The column for anyone fed up with bureaucracy, frustrated with delays or furious with poor service. Tell us your complaint and we'll try to fix it ... An expatriate reader said his wife was treated rudely in front of their young children at a Delifrance outlet in Causeway Bay because of the colour of her skin. 'Just after 1pm on Sunday October 2, my family and I arrived at the busy Delifrance food outlet in Windsor House, Causeway Bay. We arrived at the same time as another family of four. The other family sat at the one remaining empty table, no problem, they saw it first. 'My two sons and I then waited to order our food while my wife waited patiently alone for a table to become free. Shortly, a booth was vacated and my wife went to sit down at the table. A staff member then ran over and physically restrained her. She was told that she couldn't sit there. The member of staff then called to the other family, in Cantonese, and asked them to 'come over here, this table's better'. 'After making sure that the other family were sitting comfortably, the member of staff then directed my wife to the table that the other family had just vacated. My wife, an HKSAR permanent resident, was not in the least bit surprised at this treatment as she has brown skin and is therefore used to receiving 'special treatment'. 'My children, aged six and nine, are more naive and as we left Delifrance without ordering or eating I had to explain the meaning of the word 'racism' to them. They were rather scared, because they have brown skin as well. While my long-suffering wife takes such treatment philosophically, I will not let my children witness such treatment again. It's not about the table, it's about how fellow human beings treat each other.' After a Take Action inquiry, Delifrance has issued a formal apology and promised to upgrade staff training. 'First of all, we would like to express our sincere apology to your reader's unhappy experience at our restaurant and we have investigated the case immediately once we received the complaint,' a company spokeswoman said. 'As an international food and beverage operator, we always treasure the patronage of customers from both Hong Kong and foreign countries. For this case, the seat was already occupied. However, our staff did not explain clearly to your reader and made him feel disappointed. 'Please rest assured that we have briefed our frontline staff again on the importance of customer care so as to avoid the same thing from happening again. We do believe the valuable opinion from your reader will motivate our improvement in service quality in future.' Reader Lim Saw Khim wrote to describe an unpleasant flight aboard Virgin Atlantic VS201 on September 24 from Sydney to Hong Kong. 'I had with me hand luggage consisting of my laptop and which had been allowed through at the check-in,' she wrote. 'When on board, I could not reach the overhead cabin to store my hand luggage and having always asked for assistance, I did again this time. I was shocked when the stewardess said she could not help as it was company policy in case they hurt their back. Her colleagues added that since I brought the luggage it was up to me to store it away. 'What customer service is that? Am I to be penalised because I am too short to reach the overhead cabin? So what do they expect me to do? Stand on the seat and risk a fall? 'I had no choice but to leave the hand luggage there and she finally brought a senior steward to put it up for me. May I add that upon reaching Hong Kong, I had no assistance in bringing the luggage down and had to do it myself (which is easier as I just grabbed the handle and swing the bag down). 'I would like to say that on my flight to Sydney, there was one lovely steward who helped to put it up and bring it down as well. I only wish they have more staff like that - it would be good for the reputation of Virgin.' Virgin has apologised to Ms Lim and given her a $120 coupon to buy duty-free goods as a token of appreciation. 'I was deeply saddened by the lack of assistance offered by our cabin crew,' wrote a customer relations manager, James Pau, in a letter to Ms Lim. 'We do expect our cabin crew to perform their duties with utmost consideration and care and the negative comments received in this instance is not the service we wish to provide or you have the right to expect. 'You have my promise that your comments have been forwarded to our operating crew as well as our cabin crew performance manager for his consideration. 'In closing, I would like to genuinely apologise personally and on behalf of Virgin Atlantic for the lapse of service and hope that we may still have the opportunity to warmly welcome you onboard our flight where we can redeem ourselves in your eyes.'
