SINGAPORE — A TikTok video with “brutally honest” reviews of some of the food being sold at a Ramadan bazaar here has stoked a debate online regarding the appropriate ways for dissatisfied customers to provide feedback.

The owner of bazaar stall Frank On Wheels recently clashed with TikTok users after the expressing discontent on being given a scathing review in the video by user “Gunbutt”.

In his TikTok video, “Gunbutt” explores the ongoing Ramadan bazaar at Kampong Glam to provide a “brutally honest review” of some of the offerings there. He tries out a variety of food and beverages from four stalls.  

The customer starts off with the Cheezy Crab Fries Turkey Bacon by Frank On Wheels, which the fusion food stall touts as “the only smokey fries in Singapore”.

The unique snack had previously gone viral after being featured and raved about by many people on social media. 

The customer gives a view of the seemingly popular fries: “It’s honestly just basic fries with cheese sauce and the tiniest bit of crab stick on top. For S$11.90, please don’t bother wasting your money.” 

He goes on to show that the “smokey” component to the fries is simply vapour from dry ice that is packed into a small bottle on the side.

“There’s nothing smoked about this. It’s purely just for aesthetics,” he continues, before giving the fries a rating of one out of 10.

The customer then goes on to give similarly poor ratings for a Korean cheese toast and keropok lekor, a traditional Malay fish cracker snack. Only a couple of sweet beverages by the stall Gaosyp x Offday Coffee received a positive review.

The video by the customer seemed well-received by TikTok users, who praised him for not “sugar coating” and encouraged him to do more honest reviews of other Ramadan bazaars. 

As of Tuesday (March 19) afternoon, the video has gotten more than 575,000 views, 24,800 likes and 820 comments since it was posted last Wednesday. 

However, the customer’s online review seemed to have been too frank for Frank On Wheels. Someone claiming to be the brand's owner responded to the video with multiple comments showing dissatisfaction with the negative review. 

User "AbayaByKhalishaSg", identified as the owner of Frank On Wheels, wrote: “What do you mean by basic fries? So the fries you eat at (the hawker centre) are different? And yes, the smoke is for aesthetics, not for you to eat! I would appreciate (it) if you had come over to let me know (rather than) posting (online).”

It is unclear why the person chose to post the above comment using the account "AbayaByKhalishaSg" instead of the official TikTok account of Frank On Wheels.

Several viewers slammed the response, arguing that “Gunbutt” was free to express his views: “Unprofessionalism at its finest. Everyone is entitled to their own criticisms, they’re not obligated to keep it hush when they’re paying.”

Another viewer wrote: “You sound pretty passive aggressive to a paying customer who’s entitled to his opinion. He’s doing a favour for the community, he doesn’t have to let you know.”

To this, the supposed owner retorted: “So doing this to other people’s rice bowl is ok?”

In other comments, "AbayaByKhalishaSg" explained that the Cheezy Crab fries is a new product that may require further improvement, adding that the customer “should have bought other flavours” instead.

The person also claimed that Frank On Wheels would have given the customer a “new set” of fries and recommended better flavours if he had come forward with his feedback on the day of his visit.

The person was seemingly accusing the customer of posting a bad review for the sake of creating social media content.

These responses prompted further criticism from other TikTok users, who then described the stall owner’s reaction as “immature” and “defensive”.

The owner then questioned if paying customers should be allowed to do anything they want without giving sellers a say.

The responses from the owner appear to have been deleted from the original video. However, screenshots of the comments were reposted by “Gunbutt” on his account.

HAPPY TO RECEIVE FEEDBACK

In response to TODAY's queries, the owner of Frank On Wheels did not reply to give a full name, declining to confirm as well if the TikTok user name "AbayaByKhalishaSg" and the stall are linked.

The owner merely said that the business is happy to receive feedback from customers if improvements need to be made.

"Real, honest reviews are within the opinion of the reviewer. I have no issues with this.

"But as operators, we run a business. We invest in the business. We put in effort to serve our customers. People may not realise the impact of the hatred they created online behind faceless reviews. It can destroy businesses."