Recently, I bought a carton of milk from a FairPrice Finest outlet. When I returned home, I was dismayed to find that the milk had already gone off, even with an expiry date of two weeks later.

I walked to a nearby FairPrice store to ask for a refund, as the outlet I had bought the milk from was much farther away from my home.

At my regular FairPrice store, I waited 20 minutes before I was attended to, only to be told that I had to return the milk to the original FairPrice outlet I had bought it from.

I made the one-hour journey back to the original outlet and queued at the regular check-out counter to make my inquiry.

When it was my turn to be served, the cashier took 20 minutes to track down the supervisor, who was the only one authorised to give me a refund. I stood there awkwardly while a long queue formed behind me.

I am a heavily pregnant woman, and this experience really brought home the difficulty consumers face in returning or exchanging goods in Singapore when the product is faulty or defective.

I had expected that since FairPrice is ubiquitous around the country, and supermarket grocery shopping is essential to all in the community, it would be simpler to get a refund on a faulty item - 10 minutes perhaps, rather than four hours of my day.

I hope FairPrice changes its policies so that vulnerable people, like pregnant women and the elderly, in particular, are spared the inconvenience, time loss and physical toil in getting a simple refund for a faulty product.

This problem could perhaps be solved if FairPrice simply allowed returns at any of its branches, and also implemented separate counters for customer service inquiries, refunds and exchanges.

Amanda Ruiqing Flynn