Complaint Against Parle, Plastic Thread In Melody

Complaint Against Parle, Plastic Thread In Melody (1)

Tadka Take

Melody Khao, Khud Jaan Jao!

The last thing I would want to know after eating Melody is the number of ways in which a long winding piece of plastic can kill me once it sticks itself to my insides.

Sadly, this was the gruesome revelation Parle Melody had in store for the Choubeys had they not been careful enough. Garima Choubey wrote to us with her horrifying experience when while chewing a Parle Melody, she discovered a long plastic thread sticking out of her toffee. A follow up with the Parle customer care has not yielded any result yet.

Consumer Story

This is what Garima narrated to us in her email.

PIECE OF PLASTIC was found inside Parle Melody Chocolaty Toffee when it was being chewed. In the attached pictures, it can be seen like a PLASTIC THREAD coming out of the toffee.  I still do have that tofee as a proof.
I already complained  to parle’s customer care  followed by two reminders as per the trailing mail but still waiting for the corrective actions from their side. This irresponsibility towards their product which could be a life threat  was least expected from such a reputed organization like Parle.

Moreover, delay in a justifying response to a customer complaint is much more annoying.

Below is a copy of the mail Choubeys wrote to the customer care cell.

From: Rahul Choubey

To: Consumer Services – Mumbai

Sent: Sunday, March 25, 2012 12:45 AM

Subject: Plastic inside toffee

Dear Sir/Ma’m,

Piece of plastic was found inside Parle Melody Chocolaty Toffee when it was being chewed. In the attached pictures, it can be seen like a plastic thread coming out of the toffee.  I have the wrapper and tofee and now I am planing to lodge a complaint in Consumer court about the quality control of company.

Pls revert, & act on the above matter accordingly, as soon as possible.

–
Rahul Choubey

 The customer care responded as follows:

On Tue, Mar 27, 2012 at 9:07 AM, Consumer Service <cs@parle.biz> wrote:

Respected Customer,

Your patronage of our product is greatly appreciated.

We here at Parle are doing our utmost to maintain the high standards of our products and we always look towards our customer’s satisfaction.

We encourage feedback from our customers to help us improve our systems.

As far as your complaint is concerned, kindly give us your contact details for our representative to attend you and collect the sample for us to investigate the matter at our end.

In subsequent email exchanges, the customer care kept asking for contact number and address/location of the consumer but despite being supplied with the required information, and two follow up reminders, no corrective action has been commenced from Parle’s end till date.

Complaint Against Parle, Plastic Thread In Melody (2)

Tadka Take 2

Of all the innovative ways that human kind has evolved to land people up in hospital, eating a toffee is the unlikeliest and my least favorite.

Contaminated food is a serious concern, serious enough to trigger an entire Satyamev Jayate episode (which by the way is latest benchmark to establish the gravity of a social concern). The gravity increases manifold when the culprit is a reputed brand and not the local doodhwaala (milkman).

Packaged products like chocolates and toffees are presumed to be safe and hygienic, primarily because of the reputation of brand names that are usually attached to them. These are the products which may be questioned for their utility in terms of nutrition but never in terms of safety.

Hence cases like this one are a bolt out of the blue, more so because in most such cases, the most vulnerable lot of consumers is at stake-the kids.

In this instance, it is not just the contamination which is of concern; we could have for once, passed it as a rare case of oversight. But what is more appalling is the apparent disregard which the brand has exhibited in this case with a complete absence of any action, expedite or otherwise from its end. All corrective measures aside, it was the duty of the brand to deliver a formal apology to the consumer as soon as the matter was raised before it and follow it up with reasonable measures as can be expected from responsible brand. However, Parle has evidently failed to live up to these expectations, at least as of now.

Negligence is bad enough but what is worst is negligence coupled with disregard!

Are you listening, Parle?

Do you have a similar story? Do you want the brands to hear you out? Write in us at editor@akosha.com and we will make sure you are heard, loud and clear!