Yishun durian seller loses S$368 worth of Mao Shan Wang after uncontactable delivery rider took wrong order
On 11 Jul, a post on the stall’s Facebook page highlighted that a delivery rider had collected eight boxes of Pahang Mao Shan Wang from the shop, but did not deliver the fruits to the two customers who ordered them.The post stated: “Kena Lalamove driver again. Total 8 boxes Pahang MSW. Come take item never send [sic]. Jialat lah [laughing emojis].”
Famous Durian’s owner, Anthony Gan, tells 8days.sg that the Mao Shan Wang orders were worth a combined $368, with delivery fees totalling $27. Pahang durians are generally considered to be of higher quality and come with premium prices.
What happened
According to Anthony, the rider had collected the durians at around 9.20pm. But his customers reported that they did not receive any durians even though it was almost midnight.
Anthony explains to 8days.sg that the particular rider was not supposed to take those durians, as he had cancelled the rider earlier for taking too long to reach his shop. He then booked another driver for the delivery.
But the cancelled rider showed up anyway, and was mistaken to be the replacement driver. He was captured on CCTV leaving with the big durian orders, but the goods never reached their recipients.
“We didn’t focus [on the fact that it was not the correct rider] and just passed the durians to him,” says Anthony, adding: “We didn’t have his contact number as we had already cancelled his job.”
Driver uncontactable
The stall only realised the mix-up when the second rider arrived and had nothing to collect. Anthony reached out to Lalamove’s customer service centre, who attempted to contact the driver.
“I wanted to find out what happened, in case the rider met with an accident. They told me he wasn’t picking up and it would take four to five days for Lalamove to investigate this,” shares Anthony.
He appealed for over a day on Facebook for the rider to contact him about the missing durians, including posting a CCTV screenshot of the rider with his face obscured to prevent doxxing.
Anthony also cautioned online that he will make a police report if the rider remains uncontactable, though he delayed doing so as he did not want to disrupt the man’s livelihood.
He shares that Lalamove offered to compensate $200 for his loss, the maximum amount given under the company’s insurance coverage policy. But he declined as he wanted to get to the bottom of the matter and make a police report if necessary.
Missing durians mystery solved
Today (13 Jul), Lalamove updated Anthony via e-mail that it had tracked down the rider. It explained that the rider had only realised his delivery job was cancelled after he had picked up the durians, and was unable to see the recipients’ addresses and contact details on his app. For reasons not specified, the rider decided to take the durians home after he was unable to contact Lalamove’s reps.
In its automated reply, Lalamove says: “The driver had attempted to reach out to Customer Service however to no avail. The driver proceeded back home and safekeep the item. When LLM got a hold of the driver, the items were already in his possession for a day. As such the items were not safe for consumption and the driver was instructed to discard the item. LLM will be compensating the maximum amount of $200 to the merchant. We apologise for the negative experience you encountered with our service, and we will strive to serve you better moving forward.”
Anthony says he plans to accept the compensation offer, and has deleted the rider’s CCTV photo on his Facebook page.
He tells 8days.sg: “No choice lah. They offered to compensate $200. I thought of making a police report, but the rider will have to suffer [the consequences]. So never mind lah, I will just let this go since I’m used to giving people chances. Live and let live.”
8days.sg has reached out to Lalamove for comment.
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Photos: Famous Durian
