MONEY MORAL DILEMMA: Would you want them sacked?

t_i_g_e_rr

If this was the 100'th person who had lost £100, wouldn't getting them sacked actually be the moral thing to do for the next 100 people.
I might write a letter telling the company "I know the person is on their final warning". Perhaps then a truthful person would survive, but a liar would be sacked for deceit.
When the boot is on the other foot, this doesn't work. "Please don't record a default on my account, I won't be able to get a mortgage if you do". Is there a good reason why I can't have a mortgage? Perhaps. Is there a good reason for this person to lose their job? Perhaps. It isn't the complainer’s job to judge whether they are telling the truth or not, or whether they are fit to do the job or not.
You might be doing the company a favour. Maybe bad call centre staff could bring down the whole company, costing many more jobs.
So, the £100 is mine, but the decision to sack or not is not mine. I bear no guilt for complaining since it was not I that did anything wrong.

jat100

Although I would feel great sympathy for the individual concerned, I would still complain. Whilst I would not want to bear any responsibility for someone losing their job, I would feel greater responsibility for the many customers who might suffer a similar loss, possibly without noticing or knowing who to or how to complain.

If I was the employee concerned, I would not want to use emotional blackmail to prevent someone complaining, thereby saving my job. I would feel some pride in trying to sort the problem out to the customer's satisfaction so that my boss would see that, if I made a mistake, I had the wherewithal to admit to it and fix it. Everyone makes mistakes - the way in which we deal with them is the true measure.

jat100

Further to my previous post:

A possible solution to this dilemma is for the customer to ask the employee to assist in the complaint. Then, the customer would be able to contact the employee's boss to advise how helpful he/she had been.

A piece of advice I was given years ago:
It is better to admit to a mistake when you can offer at least one solution on how to fix it.

EnandEm

How about asking why they're in this situation? If it's a bad company to work for the company might be expecting unfair performance from their staff. If you talk nicely to the person who's cost you money you could get more info about what the company's up to internally. If they're prepared to ask you, a customer, for mercy, rather than trust their company, then they must be quite desperate which means there must be something wrong with where they are working. I've worked for two major companies, both of whom were featured on Watchdog tonight because of their appalling customer service, and in both instances used to get into trouble / frowned upon for being too customer friendly - even though I would defend my actions by saying that turning every customer complaint into an opportunity to help them is good for the company's brand long term. So it might be worth seeing whether the operative's mistake is owing to company policy as a whole and whether they might be in trouble for reasons which are costing the company money short term (ie by refunding customers without question), but generally benefitting customers and the company long term. In this case you could then go above the head of the person who caused the mistake without mentioning names (always go straight for the CEO / Chairman's office) and also then be armed with information about how their company works internally. I would try to give the poor operative a break - it's not generally realised for example how many women work in appallingly paid customer service jobs because the hours are often ok for looking after children but the conditions are such that no normal person would consider working in these jobs, except for being desperate to get some sort of work that fits around childcare.

coolcol1

everyones complaining?
again-everyones complaining?
i thought we were a country of blairs???!(hehe)
i too would complain but to the company not the man!

Bones_2

Complain. It's not like the amount is peanuts - £100 is nearly half my weekly take home pay - who could afford to lose that?

The emotional blackmail would also make me more likely to fire off a letter of complaint to the MD of the company, than drop a complaint altogether, whatever amount of money was involved.

If, on the other hand, the employee had offered to fix the problem in a professional manner, I would be more likely to write to the company thanking them for solving the problem and praising the employee for their part in the matter.

Quasar

I'd go ahead with the complaint because:

1) If he/she's already on a final warning, then I wonder what that was for - another badly advised customer? Whatever it is, it shows a poor worker.

2) I won't be done out of £100 to protect someone's job when he/she can badly advise the next customer. Ok, maybe I don't care that much about the next customer, but still.

3) I won't be pushed to be quiet by a sob story at the end of my phone.

pmd

Complain: the operator's next customer might be a non-assertive non-MSE-er who needs that £100 desperately (or the next mistake may be for £1000 instead). The company needs to know that things are going wrong. I might suggest to the operator that they talk to their trade union - and that if they aren't in a union, they maybe need to think about joining one in future.

cruyff73

I'd definately continue with my complaint and I wouldn't feel guilty about it. As many have said, if it's their final warning then they probably shouldn't be doing the job anyway and are not learning from past mistakes. I'd be very dubious as to whether it was the truth anyway!

cport80

I would give them a chance to put things right since this would be mutually beneficial (I get my £100, they keep their job). If they were unable to fix their mistake then I would complain.