Upset customers of misleading durian business form Facebook support group, involve PMO and Shanmugam

Hell hath no fury like a durian lover scorned.

It’s durian season and folks expect nothing less than the best when biting into their pricey orders of premium Mao Shan Wang and Black Gold. 

A local durian delivery service, however, has been causing quite a furore among its customers — so much so that the latter even set up a Facebook group to recount their rotten experiences.

Called “Victims of duriansexpressdelivery.com”, the Facebook group is exactly that — a support group of sorts for those who’ve had bad encounters with the online durian store. 

In a deep dive by 8 Days, these aggrieved customers have noted that the durians they’ve gotten from the store have been gravely dreadful. Some have received rotten, inedible durian while others received barely defrosted ones. 

Other cases involved customers getting sent durians that were not at all what they ordered. According to 8 Days, one customer paid $224 for an assortment of Black Thorn, Black Pearl and Old Tree Mao Shan Wang durians but instead got three boxes of “tasteless ice-crusted frozen durian lumps” of unknown varieties. 

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These customers have banded together in the Facebook group after their complaints and requests for refunds saw little response. 150 of the customers have since made multiple reports with the police and the Consumers Association of Singapore (Case), and even forwarded their complaints to the Prime Minister’s Office and Minister for Home Affairs and Law K Shanmugam. 

The Facebook group has 208 members as of writing. 

Mistaken identity

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The troubles stemmed from a case of mistaken identity — many believed they were ordering from an established brand: Durian Express Delivery. 

The one that’s been angering people with supposedly inferior durians simply added an ’s’, leading people to order from duriansexpressdelivery.com instead of the renowned durianexpressdelivery.com. 

Reece Lee, the man behind Durian Express Delivery, told 8 Days about the issues he had to deal with due to the mix-up. According to him, he has had to handle up to 20 complaints a day by customers who believed that he sold them bad durians, even though he didn’t. 

“At the end of the day, we want to let people know we’re the authentic one. So for the sake of customers, it’s still okay lah,” Lee said. 

As for Durians Express Delivery, a spokesperson told 8 Days that the shop has since ceased its operations and claimed that at least 70 people have been refunded. Their website, however, remains up. 

AsiaOne has reached out to Durians Express Delivery for more comments. 

ilyas@asiaone.com