A simple act of kindness

[Mill]

You know, I feel a lot of time society has gotten more toward making a buck and toeing the corporate line than helping out the customer. I had rented some movies several days before I left for Europe, but I gathered them all together and returned them the day I left. Even though I had double checked, I left one of the extra DVDs of Sin City on my Entertainment Center. When I came home I saw that I had several calls from Movie Gallery on my caller-id, so I went and looked and saw that I had left the DVD on the Entertainment Center. I drove to the store feeling like such a jerk, and realizing I'd probably have to pay about 30 bucks for my mistake.

Well, I was pleasantly shocked. I went in with my credit card in hand ready to pay my late-fee, but the cashier took in entirely off my account without me even asking! I told her that I felt like a jerk for not returning it for a week and a half, but I had flown to Europe, and had simply left the DVD at home. She said that it happens, but that since I returned it as soon as I got home (I did) and that I had returned all the other movies on time that she would just delete the fee. I was shocked! I guess it is good business sense to a degree, because if I had a 30 dollar late fee I would have probably waited a few months before I rented again just to punish myself. Rare to see that from a Corporation these days...

 

[meltdown75]

get her #

 

[FoBoT]

they are feeling the heat from netflix and know their days are numbered, so NOW they give a crap about you


but nice story anyway

 

[geno]

I had a rented DVD stolen from me and I wasn't even charged for it, pretty cool (this was Blockbuster BTW)

things like this make me want to give them more business, even though I hardly rent anything

 

[DrPizza]

Customer relations with good customers go a long ways...
If you're rude to customers in such a situation, there's simply too much competition.
Such acts lead to the retention of a lot of customers... The repeat business plus word of mouth advertising they get (they're not jerks about the policy when honest mistakes happen) will probably make up for more than the late fees.

Now, if a video store said, "I'm sorry, you're 5 minutes late with that video, so you have to pay the late fee." Then the opposite would happen. Some customers would get irritated by the anal retentiveness of such a schedule (particularly if something happened on the way to the store and they would have been on time) and will go elsewhere. Word gets out that they are anal retentive, and they get less word of mouth advertising.