Couple of weeks ago, I put $1.50 into the soda machine in the work lunchroom, and was rewarded with my 20 oz. Diet Dew and TWO 20 oz. Pepsi Colas. I offered the extras around the lunch room. One person accepted one, and I drank the other myself.
Last week, when the same machine stole a buck from me, I declined to put in for a refund.
Take it. The damn machine made you buy two bars when you only wanted one. Consider it a buy two get one free deal. And the third bar might have been hanging there because the machine ripped off someone else.
I’d take the candy. It all evens out over your lifetime.
Besides, Mr. Goodbars are tasty.
Curse my weird memory, but didn’t Archie and Meathead get into it over a similar situation? A malfunctioning payphone, maybe?
Something else: Take it, and stop using that vending machine.
Actually, it seems I had given the machine a good enough shake that the Mr. Goodbar, being thin, just slid out of its coil, so there was an empty coil at the front of the Mr. Goodbar slot.
I suppose the most ethical thing to do would have been to put in another 75 cents and advanced that coil forward, but I didn’t have any more money.
If someone really needs a Mr. Goodbar, there are a dozen other machines in the building they can use until the vending machine guy comes to refill them and rectifies the issue with the one I got the freebie from.
I voted take it, but if it was something I didn’t like that dropped, I would take it and give it away. I’m not inclined to just leave it there.
Take the candy bar. If it makes you feel more Zen, leave a Thanks! post-it on the glass.
I would take it and eat it. The only exceptions to this would be if I didn’t like it, in which case I’d give it away, or if I knew for a fact that 2 items had come out because someone else’s had gotten stuck. In that case, if I knew who had tried to buy it (say they’d been going around bitching about the machine eating their money or something) I’d track them down and give it to them.
I’d have visited the local chapter of the Moral Majority to inform it of the chocolate bar’s filthy double entendre name, and to persuade the Moral Majority to launch a campaign to change the bar’s name.
But first I would have eaten it to more easily dispose of the wrapper before any children saw it.
Take it. On average, I’ve probably lost more from vending machines than the rare times I’ve come out ahead. This is a small step toward breaking even.
80% take it
20% give it away
voted ‘other’
Keep it.
When Fate throws a gift in your lap it’s bad manners to toss it back.
Word for word what I was gonna say. Fuck, you’re not sticking up a liquor store here.
Now MOL, get outa my head.
Another ditto for MOL.
This reminds me of that old Gomer Pyle episode where he got he mistakenly got $2 extra on his paycheck. Gomer, being the honest gent that he is, wanted to give it back. But of course the whole effort turned out to be more trouble than it was worth.
Take it. In my experience with the same vending machines over a long period of time, they’ll screw you out of your money at least as often, if not more often than they’ll cough up a bonus.
Over time, it sort of evens out if you take the bonus (you still usually end up in the red though).
Say, that reminds me - I have a free bag of baked Lays in my desk drawer from just such an occasion. Not that I like baked Lays, or should be eating chips at 9:51am, but I missed breakfast.
Take it. It makes up for the times you put money and and get nothing in return.
If I like it, I’ll take it. If I don’t like it–which is most stuff in vending machines, to be honest–I’ll leave it for the next lucky person to find.
Our vending machine has little envelopes we can put on the vending machine and a reason why we think we are due a refund.
When this happened to me, I taped the candy bar to the envelope and wrote on the envelope that an extra candy bar dropped and taped them together at the same spot as the refund requests.