Lack of professionalism, poor customer care and racial prejudice

I decided to apply for an account to purchase a couch that I liked and pay for it over a 6 month period instead of buying it cash. After an unnecessary delay in the processing of my application, a customer care agent, Meagan, at The Foschini Group customer care centre called me. She did a telephonic affordability assessment with me then told me that my account was approved. When I went to the @Home store at Design centre in Fourways to activate my account, I was told that my application was declined due to a “lack of affordability”. I’m a doctor with a good credit score so this is not possible. I called TFG customer services while at the @Home store at Design centre. After speaking to 2 of the customer services consultants, I asked to speak to Meagan. At first I was told that Meagan is on another call. When I called 10 minutes later, I was told that Meagan went outside and that it’s unknown when she’ll be back. After 10 minutes, I was told that there are three people by the name of Meagan who work at customer services, so it’s unknown which Meagan I’m referring to. I then asked to speak to the manager at customer services at TFG and the consultants refused to escalate my call. After spending more than one hour and 30 minutes at the store trying to sort this issue out, I decided to give up. The last customer services consultant that I spoke to said that she would make a note of my complaint and that they would get back to me.

I was incredibly angry at this point. 1) I had wasted more than one hour and 30 minutes of my time at the @Home store trying to sort this matter out; 2) I had spent a lot of money on airtime contacting customer services at TFG up till this point and I had to request an extra bank statement at an extra cost and 3) the TFG customer services consultants were incredibly rude, condescending and obstructive. In the evening, I sent an email to TFG customer services and DM’d Bash online on Instagram about my experience.

On Monday, the 19th of July, a manager from customer care services contacted me. He said that he wanted to clarify what happened between myself and Meagan, the agent that I spoke to on Friday the 16th of July. After I told him what happened, he told me that:

1) I was mistaken, the agent that I spoke to was Michaela not Meagan and that he noticed during the telephone conversation that I was sick so maybe that’s why I can’t remember this detail 2) I am mistaken, he listened to the telephone conversation and Meagan never said that my account application was approved. 3) when I then asked how it’s possible for my account application to be rejected when I have a good credit score and can clearly afford it, he could not give me an answer.

I feel that that there was racial prejudice in how this matter was handled. If it were a white doctor/person, this would not have happened. I am incredibly disgusted, repulsed and appalled by the behaviour of the customer care services department at @Home and The Foschini Group (TFG), how poorly they treat customers and their lack of professionalism. I will never shop at @Home, Coricraft and Foschini again or support any of the subsidiaries of the company because of this foul experience.