Business Error in Your Favor

I checked my credit card statement today (online), and found a weird discrepancy in which it said I owed less than I thought I did. Turned out there was a peculiar coincidence: an exchange at one clothing site was misprocessed as a return--for exactly the same amount of money as a purchase at another clothing site. Curious, no? The extreme tidiness of the coincidence made it easy to ignore--it was kind of just like getting a sweater and a pair of flats for free, like I'd never paid at all. It was tempting.

But I'd gotten really good customer service around this exchange process--the first dress they'd sent had a defective seam, and they'd sent a new one right away with expedited shipping--that it would absolutely have outraged the conscience to cheat them. It's always easier to make the right call when there's a human face on it, you know? It might have been a little more tempting if it had been the Gap.

I wrote the woman I'd corresponded with about the exchange, telling her to charge my card again.