then she explains "Sir, the IB is at another restaurant in the hotel, this restaurant is called "TEMPTationS". This is an Asian restaurant. My team runs the Asian restaurant, sir. We are all Asians you know? So this is an Asian restaurant"

Maybe I could have cheekily said, "So what about that other restaurant then? Since they're an IB will all the staff working there be 'internationals?'", but it was clear that she was more interested in giving me a lesson on the real meaning of "Asian", so I replied "OK", resignedly and just sat there listening to her.

Then, she went on, "We have some Malay food, Chinese food, a little bit of Japanese food and some Thai food. So we only have Asian food, you know, the local food. Because we are Asians."

Yeah, I like chocolates, because I am Willy Wonka.

After listening to her, I tell her, "OK, I believe this ad is misleading and I want a resolution. Since I've been misled by your ad into believing that this was an IB I believe it would be fair if you allow me and my friends to go for the International buffet at no extra burden on my end."

Her answer to that was, "Well sir, the Thai and Japanese food are not local food." And I am thinking to myself, what? Did she really just say that?

Was she really trying to tell me that as long as there are other Asian delicacies in the buffet menu that have origins outside of Malaysia, I am suppose to understand that it's "international?"

Sure, one could argue that any Asian country other than Malaysia is pretty much "International", but that's not the norm when it comes to the way hotel promotions are advertised. When hotels say International Buffet in their ads it's almost always mostly western cuisine with "some Malay food, Chinese food, a little bit of Japanese", etc. And most of us who've lived in SouthEast Asia for some years, know this.

Sure one could also argue that I don't have statistics on that last fact (which would then mean it's not a fact, right?). But come on. If it was an Asian Buffet, just say it was an Asian Buffet! I would not have bothered to spend time reading the overly-general description and doing all the cross-referencing with other hotels and their dinner rates.

If I wanted something Asian, I can... well... um, live in an Asian city.

Any a city in Asia, like Bangkok, Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Seoul, Singapore, etc. has all the Asian cuisine you can drown yourself in.

So, the conversation ends with her saying that she will get the manager to give me a call to help me with a resolution tomorrow. The thing is, I am flying out to Malaysia tomorrow and will be away from the phone for some hours. Funny how when you really need a resolution, the person who has the authority to give is not at work (yeah, yeah, it's the weekend, I know.)

I am really annoyed that the first time I try to give Groupon a chance and they fail me. And I am deeply upset with the way Renaissance handled my query.

I am sticking to my regular voucher service and definitely dumping Groupon. As for Renaissance? Yep, I'll be skipping Marriott-run hotels from now. It's just to costly to get things fixed when there's a problem in their turf.

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