I’m not happy about this, but there it is.
Back in October I wrote this post about how the boobs at Safeway managed to give me over $300 in food for my wife’s memorial event without charging me for it. I ruefully observed that as an ethicist I was obligated to go to the store and pay what I owed them despite the fact that the Safewayers were none the wiser: it was a classic example of “ethics is what you do when nobody’s watching.”
Today, like Michael Corleoni, I’m settling all family business, or at least the family business I can settle right now. I sent some money to the IRS, returned Comcast’s equipment because I switched to Verizon, had some guys shotgunned to death in an elevator, and paid the %4#@! Safeway bill.
Okay, I’m kidding about the elevator.
As some of you sagely predicted, I had to argue with the Safeway staff to pay the mishandled bill, but eventually they gave in. Did this indisputably ethical act of paying a debt that the recipient didn’t even know existed make me feel warm and virtuous? Did my classic Golden Rule conduct fill me with satisfaction and self-respect, knowing that, in this case at least, I had demonstrated honesty and integrity along with my bona fides as a professional ethicist? Hell no!
The creeps at Safeway didn’t even say thank-you. Paying up was still the right thing to do. Ethical conduct is said to be its own reward, but the beneficiary, if any, is usually society itself, not the sucker who forks over 300 bucks he could put to good use to a company that hires employees too dim or badly trained to master that “collect payment for products and services” thingy.
If I had been the Customer Service agent, I would have at least given me a coupon, or maybe a complimentary bottle of Korbel. But he wasn’t an ethicist, the lucky bastard…
Ethics Alarms 
Doing the right thing IS its own reward!
PWS
Paul speaks the truth.
We had a tangentially similar incident occur this Christmas Eve at our local Fareway. We got distracted talking with each other and the girl monitoring the self-checkouts…and left without paying for our groceries. It was something like $26, and we began questioning our payment, wondering if we actually paid, halfway to the next store. We went back, but the kiosk had been cleared and the manager told us, “thank you for coming back, but we have no record of the transaction, so consider it a gift.” I told the manager we’d watch our credit card statements for a few days…if nothing showed up, we’d be back. He chuckled and said don’t worry, probably figuring he wouldn’t see us again.
Last night, we went back to the Fareway, told them we still owed them $26 for groceries and they needed to ring us up. They called the manager down, who was gobsmacked and said as he rang us up, “You guys are one in a million.”
That response to a simple act of honesty and integrity is simultaneously humbling and tragic.
Jack, you are 100% correct that we are the “suckers” for paying back a bill that no one realizes is owed or – in our case – was told to forget. But even if the effects of your act aren’t profound, a few people are now aware of what you did and may choose to act ethically in a situation down the road…which will be seen by others who might choose to act ethically. The ripples of integrity you created at a Safeway can have a huge lifespan in the water..
Well done!
Be safe tonight…one and all.
In this case the manager told you, “thank you for coming back, but we have no record of the transaction, so consider it a gift.”
I would be inclined to accept this ‘gift’.
AITUAH ?
First comment on 2025! Take a bow…
I would tend to agree.
You make the offer to pay what is owed and if they declare it a gift, accept the gift.
After all, considering the accounting problems, that $26.00 payment on an amount not owed in the system might cost hundreds or thousands of dollars in professional costs during the next audit.
-Jut
It was our mistake, and we felt we needed to correct it, regardless of what the store said.
You! You did this too me!
A few days before Christmas, I parked in my usual spot. The lot operator had changed the payment method. It used to have gate, and you paid when you exited. They recently removed the gates, and now you have to prepay online. It’s a pain.
On the day in question, I was running late AND their website was glitching. So I went to the office intending to try again in 20 minutes.
I of course forgot until I was walking back to my car in the evening, and instead paid for the day just before I drove away.
Happy New Year, Mr. Marshall. It will have to be better than 2024.
If nothing else, you don’t do it for them, you do it for you. Your honesty and integrity are worth far more than 300 bucks to you, and you’ve proven it. You weren’t fighting and arguing to pay 300 dollars to an idiot, you were paying it to balance the scales honestly. Because it’s important. May we all hold ourselves in such regard!