A day later we get a call from the supplier stating that we did not deliver the cargo, we are baffled as we have the proof of delivery on our hand. Little did we know that this particular supplier have 2 customer in the same location! And we have delivered the cargo to the wrong customer and the wrong recipient did not check before signing. As you might have guessed the actual recipient is less than happy. The supplier's salesman got the complain from the customer stating that they have not receive the item, the salesman accused the customer as being a liar and hung up on the customer.
This caused a big situation for us as the customer is furious and refused to acknowledge our delivery until the supplier's salesman apologized. We have transfer the stock to the original recipient and if it is not acknowledged it might be deem as stock loss.
We decided our best bet is to convince the customer to sign the delivery note, my partner went to talk to the customer patiently and apologized on behalf of the salesman. It took about half an hour and the customer eventually compromised with a condition that we raise her complain to the supplier personally. We agreed and escalated the issue to the supplier's management the next day.
After this ordeal, we learn that complacency is a big no no. We should have check the address properly even though we have done the same process many times. It also strengthen our mission as we believe that we as the last line of fulfillment represent our customer, so by apologizing on behalf of our customer is giving our customer a good reputation.
Therefore no matter the nature of your business, being complacent can hurt your business. We are fortunate that we make this mistake in the early stage of our startup, if not this mistake might be more costly.
