Explaining the Brief Summary of Company-

Future Group is an Indian private conglomerate, headquartered in Mumbai. The company is

known for having a significant prominence in Indian retail and fashion sectors, with popular
supermarket chains like Big Bazaar and Food Bazaar, lifestyle stores like Brand Factory,
Central etc

There are 3 stores divided into sections:

Exhibitions: Puts up a live display of various rooms such as living room, dining room,
bedroom, kids’ room, kitchen and bathroom.

Services: this section offered service such as Mr.Carpenter, Mr.Plumber, Mr.Electrician,

door delivery and installation.

Markets: Featured products for living room, dining room, bedroom, kid’s room, kitchen and
bathroom, home furnishing, mattresses and Depot.

Summary of the case

Mrs.Raj Dogra, a middle-income working woman wanted to revamp her home. She was keen to have
a new kitchen with smart designs as were displayed at Home Town. She made several visits to Home
Town and spent lot of time with Mr.Vipin, who was in charge of designing the kitchen, discussing the
design of the kitchen. Mrs.Dogra finalized the design specification of the kitchen for Rs.1,11,000 with
a delivery due date after a month i.e. June 9, 2007.

Mr.Vipin made false promises that modules would be fabricated at the company’s world class facility
at Nagpur. Mr.Vipin had handed over the blueprint of the modular kitchen and diagrams suggesting
changes in the kitchen space.

On June 6, Mr.Vipin was unsure of the delivery and reluctant to give commitment. On June 8, Mrs.
Dogra went to Home Town to know the exact status from Mr. Vipin who was trying to hide himself
so as to not face Mrs.Dogra When encountered, Mr.Vipin revealed that the company did not have
stock as specified by Mrs.Dogra. Customer’s dream of having a modern and trendy kitchen was
shattered.

On speaking to Mr.Vinod, Head of kitchen section, Mumbai, Mrs.Dogra was to change her
specifications as the required material would be available only after 3 months. She was assured that
the products would be delivered within 10 days i.e. June 19. Promise to compensate for the delay
was not attended.

On June 14, Vipin sent an SMS that the kitchen was getting air-lifted on June 20. When nothing was
heard till June 21, customer made enquiries about the same to find out that due to rains the roads
were blocked and further delay was estimated.

Mrs.Dogra sent an email to the Pantaloon Customer care cell on June 23, with a request that the
matter be brought in notice of Mr. Kishore Biyani, CEO Future Group. Finally, material was delivered
to the customer on June 27. When carpenter came to install the same, it was discovered that the
material was short supplied and the kitchen was not ready for installation as the plumbing work was
not in order, even though it had been approved by the technical team of Home Town. Look of the
kitchen was spoiled as tiles had to be broken and water pipes were taken outside the walls. A team
of carpenters were deputed from Mumbai to handle the installation. Plumbing problem was
unattended.

The colour and material of the shutter as chosen by the customer as an alternative to the original
specification, was different from that selected by the customer

Mr.Vinod visited customer’s house on July 4 and promised to change the shutters within a period of
three weeks. According to Mr.Vinod, even though the existing shutters were not as per the
customer’s choice, they were close to what she had opted for. This annoyed Mrs.Dogra as it was her
kitchen and she would like to modify it according to her choice, moreover when she was not getting
it done for free of cost. The replacement for the shutter was provided several days after the
promised date. Customer was waiting for someone to re-fix the shutters and rectify the defects that
still existed.

Till August 3, Mrs.Dogra was still waiting for the carpenter to complete the work. The management
of HomeTown tried to identify its mistakes and learn from them so that they are able to provide
effective service delivery and eventually are able to meet customer expectations.

Analysing of the problems

Some points in which I can say that hometown was not good at:

 Insufficient relationships focus

 Inadequate Service Recovery
 Absence of Customer-driven standards
 Inappropriate physical evidence and services cape
 Inadequate Service Recovery
 Poor service design
 Most importantly, we know customer satisfaction is the biggest goal of an
organization but here company fails to deliver a minimum level of satisfaction to
Mrs.Dogra.

Recommendation from my side

1. If HomeTown would have responded to the mails sent by Mrs.Dogra in a proper and
timely manner, it at least gives a sense of relief to the customer that the service
provider is working on the issues mentioned.
2. Booking or fixing appointment of service provider as per convenience of customer
and service provider.
3. Motivating employees to face service delivery failures and how to handle them.
4. Providing incentives if they achieve objectives and targets so that employees are
motivated.
5. Take service failures as experience and improvise services.
6. It is important for every organization to provide proper in formation to its customer
that when they will receive there product / a proper information should be given to the
customer by the employee.