A man in Singapore who paid S$70 for cupcakes customised with the faces of him and his friends complained that several of the faces looked the same, and claimed that the bakery responded to his request for a refund by blocking him on WhatsApp.

Responding to Mothership's queries, the bakery provided their side of the story and apologised for their WhatsApp communication.

Customised cupcakes looked similar, name misspelled

Mothership reader Sean said that he had placed an order on Dec. 22, 2020 for 12 cupcakes with customised faces from Tings Bakery & Event Styling.

The cupcakes, which cost S$5 each, would feature faces designed according to photos provided by Sean, and names written out.

However, when Sean picked up the cupcakes three days later, he discovered that three of the faces — those of "Andrew", "Josh", and "Shaun" — looked strikingly similar to one another.

In addition, one of the names — "Jesper" — was spelled incorrectly.

Sean also told Mothership that the cupcakes were earl grey flavour ones, but were "bland without any hint of earl grey".

Customised to their best ability, based on photos

Tings Bakery told Mothership that they had customised the cupcakes "to our best based on the photos the customer had provided".

The bakery explained the process:

"For faces to be sculpted on the cupcakes, as most bakers may be aware of, the faces requested will be of a cuter version as these are all handmade and it's impossible to do a replica.

To bring out the character of the person, we had carefully designed the faces according to the prominent features such as their hairstyle, face shapes and accessory such as the spectacles."

With regard to the faces of "Andrew", "Josh", and "Shaun", which Sean complained looked "the same", the bakery said that the hairstyles were "subtly different", as were the curvature and the shapes of the faces.

The bakery also provided a picture of the full set of 12 cupcakes, which shows four other faces which look quite dissimilar.

The bakery also addressed their mistake in spelling Jesper's name:

"As for the name which was spelt wrongly, we had overlooked and apologised to the customer through our messaging."

Customer could have checked on cupcakes at bakery

Tings Bakery added that Sean collected the cupcakes from their bakery himself, and that if he had checked the cupcakes on the spot, they could have made any changes that he needed.

However, the bakery said, Sean did not mention any issues with the cupcakes and stayed in the shop for around 15 minutes while waiting for his friends to arrive.

"There was sufficient time for him to check and our usual practice was to make changes and improve on it if there was any dissatisfaction over the cupcakes upon collection.

The customer did not mention anything hence it's presumed that everything was good to go."

If Sean was not satisfied with the cupcakes, Tings Bakery added, he could have brought the order back for them to make changes. However, he did not.

Tings Bakery also pushed back at Sean's complaint about the lack of earl grey flavour in the cupcakes:

"Firstly, the earl grey flavourings we used were made from authentic tea leaves. We had customers who ordered earl grey flavoured cakes from our bakery and there was no adverse feedback."

"The customer also did not inform us on this issue earlier which makes us wonder the authenticity of his claim," the bakery said.

Tings Bakery also added that all customers fill up an order form which includes the company's terms and conditions.

"It is stated clearly that payment will not be refunded unless the cake is damaged due to our negligence.

We have also highlighted that any sample picture provided are only for reference and the results will not be the same as all our cakes/ cupcakes are handmade."

Apologise on behalf of staff who handled WhatsApp

According to WhatsApp screenshots, Sean reached out to Tings Bakery about the spelling mistake and the similar-looking faces.

However, he received no response from the bakery until four days later on Dec. 29, when the bakery responded saying that they had been "very busy" those few days.

The next day, Sean reached out again, asking Tings Bakery for a token refund for the inconvenience.

The bakery then apparently blocked Sean on WhatsApp.

Tings Bakery told Mothership that the reason for their delay in replying to Sean's initial WhatsApp message was because they were busy preparing orders, and that they apologised to him instantly once they saw his message.

The bakery did recognise fault in the way that they handled Sean's query, however, and apologised on behalf of the staff member who "didn't handle the matter well" on WhatsApp.

Tings Bakery added that they have already given a warning to the staff member in question, and will make sure that it will not happen again in the future.

The bakery did not address the decision to block Sean on WhatsApp.

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Top photo courtesy of Tings Bakery & Event Styling.