I’ve gone out of my way to give back much smaller amounts than that, so a mistake of that magnitude would result in unloading the kids and going back in to return the money. If I’d already gotten home, I’d call first and then take it back.
Then I’d withdraw some cash from my account, assuming I had any, and take myself to Sizzler on my own dime to celebrate my honesty.
I recently spent a couple of hours tracking down and reuniting an empty, lost purse with its owner. It was Coach, too–coulda sold it on eBay for $50 or so.
Just in case anyone misunderstood my last post, i want to point out that i was not agreeing with Ellis Dee’s actions at all; i was only agreeing that his actions would constitute being a dick.
Especially since, in the first paragraph of his post, he makes clear that if he needed the money, he would keep it, morals be damned.
It’s the height of hypocrisy to excuse your own dishonesty, and then turn around and try to get an employee fired for making an honest mistake. I really find it hard to recincile this statement:
and this one:
You didn’t mind “hurting the owner” when you needed the money.
One thing that some people may not realize is how easy it can be to give extra change, especially if you’ve just gotten a stack of brand new, uncirculated bills from the bank. One time while working retail, I almost gave a woman an extra $20 bill - they stick together, you see. Circulated bills tend not too because they’re more worn and wrinkly.
It was clear. And I agree, it would be a dick move. That’s why I said it myself.
You don’t sound like you’ve ever known hunger. It’s not pleasant. You’d be amazed what thoughts go through your mind when you have no food, no way of getting food, and you haven’t eaten in over a day.
Honesty is a luxury. Survival is not. Granted, honesty comes into the picture pretty quickly. Once you have food and shelter, honesty is the bee’s knees. But go ask a homeless person how important honesty is to them. And while you’re at it, ask them what they would do in the OP’s hypothetical, so that you can rant and rave to them about how important honesty is.
You are having trouble reconciling the two because you likely have never experienced hunger.
But I dispute the “honest mistake” thing. I clearly stated that an honest mistake would warrant completely different action; return the money with no fuss. Giving out an accidental $50 is simply not an honest mistake. It is the height of incompetence.
Ask people who handle money every day, and see what they tell you. One poster in this thread has stated that no drawer was ever more than $4 light for a shift. We’re talking an order of magnitude higher than that. Sure, put a manager on cash and you might get the occasional major screwup. But people whose job it is to handle money simply do not give out accidental fifties. Doesn’t happen.
That is what my response is addressing. The ridiculous hypothetical.
Let me be very clear here. My main problem with your position is not that you might choose to keep the money if you were suffering from poverty and hunger. I can completely understand that position.
What has my jaw dropping on the floor, rather, is your rank hypocrisy.
You spend considerable effort telling us how bad it is to be hungry, and how i shouldn’t judge the honesty of people who don’t have enough to eat.
But then, in the next breath, you make quite clear that you are willing to put someone into that same situation—out of work, with the very real possibility of ending up in poverty and hunger—for a simple mistake.
You tell us how awful hunger is, and how we shouldn’t judge the actions of people in such a situation. Yet you apparently believe that an error (whether it be an “honest mistake” or “gross incompetence”) is sufficient cause for depriving someone of their living.
You misread, or misunderstood, or are being deliberately obtuse.
An honest mistake is simply that. I never once in this thread recommended termination for an honest mistake. Gross incompetence, OTOH, is sufficient grounds for termination from any job, and often prevents a person from pursuing other jobs in the same position. My stance is that the OP outlined a hypothetical that is an example of gross incompetence for a professional money handler. Thus, termination is warranted.
This reply of yours that I quoted, you seem to be implying that gross incompetence is not grounds for firing. That’s an interesting position; do elaborate. (Unless, of course, you were attempting to paraphrase my position. If that’s the case, please refrain from doing so in the future, as it was a blatant distortion. Use the quote feature instead.)
And as to your strawman, losing a job != starving to death.
Same here. And was very happy when someone returned the favor. As a student I used to work at a post-office and once accidentally handed out a sheet of 100 5 guilder stamps instead of 100 80 cents stamps (they nearly have the same colour). Where I’d normally pride myself in sometimes managing a balance difference of only 5 cents, that would have been one of 420 guilders. :smack:
I had an interesting experience a few years ago, which possibly influenced my return-the-cash response here.
I held a yard sale and sold a ton of baby stuff dirt cheap. Lots and LOTS of baby clothes, that sort of thing. About a week later, I received an envelope in the mail. Inside was a quarter taped to a sheet of paper, and a note that said something along the lines of “I bought some things at your sale, but I didn’t realize until I got home that I’d stuck one of the sleepers in my bag as I shopped. It had a price tag of .25 on it. I didn’t want to steal it, so I’m sending you the money.”
The girl who sent it was from a Mennonite (or something similar, I can’t remember) family, and we barely knew each other. She probably had to do some detective work to find out my full name and address. I’ve never forgotten her honesty, and the fact that her integrity was more important to her than that quarter would have ever been to me.
Well, recently I didn’t have enough money on me to buy my lunch in my building. I asked the check-out girl if I could owe her the $.50 and told her I’d bring it right down.
Sure enough, I got sidetracked and didn’t get it to her until the following Monday. But I did give it to her.
Would I go back to the store if they overchanged me a penny? In Lobsang’s defense, I probably wouldn’t. If they overchanged me a dollar, I’d probably give it to them the next time I was in the store.
I’m the least religious person around here. But I do cotton to the ol’ do unto others thing. I would like someone to tell me I overchanged them. I would expect to be treated in kind. Most folks wouldn’t notice a penny. But if I DID notice – and I caught it before leaving the store – of course I’d tell them they gave me too much.
True story: My wife sprained her ankle dancing at our wedding reception, so she was on crutches for the honeymoon. We arrived in Munich, and found a nice restaurant that we could walk/hobble to in about 20 minutes. We had a nice dinner at a sidewalk table. My wife went to the ladies’ room, and then I went to the men’s room. We left.
Back in the hotel room, she asked me how much the dinner cost. I said, “I don’t know–you paid the bill.” She said, “I thought you paid the bill!” We each thought the other had paid while we were in the bathroom.
I walked back to the restaurant, found the waitress, and paid for the meal. She thanked me profusely and told me that the cost of the meal would have come out of her pay for the day.
I like keeping a positive balance in my karma account.
10 years ago I might have kept it, but 10 years ago I lost my wallet in a casino in Atlantic City. It had over 500.00 and all my cards. I was freaked. I must have looked for it for over a half hour. As I was about to give up, some nice couple came up to me and said “Looking for this?”.
Every thing was in there, not a single dollar taken. I was so happy I gave them 50.00 for dinner on me. And since that time I have always taken pains to make sure I do the same for others.
I would return it immediately. If I discovered the mistake that afternoon or the next day, I would drive to the store and return it. I would return it no matter when or where I discovered the mistake.
My honesty isn’t BS altruistic macho, it’s borne of my sense of compassion, justice, ethics and belief in the social contract.
I don’t want to go through life as some rationizing cheat who won’t so much as lift a finger to help someone else out. I don’t believe in karma, but I do believe in honesty and keeping that $50 is dishonest and the surest sign of dishonesty is the tendency to rationalize, minimize, blame and deny.
Celebrating an ill-gotten $50 at the Sizzler? Christ, don’t make me laugh/vomit.
Yes, we do and yes, it does. I’ve worked in the cash office at my store for almost 4 years and I can tell you that extra 50s are handed out (or kept) on occasion, and extra 20s more often. These are largely honest mistakes, although we do find and fire people for too many “mistakes” that aren’t really accidental.
We discipline our associates for being over or short, and while over is more common (failure to hand the customer their cash-back on a debit or their stamps usually), shortages do happen, and they do not have to pay them back.
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
The clerk who made the mistake will have to make up the shortfall in the cash drawer out of his own pocket. Give that money back. That is the right thing to do. Keeping it is the wrong thing to do.
There is a difference between right and wrong, you know.
