Zomato Issues Apology After Its Customer Care Employee Refers Hindi as National Language
Online food delivery major Zomato today issued an apology in connection with an incident where one of its customer care executive referred Hindi as the "national language".
Chennai, October 19: Online food delivery major Zomato today issued an apology in connection with an incident where one of its customer care executive referred Hindi as the "national language" of the country. The apology came after some netizens slammed Zomato and called for its boycott. The incident was reported by a customer from Tamil Nadu after which #Reject_Zomata started to trend on Twitter. Swiggy, Zomato to Pay GST on Restaurant Services Supplied Through Them, Says FM Nirmala Sitharaman.
One Vikash on Monday contacted Zomato's customer care service for refund after one item from his order was missing. After initial conversation, the customer care executive told Vikash that he was unable to help for the refund from the restaurant because of the "language barrier". When Vikash said Zomato should have hired people who understand the language, the executive replied: "For your kind information, Hindi is our national language. So it is very common that everybody should know Hindi a bit." Zomato Co-Founder Gaurav Gupta Resigns; CEO Deepinder Goyal Thanks Him for His Contribution in Building the Brand.
Irked over this misinformation, Vikash shared the screenshot of the conversation on Twitter, prompting people to trend #Reject_Zomata. After facing flak, Zomato issued a formal statement, apologising to Vikash. They also announced the termination of the employee for “negligence towards our diverse culture."
"The agent's behaviour was clearly against the principles of sensitivity that we train our agents for on a regular basis. This customer care agent's statements do not represent our company's stance towards language and diversity," Zomato said. The company further said they will soon come up with Tamil version of the app and are in process to set up a local Tamil call/support centre in Coimbatore.
DMK lawmaker Kanimozhi also reacted to the incident, saying it should be made mandatory for companies to serve their customers in their local language. "A customer doesn’t necessarily need to know Hindi or English," she added.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Oct 19, 2021 02:02 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).