As a final exercise, I wanted to get my Kitchen furbished with modular furniture and cupboards for storage. After surveying the market, I had discovered the many players in the market, who are into these modular kitchen solutions.
Zeroed down on M/S Godrej, who is a leading player in this segment with all metal construction, relieving a buyer from deciding on the types of wood, particleboard etc. that are used as substitutes by all the other players. In addition, Godrej as a brand name, itself is well renowned throughout the country in the furniture market. Therefore, I have pursued the dealers of Godrej, in-spite of not being as customer friendly as the other players in the market. Despite overlooking the various shortcomings of these Godrej dealers, just because of my weakness for the all-metal material of construction and the brand name ‘Godrej’ itself, the finalization of the deal on Godrej failed only because of their adamant terms of contract.
Once again, I was in market scouting for alternatives and found that the brand name ‘Kutchina’ has a number of outlets in the market and their visibility is higher. Their shop keeper/sales personnel are perseverant in chasing their prospective customers like me. In anticipation of an equally enthusiastic and satisfactory after sales deliverance, I have placed an order with Kutchina (Bajoria Home Makers Private Limited) along with an advance payment for the execution of the order i.e. delivery and installation which were to be completed within three weeks. Then did my major struggles start.
I had to continuously chase them for the delivery of the material which itself had taken more than three weeks. They had started the installation work promptly within 24 hours after the materials were delivered with a verbal assurance that, it may take up to maximum 3 days for the entire installation to be completed, as everything was pre-fabricated as per the measurements taken. However, I discovered to my utter dismay that the installation job was not just an assembling of pre-fabricated cupboards but re-fabrication of the entire cupboard by taking fresh measurements like a typical carpentry job! Consequently, it definitely took more than double the time promised.
While on the subject, I would also like to mention that the workers, carpenters and sales personnel are very nice to talk to, and well behaved while interacting with the customer face to face. Every day the customer is convinced for another day’s extension for the completion of the work. Unfortunately, their working hours are only from 11am to 6pm, due to which the total installation job required more days. Thus, depriving us of our precious working hours, as our presence for monitoring the work is essential. Even after several attempts in persuading the workers into working for longer hours to complete the job, those sweet natured carpenters / workers, did not budge, citing their own excuses. After 6 days of my persistent perseverance to get the job completed, I had lost my composure and tried reaching out to the management (Mr. Shehashish Mukherjee, National head of Marketing & Sales) of the organization, which had been a herculean task indeed to convey the grievances. They had finally completed the work expeditiously but shabbily the next day. The so-called job completion pictures are as under, which requires no further elaboration to show their finished product, and that it is awfully below the expectations of their pre-sale overzealous commitments and rosy pictures.
In short, I would like to share the following with all those aspiring to build up their kitchens-
- One should get their kitchens tailor fabricated by a creative, hardworking carpenter, which would save one a lot of time, money and agony.
- Even if one wants to go for branded modular kitchen solutions, one should insist on witnessing the finished products at a few of the customers’ locations of that respective brand.
- Also, suggest one to talk to a few of the old customers of the brand and seek their opinions/experiences before finalizing the order.
- Be convinced with the grievance redressal system beforehand, rather than getting lost in the lurch after getting the fingers burnt.
Everyday Life Dilemmas 