Privacy laws, employee rights and slack customer service

[recom273]

There is a little bit more to this story, but if in Thailand I am experiencing bad customer service, am I within my right to pull out my camerafone and document my experience or can the employee claim that his/her rights are being violated ?

[benalibina]

Waiting for the " little bit more ".

[recom273]

Waiting for the " little bit more ".

lol .. im waiting for someones opinion .. theres nothing much to the "more .."

[wym]

Carrying on jumping up and down contacting upper management won't get the results you seek and could lead to unintended consequences. I don't think they'd cite privacy rights, don't need any logical justification to object, could even be physically dangerous for you - which is why you need to give more details on the scenario for any advice of value.

But generally speaking it never pays to get into confrontational mode here, if a business doesn't give you good service move on to a competitor that does.

If none are good enough for you in a topic area that is very important to you, consider going to live in another more developed country.

[CharlieH]

Bad customer service , thailand ? Really? Guess you havnt been here very long then, give it awhile and its water off a ducks back ! Just another day in paradise.

[recom273]

Yeah .. That was the situation, I was in an airport, so we had more security / army ( guns ) / airport security than you could shake a stick at.

It was just the usual crap show with a local airline. Its approaching 6.00 pm, the booking girl cant be bothered to deal with something as she wants to go home, tells the missus to go wait over there for 10 mins and then go to counter X, we wait 15 mins, go to counter the girl denies all knowledge, 4 people just lounging around, she asks us to wait out of the way for another 10 mins for the supervisor to come back from break.

Thats when I lost it, no one bothered to pick up the radio, no one bothered to move a muscle. Agreed a stupid situation, its usually water off a ducks back, maybe i wanted to go home and get my dinner but i didnt send an email today changing my ticket to an unsuitable time without consultation or agreement, it wasnt me that closed down the online chat, it wasnt me that didnt pick the phone up, but i had to stop my afternoon and go to the airport to sort the whole situation.

Anyway, I took out my phone and pretended to take a video, and at least something started to happen. The desk operators started paging the supervisor who appeared 5 minutes later and promptly got on with something else, but also airline security demanded to see he footage on the phone as the girl was worried she / her comrades would get the sack if the company saw the footage. ( Like, hello .. ) I told them there was no footage and therefore no need to see the phone which was actually nothing do with them anyway.

Actually, a quite interesting evening, the TAT girl agreed with my situation that the airline staff were just oxygen thieves, the airport security and airline security couldnt do naff all about the phone, despite all their talk. i told them the only person who could see my phone were the police. Eventually the BiB arrived, i flashed him some holiday snaps, joked around and he was more interested my bike and jacket than this amazing situation that one lazy individual created.

The wife came back with reports from airport security, agreeing that i was within my rights to take the video, if i felt i was being unfairly treated, then service would improve.

Anyway, putting tonights incident aside .. Is it illegal to video someone at work in this country without permission if you think you are being treated unfairly or maybe even threatened ?

[wym]

Wow.

Whatever the law might be, has nothing to do with reality.

But I can guarantee you keep acting up like that and you will have a miserable time here.

Really, take a deep breath and relax, nothing's worth that kind of spike in blood pressure.

Or take your holidays in a cold country where they have better service.

[thailandbeachisland]

Record, but don't show them that you record, I do it all the time and post anonymously on Internet...

The best thing to do, so they can just cry !

[impulse]

I know a guy who did something similar in Wyoming when he wasn't happy with airline service. He ended up on the airline's "no fly list" for a year.

[recom273]

Wow.

Whatever the law might be, has nothing to do with reality.

But I can guarantee you keep acting up like that and you will have a miserable time here.

Really, take a deep breath and relax, nothing's worth that kind of spike in blood pressure.

Or take your holidays in a cold country where they have better service.

Why is the law irrelevant ?

I have been here long enough to not let these things get to me, usually, but wouldnt you be bummed if someone told you to go stand in the corner for 15 minutes, after the time, denied all knowledge of you but asked you to repeat the process for another 15 minutes, whilst they lounged around and chatted .. its called being 'muggged off' in my country.

Some of the reasons i came here were the customer service .. The big bike shop will stop working on a half-million baht bike to sell me something so minimal in comparison, but send me away with a smile, the coffee shop who prepare my usual on sight, the service kids in the petrol station who race over hoping to have the time to talk about football, the old lady who explains whats in the curries, trying to warn you that it has something you might not like. etc. All those things that make Thailand great.

What I dont like is when no one gives a toss, but like yesterday, everything broke loose, because, they someone thought i might be taking a video of them not doing their job to post it on youtube, if you got nothing to hide, why let it bother you ? Even the missus agreed this in the end.

-----

So the question, just for future reference. If a person is paid to be at work, they are no longer an individual, but a representative of a company. If their is some kind of interaction or transaction, then i become a customer. If as a customer, im in a position where i think im being taken liberty of, do i have the right to make a video to show to their company ?

[recom273]

I know a guy who did something similar in Wyoming when he wasn't happy with airline service. He ended up on the airline's "no fly list" for a year.

LOL .. Dont you think this was going through my mind last night. I got to go back in 3 weeks and fly out. Im sure i will have a grear experience, "err .. sorry sir, the plane is booked but we do have a seat available in the bathroom"

[sdanielmcev]

As the old saying goes, you attract more bees with honey than with a baseball bat. This seems to be especially true in Thailand.

[impulse]

I know a guy who did something similar in Wyoming when he wasn't happy with airline service. He ended up on the airline's "no fly list" for a year.

LOL .. Dont you think this was going through my mind last night. I got to go back in 3 weeks and fly out. Im sure i will have a grear experience, "err .. sorry sir, the plane is booked but we do have a seat available in the bathroom"

I'd worry more about them snapping on the latex...with the famous Thai smile on their faces.

[wym]

Wow.

Whatever the law might be, has nothing to do with reality.

But I can guarantee you keep acting up like that and you will have a miserable time here.

Really, take a deep breath and relax, nothing's worth that kind of spike in blood pressure.

Or take your holidays in a cold country where they have better service.

Why is the law irrelevant ?

I have been here long enough to not let these things get to me, usually, but wouldnt you be bummed if someone told you to go stand in the corner for 15 minutes, after the time, denied all knowledge of you but asked you to repeat the process for another 15 minutes, whilst they lounged around and chatted .. its called being 'muggged off' in my country.

Some of the reasons i came here were the customer service .. The big bike shop will stop working on a half-million baht bike to sell me something so minimal in comparison, but send me away with a smile, the coffee shop who prepare my usual on sight, the service kids in the petrol station who race over hoping to have the time to talk about football, the old lady who explains whats in the curries, trying to warn you that it has something you might not like. etc. All those things that make Thailand great.

What I dont like is when no one gives a toss, but like yesterday, everything broke loose, because, they someone thought i might be taking a video of them not doing their job to post it on youtube, if you got nothing to hide, why let it bother you ? Even the missus agreed this in the end.

-----

So the question, just for future reference. If a person is paid to be at work, they are no longer an individual, but a representative of a company. If their is some kind of interaction or transaction, then i become a customer. If as a customer, im in a position where i think im being taken liberty of, do i have the right to make a video to show to their company ?

My point is that even if there is some sort of guaranteed "right" to video in that situation, such a theoretical factor means very little where the rubber meets the road in Thailand. Anyone with high status in a given context, whether their authority is official or corporate will be free to flaunt the law with impunity, and as foreigners most of us have no recourse - to the point that if you really p1ss off the wrong people you can just disappear without a trace or suffer a normal health & safety "accident" and who's going to care?

Only exception would be those few that have strong connections to powerful Thais or are genuinely high-status themselves like the owner of Minor Int'l.

So tread softly here, choose your battles, very common to suffer poor service, don't be in such a hurry and try to relax.

Or go elsewhere. . .