Day Four - Looking into my heart

Since we moved into our new house I have had several issues with my phone, with the internet, with a lost cheque and, most recently, with the delivery of a shower tray. On day 1 the van arrived with nothing on it! On day 2 they delivered a left-hand tray instead of right-hand one. On day 3 they did the same again! Eventually they got it right at the fourth time of asking!

One of the biggest frustrations is not being able to speak to anyone to explain your problem, each time you have to go into the company chat room and go through an automated system designed to increase your blood pressure. Only after an eternity do you get through to a customer service representative - who tries to help but doesn’t!

In this case, sadly, the only way we got satisfaction over our shower tray was by putting a bad review on social media. Within half an hour we received a phone call and they sorted it all out and then offered a nice sum in compensation, with an expectation we would alter the review!

Jesus says we should forgive people when they sin against us, but how can you extend that to companies and businesses? You certainly should never take it out on the people on the help desk, they didn’t cause the problem.

One other thing that happened to me recently was I decided to pay for my new car partly by credit card. When I went online to pay off the card I somehow managed to set it up to pay off on two consecutive days, making me badly overdrawn. I then went into my local branch seeking forgiveness for my error and their help to put things right. Not only did they spend over an hour sorting it out for me, but two days later I received a parcel with two bottles of wine to compensate for the error!

Forgiveness, both seeking and offering, releases us from the burden of feeling guilty or feeling resentful, both of which are harmful to our health and well-being.

It doesn’t undermine what has happened. We did not change the details of the review of the shower tray company, but we did add that they sorted it out and offered us compensation. But I really wish companies would go back to speaking to people rather than using chat rooms, particularly with automated robotic responses!

Vince Carrington