We’ll get to this real piece of work in a moment, but first, a personal story: I went out to a birthday dinner with a friend and a few other people the night before Thanksgiving. Not only was I paying for two-thirds of the meal (for five people), but we planned to hit a few bars and clubs the rest of the night, with me paying for quite a few drinks along the way. At least, I was supposed to. Well, the waitress at the restaurant screwed up the initial card swipe, then, with an assist from the manager, proceeded to swipe my card two more times. With about $500 in frozen money and the triple swipe, my bank shut down my card. With no cash, I was done for the night (paying for stuff, that is). It sucked, and I felt bad about it. I didn’t, however, proceed to bitch to the restaurant because 1) it’s one of my favorite restaurants and I’ve never had a problem there, 2) I knew all that shit would clear by Monday (annoying, to be sure), and 3) throwing a temper tantrum about it just wouldn’t solve anything.
Basically, shit happens, and what are you gonna do, right?
Well, if you’re Harvard Business School associate professor Ben Edelman, and you’ve just been overcharged a measly $4 on a Chinese takeout order, you fire off a bunch of angry e-mails to the offending Mom & Pop joint, threatening them with legal action. Here’s the entire e-mail chain (including responses from restaurant owner Ran Duan), courtesy of Boston.com:
Edelman assured Boston.com that he normally doesn’t engage in such behavior unless it involves large companies. Thus, he’s being nice and letting town officials think about his complaint for a few days before he decides his final course of action. Or, he could be a decent human being and let it go.
[Gawker]
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