Questions for Singapore Post

1. What is the underlying problem for Singapore Post? How did this problem get created?

Answer -

The underlying problem for SingPost in simple words was the negative word of mouth it was
receiving due to customer complaints and concerns from different national agencies which was
a result of providing unsatisfactory customer service and not acknowledging it.
So, How does it all get started, for this we have to roll back some years.
SingPost has been in business for 160 yrs and has become one of the pioneers in the industry.
It prided itself on providing end-to-end integrated digital mail solutions and offering e-commerce
logistic solutions. Its USP has been effective last mile delivery.
During the last 2 yrs, there has been a major transformation in the organizational structure with
5 directors including one group CEO leaving the company which caused a fall in its share price
and even in the eyes of investors.
Also as the world has modernized over time in technology and also as a whole, effective last
mile delivery which earlier was SingPost USP has now become a basic necessity or expected
feature from the customer’s perspective. And thus, when in the years 2018 and 2019, SingPost
was n’t able to accomplish what it used to preach it gained negative publicity. During these
years, the company received multiple instances of mail being left on mailboxes,discarded
parcels,false missed delivery notice, valuable parcels left at doorstep etc.. Moreover, SIngPost
was ignorant of these complaints and hence were criticized for not being accountable and giving
generic responses. All of these had a chain effect and resulted in the bad brand image of
SingPost which came along with a threat of losing the trust of stakeholders and losing out in the
competitive market.

2. What type of service failures were reported against Sing Post by Ang Mo Kio? What
kind of customer was he? What kind of customer ire did the brand SingPost face post the
Mo Kio incident? What does it tell you about the type of customers in the fold of Sing
Post? Should it concern them?

Answer -

An Ang Mo Kio resident discovered stacks of unopened letters in the trash bin and shared the
incident through a series of pictures on Facebook.It consisted of official letters as well and is an
offence under Postal Services Act to discard or destroy any postal article.
This incident included several types of service failures against the SingPost like Failure to
provide the core service by the company,Employee or delivery agent failure.This service failure
also included not meeting the legal obligations under the Postal Service Act by the SingPost.

As the customer took the social media route to express the grievance and took all actions
against the company legal obligations by including the third party regulating body, he can be
classified as both an IRATES and ACTIVISTS kind of customer.

After the incident was reported online, a lot of PASSIVES kind of customers who did not
complain about their service failures came forward and expressed their unhappiness and
incidents of service failures against the SingPost showing their disapproval for the company.

This incident tells us that the major customers of SingPost can be classified as PASSIVES who
are not complaining about the service failures and may be switching to other companies due to
dissatisfaction against the SingPost services.

The leadership and the management team of SingPost should be deeply concerned about such
a situation due to the following reasons -

● These customers will not only add to the loss of revenue stream but will go beyond and
will not provide a chance to perform service recovery.
● Also these customers will provide negative word of mouth and show dissatisfaction on
online mediums in future triggered by other similar incidents.
● Also showing ineffective service recovery to these customers will lead to further
problems for the company.

3. What were the various other service failures in Sing post? Comment on the process
gaps leading to these failures.

Among the other service failures of SingPost, one particular incident involved a small business
owner who had paid $7000 for the distribution of advertisement flyers. When the client
contacted SingPost regarding the status of his order, SIngPost sent him photos showing the
successful delivery of the flyers to various mailboxes. However later it was discovered that the
photos were digitally manipulated and all the flyers included the same unique ID Mark which
meant that only one flyer was successfully distributed. This led to allegations that the staff had
manipulated the photos in order to prove that the flyers had been delivered, however that was
not the case. SingPost responded to this by sanctioning the responsible staff members. Here
the service gap was created due to lack of staff and the employees were overworked and had to
deliver over 2600 letters per day. Lack of compensation was also a gap.

Another Service failure was regarding leaving failed delivery notifications without waiting.
Apparently the workers would wait at the receivers’ door for a few seconds before leaving a
missed delivery notification and leaving. When confronted with the allegation the workman said
he waited for more than 20 minutes. The SingPost policy stated that the workman will wait for
45 seconds before leaving. The clients raised the issue whether 45 seconds is enough time to
answer the door.
Various other complaints regarding the parcels left outside and have been signed for with the
signature not being of the receiver.

The service gaps that led to these failures can be accounted for by the shortage of staff in peak
season and the staff having to cover more doorsteps than usual. The Staff had to work overtime
to cover all the addresses and they were not incentivised for the same. These factors resulted in
the frontline staff of SingPost to compromise the service standards.

4. Comment on Sing Post’s handling of employee driven failures. Do you agree with what
SingPost had done to handle these issues? How should Sing Post should handle such
failures?

Ans. As a result of the service failure, Singpost made an apology on their Facebook page and
promised to increase their service quality. Such as announced immediate measures as a broad
review of its postal operation, aimed at solving the most pressing issues within 3 – 6 months
because of the rapid expansion of e-commerce.

Some of the steps taken by the company are as follows:

Hired more than 100 workers to meet the rising delivery volumes; raising parcel collection
counters and worker post offices

Worked with Government agencies, Union of Telecom employees in Singapore to upgrade

worker’s skills to alleviate the workload.

Singpost also changed the salary structure review for employees; make higher pay for workers
with an incentive for successful deliveries of trackable items to customer’s doorstep. And
overtime pays for employees who worked extra hours.

The extended shift for mail delivery on weekdays to ensure that the mail reaches the customer's
place on time.

They also apply new technology and infrastructure to improve their quality of service.

This is a positive change. Singpost realized its service failure and tried to rebuild the trust that
Singpost has lost. But it is just an immediate remedy, not an adequate solution. The remedy is a
short-term plan up to the next 6 months including promises, plans, apologies, etc. But,
customers are waiting for the application of the plans. When the Singpost is already doing
those plans to improve the quality of service and when the complaints are resolved and
minimized, individuals may say, "its short term measure is adequate."
It is good for the company to make immediate remedies for the problems that need early action.

But this remedy is not just only the thing that the company will do. To make a whole, it needs a
little to become whole. In other words, to be on the top of the ladder, one must start at the
bottom to go up. And it needs a long journey or long-term plan that sets the process to be done.

Rahul grp -

Failures:-

• The incidents included mail being left in mailboxes, discarded parcels, false missed
delivery notices, valuable parcels left on the doorstep, and forged recipients’ signatures on the
proof of receipt.

• The 30–40 letters of Government Notice led to the eventual arrest of a 29-year-old
postal worker. SingPost issued a Facebook apology to residents of the affected housing blocks
and offered assistance for the inconveniences caused by the lost mail. A Facebook Apology
was not the ideal way to have addressed this issue as this led to a further outcry among
unsatisfied customers leading to 6000 reshares. A better way out would be holding a Press
Conference and addressing the issue to the affected in person.

• SingPost staff had manipulated the photos to imply that they had completed the
customer’s Order SingPost reacted by sanctioning the staff members responsible.(flyer) An
employee is a brand embassador of any company and a mistake by an employee is a mistake
by the Company and they should own it, rather than holding the employees responsible. The
company should formulate standard operating procedures which should be followed throughout
the organization.

• flyers were not being distributed, after various bundles of letters were found unopened in
nearby trash bins. The employee was overworked, having to deliver over 2,600 letters per day.
not compensated for overtime work and had no time to visit the doctor for his sore ankle.

SingPost responded by dismissing the worker for failing to perform his duties. The Company
should automate the process and look over the performance capability of their ground level
employees. Rather than dismissing the worker, he could have been assigned a desk job till the
time he gets better.
• the worker claimed he waited more than 20 minutes and leaving a missed-delivery
notice after waiting more than 45 seconds.

Regarding the worker’s claim that he had waited 20 minutes, SingPost explained

that the worker was not fluent in English and was thus unable to express himself properly.

This was nothing but an excuse for an employee’s mishandling.

The duration of 45 seconds for the employee to wat is debatable and in such a situation, the
employee could have waited for another minute or so.

Main

SingPost issued a public apology on its Facebook page. The company explained that
approximately 3 million items were processed each day, and the year end was a very busy peak
season for all staff members, requiring 20 extra doorstep deliveries each day.Nevertheless,
SingPost promised to review operational procedures vigorously to increase the quality of
itsservice. The company also announced that the workers who were involved in negative
incidents had been dismissed.

• SingPost planned to employ 100 additional workers to cope with rising delivery volumes,
and to increase the number of dedicated parcel collection counters and workers at post offices.

• SingPost also addressed remuneration as part of its salary structure review.

• workers would receive higher pay with incentives for successful deliveries of trackable
items to the customer’s doorstep.

• Those workers who volunteered for the new shifts would receive overtime pay.

Another Ans

We don’t agree with how the company dealt with these issues; they basically put the blame on
their FLEs working out there and then dismissed them later on for the same and then issued an
apology. Rather than what they could have done :

● Company should have been Proactive rather than reactive. In the case of service
failures that were taken to social media they reacted and took actions when things
became big. Rather than they could have tried to deal with it earlier so that the harm
caused in minimum
● If there was fair Compensation and Employees were paid adequate compensation for
their overtime this might not have taken place. Both customer satisfaction and
Employee Satisfaction should have been kept as priority for the company
 ● We see that the customers have been going to the police( or local authority) over
problems with quality. This is because, at this point, there isn’t a well defined complaint
redressal mechanism. If there was a channel, the company could have resolved these
issues at the company level only without the story making it to the press.
● There should be employees involved in quick reassurance that the service will be
delivered appropriately after the complaint has been received. Giving a proper update
will also be important when complaints are being resolved.
● The service failure complaints should be prioritised based on the criticality of the failure
and enough care should be given to the customers accordingly.
● Flexibility and empowerment of employees so that they can take quick decisions

5. Did SingPost have a service recovery plan? Comment on how the company reacted to
a series of failures – in the light of your understanding of failure and recovery strategy.

Ans. For long-term solutions to minimize service failures. In my opinion, the important things are
effective in recruitment and training for staff step by step in process of service, attitude, norm,
and ritual, some cases may occur with the customer and use technology in work. Because
Postman is a person who is communicating directly with customers to improve the service
quality of the company.

And set up a department to evaluate the work efficiency of Postman in each locality in case any
trouble can make a solution as quickly as well. In addition, Singpost should continue to invest in
technology and automation and infrastructure to improve productivity in work like some kind of
delivery app or technology platform and apply QR code to help customers easily check their
track or what is your parcel step on, and also give more interaction with a customer like send
them the email or messenger to inform time to delivery. It can let customers more control and
follow up their mail, parcel as well as a plus choice if they need, to ensure consistency and
reliability of its processes and systems.

And streamlining of postal products followed by standardizing the sizes of letterbox postal items,
and new letterboxes with more convenience. The first step with segregation of letterbox and
doorstep deliveries by having separate teams for each delivery will help optimize delivery

routes, ease postmen’s workload, and increase successful deliveries.

Set a partnership with some kind of convenience stores like J-mart, 7-11, Choices, Munch
Munch, I-Tec, Sol mart … that these stores can receive customer’s parcels or mail or customers
can come here to pick their parcel or mail up. It is so easy for the customer when the
convenience store is near and it also reduces the workload of Postman.

Rahul grp -
In essence, yes, SingPost has a service recovery plan. In the Ang Mo Kio case, SingPost
issued a Facebook apology to residents of the affected housing blocks and helped for the
inconveniences caused by the lost mail. The company also announced that the workers who
were involved in negative incidents had been dismissed which I believe regain the trust of their
customers. After a series of service lapses, SingPost issued a public apology on its Facebook
page.

They take immediate measures as part of a broad review of its postal operations which aimed at
solving the most pressing issues within three to six months. One of the most pressing issues
was the recent increase in workload, resulting from the rapid rise of e-commerce, especially in
seasonal periods. SingPost planned to employ 100 additional workers to cope with rising
delivery volumes, and to increase the number of dedicated parcel collection counters and
workers at post offices. The company also planned to work with government agencies and the
Union of Telecoms Employees of Singapore to upgrade worker skills and alleviate the large
workloads.

Also, workers would receive higher pay with incentives for successful deliveries of trackable
items to the customer’s doorstep which motivates the employee. Mail delivery shifts would also
be extended to weekday evenings and Saturdays to reduce missed deliveries. Those workers
who volunteered for the new shifts would receive overtime pay. They would also introduce new
technology and infrastructure to improve the delivery process according to a specific timeline.

6. While the case mentions that SingPost was one of the Best employers, yet employees
poured out their woes as the incident involving one of their own went public. From your
understanding of Employee roles in services, can you explain this anomaly?

Ans. SingPost was named one of the top employers in Singapore by the employment standards
organization Tripartite Alliance for Fair & Progressive Employment Practices as a result of its
commitment to an inclusive working culture. They had set high standards when it came to
employee engagement. Nonetheless, employees vented their frustrations following the public
disclosure of an event involving one of their own.

SingPost was named one of the best employers for its efforts to foster an inclusive work
environment. Additionally, the company held regular employee engagement events such as Tea
with the CEO and town hall meetings to foster communication between management and
employees, and it rewarded top performers through a variety of recognition programmes that
included monetary incentives to assist in motivating employees and promoting higher employee
retention and loyalty.

The incident revealed that employees were overworked and not compensated for overtime, and
that SingPost routinely dismissed employees for failing to perform their assigned duties.

The company did not contribute positively to Internal Service Quality as part of its Service Profit
Chain because it did not compensate employees for working overtime during the company's
busiest season and did not invest sufficiently in their development, resulting in employees losing
motivation to be actively engaged in the organisation.

This resulted in a decline in its service delivery system as employee satisfaction decreased,
resulting in a decrease in employee productivity, as evidenced by numerous instances of front-
line employees failing to provide service. Customer satisfaction is inextricably linked to
employee satisfaction, which has decreased as a result.

Rahul grp -

While the case mentions that SingPost was one of the Best employers, yet employees poured
out their woes as the incident involving one of their own went public. From your understanding
of Employee roles in services, can you explain this anomaly?

Employees complaint about the increase workload, and no compensation for the overtime as
the prevalent reason for his behaviour. Three incidents mentioned in the case happened on jan
2018, dec 2018 and then Jan 2019, and on feb 2019 company accepted the workload issue as
they hired 100 more employees. Now, workers would receive higher pay with incentives for
successful deliveries of trackable items to the customer’s doorstep. Mail delivery shifts would
also be extended to weekday evenings and Saturdays to reduce missed deliveries. Those
workers who volunteered for the new shifts would receive overtime pay.

With companies actions it is very much clear that issues were genuine and talking about the
best employers awards it is not mentioned in the case that in which year they received this
award. Maybe the situation deteriorated after 2017 ,as many senior and board level members
have departed from the company.

Due to its promotion of an inclusive workplace atmosphere, SingPost was named one of the
finest employers. The company also held regular employee engagement events such as Tea
with the CEO and town hall meetings to keep lines of communication open between
management and employees, and it rewarded its top performers through various recognition
programmes that included monetary incentives to help motivate employees and promote higher
employee retention and loyalty.
The incident revealed that employees were overworked and not reimbursed for overtime, and
that SingPost was simply dismissing employees for failing to execute their duties.

The company did not contribute positively to Internal Service Quality as part of its Service Profit
Chain because it did not reward its employees for working overtime during its peak busy season
and did not invest enough in their development, causing its employees to lose motivation to be
actively engaged in the organisation.

This resulted in a decline in its service delivery system as staff satisfaction dropped, resulting in
a drop in employee productivity, as evidenced by the numerous instances of front-line
employees failing to offer service. Customer satisfaction is inextricably tied to staff satisfaction,
hence the latter has declined as well.

7. What changes needed to be instituted by SingPost to reinstate customer confidence?

What changes needed to be instituted by SingPost to smoothen service operations to
prevent future failures? - Suggestions to be given in the light of Sing Post’s ambition to
become the last mile delivery partner for e-comm companies - 3-year transformation
plan.

Ans)

To reinstate customer confidence, Singpost needs to recover from a poor customer service
experience. Enabling service recovery plays a key role here, this involves Apologizing for the
mistakes made and expressing your regrets along with compensating for the losses that the
customer has faced. Making a collaborative review of the situation with the complainant shows
the dedication of the company towards solving the problem and goes a long way towards
creating a good impact on the customer. In the end, following up and fixing the problem making
sure the customer is satisfied is necessary.

The next thing that SingPost can do is to deploy a system where customers can easily give their
feedback so that it can monitor whether enabling service recovery is helping the company in
regaining the lost customer confidence.

Singpost needs to come up with practical and operational solutions to the problems and make
this effort transparent so that customers can feel that their issues are being heard and changes
are being made so that such incidents won't happen again.

Changes in service operations-

Addressing the reasons for failure is where singpost can begin. The main reasons for various
service failure incidents are Lack of motivation in the employees as they are not satisfied with
the pay structure and allegedly don't take their jobs seriously, Along with that the increased load
fueled by ecommerce and lack of workforce resulting in various incidents of failed delivery.
Along with that the training of employees is something that poses as an obstacle as well

So what Singpost can do is to, Start hiring more workers and reinforce the workforce. Provide
them with proper training so that they can fulfill their jobs effectively and also handle additional
workload of ecommerce deliveries. Also it needs to change its waiting time policy keeping in
mind the interests of the customers. Along with this, making the pay structure transparent,
compensating for overtime and giving incentives on fulfilling their targets will help boost
employee morale and result in better service delivery. Also deploying a tracking system making
sure the package or mail reaches its destination successfully helps make the whole process
transparent for the company as well as for the customer.

Successful implementation of these steps may help Singpost in achieving its goal of becoming a
last mile delivery partner for ecommerce companies.

Answer - The issues which caused consumer confidence to waive were mail being left on
mailboxes, discarded parcels, false missed delivery notice, valuable parcels left on the
doorsteps and forged recipients’ signatures on the proof of receipt. When these service failure
incidents were ignored, rather than being promptly addressed and rectified, negative attention
was cast on the company. Singpost was blamed for lack of accountability and explanation and
customer complaints were met with generic responses.

First of all, Signpost needs to promptly address these service failure incidents. It should give a
quick and proper response to customer complaints which shows that they are accountable and
are doing something about the consumer complaints.

One of the issues pointed out in the article in terms of last mile delivery was that Signpost was
considered overloaded with work.

Signpost did start the service recovery by making a public apology on its Facebook page and
explained that the company delivers approximately 3 million items on a daily basis and also in
that post they addressed what kind of action they have taken against the employees who were
responsible for the incidents. So that is a good step as it shows that Signpost is being
accountable even though the consumers were not happy and it was considered as an excuse.

Operational changes needed by Signpost in order to smoothen service operation to prevent

future failure were. As one of the major issues with Signpost was it was overloaded. So signpost
should go on to add more workers which they plan to employ 100 additional workers to cope
with the rising delivery volume and also increase the number of dedicated parcel collection
counters and workers at the post office.

They also plan to work with government agencies and the Union of Telecoms Employees of
Singapore to upgrade workers' skills and alleviate the large workload.
 Also, they made changes in salary structure and added remuneration as part of its salary
structure review. Meaning that workers would receive higher pay with incentives for successful
deliveries of trackable items to the customer’ doorsteps.

So, for Singpost’s ambition to become the last mile delivery partner for e-comm companies - 3-
year transformation plan it is highly important for it to tackle and implement mentioned
operational changes. And for last mile delivery their idea of synchronizing various last mile
delivery solutions such as courier services, collection points and parcel lockers into one platform
is also a good and important idea.

8. Two main learnings from this case.

Two main learnings from this case.

Ans) 1) Service failure is inevitable for even those organisations with robust service
delivery systems. It is how these organisations ensure that they are able to engage in
service recovery and ensure a reversal or elimination of the negative emotions against
the service brand. Moreover, the service recovery should be in accordance to what the
customers would want from the service provider and on the basis of the perception of
the brand itself. Singapore Post, after having operated for more than 160 years, had a
certain brand equity in the market. This it was unable to justify as here, the emotions
involved for the customers were a bit too high. The packages could contain the dearest
of things for them and the employees by not distributing flyers had hurt the business of
that small scale businessman. Thus, the only way the company can ensure service
recovery is through Service guarantees. This would not only put customers at ease
about the service, but would also ensure that the employees uphold the values of
Singapore Post.

2) To ensure service recovery, it is also important to have a competent work force,

which is also not bogged down with work all the time. This is visible from Singapore
Post’s ventures of planning to work with government agencies and the Union of
Telecom employees of Singapore to upgrade worker skills and make sure that they are
not always under work pressure.