I REFER to Tuesday's letter, 'New Singapore a less friendly city for tourists' by Mr Geoffrey Somers. He mentions the unfriendly attitude of the service sector towards tourists.

I would like to build on this and state that this applies not only to foreigners, but also to Singaporeans.

In many shops I have visited, sales assistants seem incapable of producing a simple smile, and others linger behind the cash register with a strong attitude of disinterest.

Singapore needs a training programme that teaches sales staff how to approach a customer.

If such a programme is already in place, I'm sorry to say it doesn't work.

A personal example of bad customer service is my recent communication with the management of Golden Village (GV).

As I wanted to book a Gold Class cinema hall for a function, I called the GV management office on the number provided on its website.

I called at least 14 times and even left a message when prompted by the voicemail that claimed someone would call back. Yet, no one from GV called me back.

I do not see any point in providing a phone number to a line that no one answers, with a voicemail to which no one responds.

This clearly shows poor service standard in management, and how it is not able to communicate properly with its customers.

I see it as a sign of disrespect that those involved in the distribution of cinema tickets are incapable of picking up the phone.

It is this lack of manners that really dampens Singapore's service sector - the inability to communicate properly, efficiently and respectfully with customers.

This forced me to visit GV in person - a time-consuming exercise that could have been avoided had it been more efficient.

If this is the attitude of companies in Singapore, service standards will never improve.

Faisel Irshad

This article was first published in The Straits Times on June 7, 2008.