A kerfuffle over king of fruit as customers confused about source of durian delivery

SINGAPORE — With durian season in full swing, a thorny fracas has emerged, with several sellers lodging complaints about a company called Durian Delivery and making public announcements to distance themselves from it.

In June, several popular sellers, such as Durian Prince, Ah Seng Durian and Leong Tee Durian, took to social media to announce to their followers that they were not affiliated at all to Durian Delivery.

They did so, they said, because they had received numerous complaints from people thinking they had ordered durians from these stalls via Durian Delivery’s website and received low-quality fruit. 

These sellers say that Durian Delivery’s website misleads consumers into thinking that it can buy durians from popular shops and deliver them. 

But Durian Delivery says its website clearly states that it is not affiliated with those popular stalls. 

One feature of the site is a blog which reviews durian stalls around Singapore. The blog post on Ah Seng Durian, for example, gives the vendor a glowing review and ends off with this sentence: “So, what are you waiting for? Drop by Ah Seng Durian’s store and experience the wonderful and tasty world of durians.”

Beneath that, in a much bigger font, is this call to action: “Get Your Durians from Duriandelivery.com.sg today!”

And below that, in a smaller font, are the words: “Duriandelivery.com.sg delivers durians to you on the same day, fresh. 100% Quality Guaranteed or Money Back. Disclaimer: We are not affiliated nor deliver durians for the store above. Please contact them directly.”

Still, some customers mistakenly believed that Durian Delivery was a middleman that would purchase durians from stalls such as Ah Seng and deliver them to their houses. Ah Seng Durian put out a Facebook post on June 12 to alert customers that it was not affiliated to Durian Delivery. 

In the post, the firm describes how a woman had shown up at its stall, saying she was there to collect durians she had “ordered and paid” for through “the website”. 

“We do not provide any online ordering and payment system,” Ah Seng Durian noted in its post.

Another vendor that has been featured on Durian Delivery, Leong Tee, has even lodged a police report against the delivery firm. The police confirmed that a report was made, but said no investigation was conducted into the matter. 

Since late last year, Leong Tee has received around six complaints a week from customers who thought they had ordered Leong Tee’s durians via Durian Delivery. It still receives such complaints, but to a much lesser degree since it posted a disclaimer on Facebook on June 14.

“We didn’t know what was happening. There were so many (calls),” said Mr Sam Lim, one of the owners of Leong Tee.

He and his co-owners decided to give these callers durians — for free — out of goodwill, even though they knew they could not have been at fault since Leong Tee only offers delivery services via WhatsApp. Since they put out the Facebook post, they have stopped doing so.

Mr Lim said they eventually got to know of Durian Delivery when affected customers told him about it. 

“During that time, when about five people came up to us to complain about their durians, it was very bewildering and we did not know why our durians were like that. We only sell durians when they are 100 per cent ripe and fresh.” 

Similarly, Durian Prince posted a warning to its customers on Facebook on June 4, saying it had nothing to do with Durian Delivery.

A spokesperson for Durian Prince told TODAY that the company’s owners were “confused” when they started receiving calls enquiring about orders that had not been made with them. 

They later found out that these orders had in fact been placed with Durian Delivery, saying that their similar names might have contributed to customers’ confusion.

DURIAN DELIVERY SAYS

When contacted, Durian Delivery co-founder Jonathan Poon told TODAY that they run an honest business and never intended to mislead consumers into thinking they deliver durians from the vendors featured in the blog posts.

Instead, Durian Delivery sells fruits from its own durian farms in Johor and Pahang, he said. 

He added that the website first started out as a blog, but he and his partners started the durian delivery service in response to requests from readers.

He believes that the company’s “generic” name could be the cause of confusion.

“Because our name is Durian Delivery, so (some customers) actually don’t really understand who we are and they just think it is a delivery service (for other vendors)… It’s not. It’s just a very generic name. So I think that’s where the confusion comes from,” he said.

He claimed, however, that the majority of his customers are aware that the firm's durians are from its own plantations. 

“If you look at our product page, there is even a video saying where our durians are from.”

TODAY asked about the complaints that other vendors said they have received from customers who claimed they obtained low-quality durians after ordering through Durian Delivery.

Mr Poon said that Durian Delivery receives such complaints daily, but added that this is an expected part of the business, since “durian is a fruit”. He said the company offers such customers fresher durian as compensation, if they send photo evidence of the bad fruit with their complaints.

One customer of Durian Delivery, who declined to be named, said she was aware that the company was not affiliated with the popular stalls named in its blog posts, but added that by mentioning famous competitors on its website, “customers might get the wrong impression” and be misled.

A TODAY reader, writing on Facebook, said he almost ordered from Durian Delivery thinking that it delivers Ah Seng's Durian.

He wrote: "Reason being I have searched on Google: Ah Seng Durian Delivery, and their link came up top. And the title says 'Ah Seng Durian by Durian Delivery Singapore'. How did that sound to you? If you're not familiar with Ah Seng (I'm not), wouldn't you think that it is 'by Durian Delivery'?"

Another customer, Mr Justin Chua, however, said he felt Durian Delivery’s website makes it clear that it is not an agent for other vendors.

He added that customers who got confused probably had a “too long, didn’t read” attitude, which resulted in them placing their orders without reading the website properly. 

“The blog post already states that it is a review. And when you order there is no description of the famous brand at all,” he said.