Hi All Brides To Be,
Had always being a silent reader here. Just had my ROM at Furama Riverfront Hotel last weekend and I thought I should share my experience here. Below is the feedback email that I had send to Mr Albert Liew (Director for Events and Catering) on my unhappiness. Hope it help Brides To Be here to ensure that things go smoothly for you on your wedding.
Dear Albert,
I understand that you are the Director of Catering and Events at Furama Riverfront Hotel and I had read a lot of good and positive reviews from the forums on the good services you had rendered to wedding couples.
I recently held my wedding solemnization at the hotel – Mercury Room I & II on 10 September 2011 (Sat). After the event, I had provided some feedbacks via the feedback / survey form and submitted to the front desk officer when I check-out of the hotel on 11 September 2011 (Sun). I have not heard anything from any of your staff since.
In case, you did not manage to see the form, I will like to feedback / highlights a few pointers on my dissatisfaction by your hotel on my event.
General
• Our wedding coordinator from your hotel is Ms Ira Ng – Manager, Catering Sales. She is slow in responding to email and every time her excuse was that she is busy and she had a lot of things to do. I think as a professional, this is definitely not the impression you want to leave to your clients. Every time I chase for an email respond, she answered me this. Seriously, do you think I dare to recommend her to anyone when I personally do not like her service?
• Also, what is the point of wasting time to create the event order form and inputting the instructions and distributed it to the various departments involved and getting the couples to sign and acknowledge when 75% of these instructions were not being followed / carried out?
Setup
• As instructed in the event order form, we requested for a champagne reception to match the entire theme. In the end, it was still in that ugly olive green colour that I personally hate.
• I had also asked for an oblong table outside the reception area to display my 2 big photo albums. This was convey to Ms Ira Ng when we first viewed the Mercury Room in January 2011 and I had reminded her again on 03 September 2011 when I met her to test the projector. She agreed.
It was also being documented in the event order form!
On the actual day, my 2 big crystal albums were being tucked at a miserable corner of the room on a small cocktail round table. The table is so small, that my guests cannot even flip the albums!! Mind you, I spent almost 10K on an oversea shoot, yet none of my guest got an opportunity to view the album.
This is truly disappointing! Even the layout floor plan that Ms Ira Ng emailed me had shown the oblong table. But this is not the case on the actual day. Being a popular hotel for wedding, I am surprised that your staff can overlooked such details!
AV / Lighting Specialist
• We had verbally informed Ms Ira Ng that we will like the AV Briefing / Test run with your hotel staff at 9.30am instead of 10am cos we felt that it will be too rushed. She agreed. However, on day of event, no one turn out at 9.30am and the testing and trial run were only able to start at 10.15am, 15 minutes before my guests start strolling in and your audio technician was extremely rude with my event coordinator – Ms XXX (who happened to be specializing in international events management and exhibitions). I think punctuality and basic courtesy were not respected here.
• Lighting management was very bad too. We had a video montage before our 2nd march-in. As our event is in the mid morning / afternoon, sun was glazing into the Mercury Room. I think your staff should exercise some common sense in pulling down all the blinds and diming the lights so that my guests were able to view the video clearly. Apparently nothing was being down on this.
Banquet Services / Operations
• As documented in the event order form, instructed had being given for your staff to help us placed the cup cakes onto the cake tray and after the cake cutting ceremony, to assist us to pack the cup cakes in individual boxes and disturbed out to our guests.
Neither of this had being achieved! No one assists my helpers on placing of the cakes and the cake table was of such miserable size that not all my cup cakes will being displayed out thus minimise the “WOW’ effect of the cakes. Your staff had also totally forgotten to pack the cakes for us till my event coordinator had to remind them.
• Weeks prior to the event, we had informed the coordinator (Ms Ira Ng) from your hotel that we will be bringing in wine (white & red) to the event and to offer them to the guests. However on the actual day of event, the waiter did not offer my guests wine. My event coordinator had to go from table to table to offer my guests wine where it should be your hotel staff duty.
• Wine and drink glasses were not filled up. As a bride, I personally had to ask the waiter to fill up my guests’ glasses. And it takes them awhile to react to my instruction. For your information, I only got 80 guests. I cannot imagine if I had got more tables.
Food
• The only positive thing about my wedding solemnization was most of my guests liked the food prepared by your chef. Please keep up the good work!
• But one thing you might want to take note. Although Tahu Telor was one of the recommended dishes, it’s not ideal for buffet. Because of the air-conditioned room, the Tahu Telor had turn very hard hence losing its texture and taste.
I understand that your hotel was packed with wedding events that weekend and we are just doing a wedding solemnization where revenue is much lower as compared to a banquet event, this does not mean that we should be subjected to such sub standard services and inexperienced staff from the hotel!
These small but important details missed out by your staff truly affect your hotel image.
Also, considering that that most of my guests were from the media and event management industries, you can imagine how they felt about your hotel services as well.
Appreciate if you can look into this matter and ensure that there will not be anymore unfortunate couples like us. I will also be grateful if you can indicate a respond that you had read my email and are looking into how your hotel can improve from this unhappy incident.
I had also cced my event coordinator – Ms XXX to see if she had got anything to add on.
Best regards,
