Forgiveness Reminder at Christmas Time

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bobinfaith

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Hello brothers and sisters;

I've always had a hard time time with poor customer service but remember an experience with my own poor customer service.

Years ago I worked two jobs, the second one at KMart. I gave a customer a two week rain check on patio furniture because the pillows were out of stock. The pillows came in but instead of contacting the customer with the rain check, I used the pillows to fill another patio furniture sale and ordered another extra pillows.

Well, the customer came back two weeks later and caught me by surprise. I forgot about the rain check and confessed to her what I did. It was a busy store that day and she proceeded to scold me which drew a large crowd. I stood there with my mouth shut, hands behind my back and took it from her. After she scolded me she gave me another chance to make it right. My store manager saw the incident and allowed me to take the humiliation and said later, "welcome to retail, Bob." I learned an embarrassing lesson that came with forgiveness.

A week ago we ordered a pizza dinner online. The driver called me from outside my home, drove off leaving the food in a plastic bag on my front patio wall instead of meeting me face to face. The pizza was burned and didn't taste good, however, the extra club sandwich and soda was fine.

I contacted the store and read the information on my receipt and the number on the box. The store could not identify my name or my order. The store suggested my pizza came from a different location and I was asked who delivered it. On the receipt it indicated a third party delivery vendor. I was asked to contact this third party vendor. When I contacted them I learned their office was from another state! The third party delivery service person immediately identified me, my order and they were the ones who debited my card. They did their best to work out the details of the bad pizza.

The top owner of the original pizza place emailed me and apologized profusely in regards to my bad experience at their location. He already addressed his staff and management team. He went on to say they are a small family owned restaurant who live and work in the area and asked us to give them a second chance and offered another pizza and gift card.

I remembered my lesson from KMart and told the owner we appreciated the generous pizza and gift card but they didn't have to. We told him we will keep his business on file when we order our next pizza. Besides, we could just walk in since we live a mile and a half instead of ordering online.

Joseph was a great example of forgiveness. Though this Biblical story was of different and extreme circumstances, Joseph's forgiveness was a gift from God and this impacted him to be a loving and caring person.

Genesis 50:19-21, 19 But Joseph said to them, “Don’t be afraid. Am I in the place of God? 20 You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives. 21 So then, don’t be afraid. I will provide for you and your children.” And he reassured them and spoke kindly to them. - NIV

Perhaps the pizza place was extremely busy that Saturday evening. It made me think and learned that customer service is perhaps one of the biggest challenges a business will face. I can't expect the world to conform to what I expect for every service, but I can allow a bad experience to lead me to check my heart and offer the same grace as Joseph did to his brothers.

I'm sure many of you can relate to my experience. How did you deal with it?

God bless you all and Merry Christmas.
 
hi bobinfaith. I like your forgiveness thread.

Yes I have had times like these and my frustration wants to jump out and strangle all pizza delivery agents. But in my old age, an angel pops on my shoulder, knocks off the devil, and like Scrooge, takes me back in time to a place of my youth and a shoddy work ethic, to remind me how sometimes I have cut corners and paid the price. Usually guilt or some form of anger.

Yes I burned buns and sent them off to be eaten shamelessly…
Yes I never cleaned toilets and left them for someone else to clean even though it was my job because I was angry I was given the job..

So, I pretty much imagine now, looking back, maybe 3 young kids trying to throw a thousand pizza togethers for hundreds of people in one hour whilst being screamed at by a boss from hell on minimum wage and trying to make ends meet.

Oh, and the pizza usually tastes better when I take a trip down memory lane somehow 😂

77336A38-8832-4F91-8B50-76DD7D4CABBA.gif
 
Aw.
So far I have avoided the shops altogether in December and in and out quick because I know what it's like, it can be very stressful.

I've tended to go and pick up my pizza and ask beforehand it be labelled with the topping on the phone, and checked and counted everything is there. If I ordered 30 pizzas, I rang early and allowed them plenty of time to make it lol

That was the days when I did the pizza run at the library. You had to read 7 books to have the pizza. Then I got children to make a thank you card for the pizza place because those pizzas were free. I learned after doing it each week to check cos I didn't want the orders mucked up! If there was an extra pizza that didn't get picked up I gave it away or to the teacher.

I made sure they had read those books but if any cheated they would have eaten the pizza with a guilty conscience!
 
Boxing Day is another story...

Joseph's family trial is probably the story that makes me cry most in the Bible. I wasn't necessarily the favourite but I know what its like to have family members gang up on you! Joseph did turn out to be the breadwinner in the end when everyone else was starving in the famine. He could have cut himself off from his family after what they did to him (and kept the food to himself) but he didn't. I think in the end you love them anyway cos...they are family. And only family can really pull you through the hard times - though we do need to ask outsiders for help, its family that take you in when you are starving.
 
Customers, in general, are frustrated. Too often customer anxiety is visited upon store workers (as well as wait-staff at eateries.
Within the past couple of weeks my wife and I encountered several local businesses that posted signs asking their customers to be respectful, not complain, and realize that in many cases frustration is taken out on those who are not responsible for the whatever slight you may believe you have encountered.

I am currently staying a few days with my son, who is a team lead at a local Walmart. I've visited his store and while many regulars know him and ask for him by name because he does try to meet everyone's needs I have also seen him go out of his way to be helpful and courteous to his customers, only to have them get mad at things beyond his control and bitterly complain when he is just following his rules.
 
Siloam said:
team lead at a local Walmart.
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Walmart is not the retailer it use to be. when sam Walton was alive he took care of his employees and customers . retail is tough when the customer is wrong there still right. in a big retail like Walmart its a very tough field to work in. most the headaches starts with Corporate decisions. then the lower end of the chain catches it. we seldom go walmart due to corpt heads . not the same as it use to be, in fact i just seen on the news where n.y was wanting to pass a law that all food services has be open 7 days a week chic flilay . stays open only 6 days.


its tough working in the job market
 
forgiven61 said:
Walmart is not the retailer it use to be. when sam Walton was alive he took care of his employees and customers . retail is tough when the customer is wrong there still right. in a big retail like Walmart its a very tough field to work in. most the headaches starts with Corporate decisions. then the lower end of the chain catches it. we seldom go walmart due to corpt heads . not the same as it use to be, in fact i just seen on the news where n.y was wanting to pass a law that all food services has be open 7 days a week chic flilay . stays open only 6 days.


its tough working in the job market
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Is this the famous Waltons tv show I keep hearing about (but never seen) ?
 
I think Sunday trading has eroded what used to be a day of rest for (most) nzers, I don't know what it's like in the US now since their market is huge and big box type stores are the thing there. When Cost-Co opened up here people went a bit crazy. I have been but its shopping experience is not something I would enjoy on a regular basis. You go round with a HUGE cart thats the size of a trailer, for I suppose to fit giant purchases made for a giant home and giant people.

We already have Warehouses and bulk buying places here. I've not worked in The Warehouse but worked in retail (bookshop chain) and done picking and packing orders in other warehouses. Some libraries are massive like warehouses and yes I have worked a 7 day operation, sometimes on Saturdays or Sundays. Basically you give up your social life having to cater to everyone else's.
 
forgiven61 said:
no Sam Walton was a Christian man who started Walmart in the state of Arkansas . the Walton's on t.v are just actors you can read about him https://www.biography.com/business-figure/sam-walton
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Were the Waltons on tv based on the real-life Waltons? Is what I meant.
Will have a look.

Robert Laidlaw started the Farmers department store in NZ and he was a Christian.

Was Woolworths a Christian? Does anybody know? I know they are insanely wealthy, having just bought out the Countdown supermarkets in nz.
 
Biography link can't be accessed in my region. I'll do some research.

Boxing Day here, but Merry Christmas day for everyone still celebrating. I tend to think of it as Jesus week because its a big stress when everyones having birthday parties all on the one day you can't go to them all lol
 
Lanolin said:
Were the Waltons on tv based on the real-life Waltons? Is what I meant. Will have a look. Robert Laidlaw started the Farmers department store in NZ and he was a Christian. Was Woolworths a Christian? Does anybody know? I know they are insanely wealthy, having just bought out the Countdown supermarkets in nz.
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Hey Lanolin;

I believe the Waltons were based on a family by the name Hamner who lived in Virginia. I never heard of the Hamner family.

Ralph Waite, played the father, John Walton Sr on the Waltons. The first time I watched the Waltons was a Christmas episode. His son John Boy Jr. received an artist kit for Christmas.

John Waite was also famous for his role as Jackson Gibbs on NCIS, the father of Jethro Gibbs played by Mark Harmon.

NCIS, Naval Criminal Investigative Service will air for it's 21st year in February 2024.

Woolworths was never a Christian company, but a privately owned business.
 
forgiven61 said:
no Sam Walton was a Christian man who started Walmart in the state of Arkansas . the Walton's on t.v are just actors you can read about him https://www.biography.com/business-figure/sam-walton
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(1918-1992)

Who Was Sam Walton?​

Sam Walton opened the first Walmart in 1962, after years in the retail management business. The discount chain expanded internationally over the next 30 years, growing into the world’s largest company by 2010. Walton stepped down as CEO in 1988, at the age of 70, but remained active in the company until his death in 1992.

Early Years​

A pioneering businessman who broke convention and showed that large discount stores could thrive in small, rural areas, Samuel Moore Walton was born March 29, 1918, in Kingfisher, Oklahoma. He was the first son of Thomas Walton, a banker, and his wife, Nancy Lee.

Early in his life Walton and his family moved to Missouri, where he was raised. An able student and a good athlete, Walton quarterbacked his high school football team and was an Eagle Scout. Upon his graduation from Hickman High School in Columbia, Missouri, in 1936, his classmates named him "most versatile boy."

After high school, Walton stayed close to home and enrolled at the University of Missouri in Columbia, where he graduated with a degree in economics in 1940.

Early Retail Career​

Following college, Walton got his first real taste of the retail world when took a job in Des Moines with the J.C. Penney Company, which was still a relatively small retailer. After serving as an Army captain in an intelligence unit during World War II, Walton returned to private life in 1945 and used a $25,000 loan from his father-in-law to acquire his first store, a Ben Franklin franchise in Newport, Arkansas.

In less than two decades, Walton, working with his younger brother, James, came to own 15 Ben Franklin stores. But frustration over the management of the chain, in particular the decision to ignore Walton’s push to expand into rural communities, prompted him to strike out on his own.

Building an Empire​

In 1962 Walton opened his first Walmart store in Rogers, Arkansas. Success was swift. By 1976 Walmart was a publicly traded company with share value north of $176 million. By the early 1990s, Walmart’s stock worth had jumped to $45 billion. In 1991 Walmart surpassed Sears, Roebuck & Company to become the country’s largest retailer.

Walton was responsible for a lot of the success. His vision of a discount retail store in rural areas was accompanied by the founder’s hard-charging, demanding style. Walton, who often began his work days at 4:30 in the morning, expected results from those beneath him, and wasn’t afraid to change course or reshuffle his personnel if he didn’t like the numbers that came back to him.

Even in the grips of a recession, Walton’s stores proved successful. In 1991, as the country was mired in an economic downturn, Walmart increased sales by more than 40 percent. But that success also made Walmart a target, especially for small-town merchants and other residents who argued the giant chain was wiping out a community’s smaller stores and downtown retail. Walton, however, tried to meet those fears head-on, promising jobs and donations to local charities, which the company often delivered in some fashion.

Final Years​

An avid hunter and outdoorsman, Walton portrayed a humble image right up until his death. His vehicle of choice was a red 1985 Ford pickup. With his wife Helen, whom he married in 1943, he lived in the same house in Bentonville, Arkansas, since 1959. The couple had four children: S. Robson, John, James and Alice.

In 1985 Forbes magazine named Walton the wealthiest man in the United States, a declaration that seemed to irritate the businessman more than anything else. “All that hullabaloo about somebody’s net worth is just stupid, and it’s made my life a lot more complex and difficult,” he said.

Over the last several years of his life, Walton suffered from two types of cancer: hairy-cell leukemia and bone marrow cancer. He died of the latter on April 5, 1992, at the University of Arkansas Medical Sciences Hospital in Little Rock, Arkansas.

Just a month before his death, Walton was honored by President George H.W. Bush with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
 
bobinfaith said:
Hey Lanolin;

I believe the Waltons were based on a family by the name Hamner who lived in Virginia. I never heard of the Hamner family.

Ralph Waite, played the father, John Walton Sr on the Waltons. The first time I watched the Waltons was a Christmas episode. His son John Boy Jr. received an artist kit for Christmas.

John Waite was also famous for his role as Jackson Gibbs on NCIS, the father of Jethro Gibbs played by Mark Harmon.

NCIS, Naval Criminal Investigative Service will air for it's 21st year in February 2024.

Woolworths was never a Christian company, but a privately owned business.
Click to expand...
Never seen either of those shows. But people would say The Simpsons (also a tv show about a family) should have been more like the Waltons.

The Simpsons did have some touching Christmas episodes, their dog was named Santa's Little Helper. The Simpsons neighbours the Flanders were funny/extreme Christians, and Simpsons did go to church. It was a sort of Luther-Presby type church called the First Church of Springfield. Marge (the mother) had faith and Homer (the dad) often got into trouble with God. But he did talk to God in one episode!
 
forgiven61 said:
(1918-1992)

Who Was Sam Walton?​

Sam Walton opened the first Walmart in 1962, after years in the retail management business. The discount chain expanded internationally over the next 30 years, growing into the world’s largest company by 2010. Walton stepped down as CEO in 1988, at the age of 70, but remained active in the company until his death in 1992.

Early Years​

A pioneering businessman who broke convention and showed that large discount stores could thrive in small, rural areas, Samuel Moore Walton was born March 29, 1918, in Kingfisher, Oklahoma. He was the first son of Thomas Walton, a banker, and his wife, Nancy Lee.

Early in his life Walton and his family moved to Missouri, where he was raised. An able student and a good athlete, Walton quarterbacked his high school football team and was an Eagle Scout. Upon his graduation from Hickman High School in Columbia, Missouri, in 1936, his classmates named him "most versatile boy."

After high school, Walton stayed close to home and enrolled at the University of Missouri in Columbia, where he graduated with a degree in economics in 1940.

Early Retail Career​

Following college, Walton got his first real taste of the retail world when took a job in Des Moines with the J.C. Penney Company, which was still a relatively small retailer. After serving as an Army captain in an intelligence unit during World War II, Walton returned to private life in 1945 and used a $25,000 loan from his father-in-law to acquire his first store, a Ben Franklin franchise in Newport, Arkansas.

In less than two decades, Walton, working with his younger brother, James, came to own 15 Ben Franklin stores. But frustration over the management of the chain, in particular the decision to ignore Walton’s push to expand into rural communities, prompted him to strike out on his own.

Building an Empire​

In 1962 Walton opened his first Walmart store in Rogers, Arkansas. Success was swift. By 1976 Walmart was a publicly traded company with share value north of $176 million. By the early 1990s, Walmart’s stock worth had jumped to $45 billion. In 1991 Walmart surpassed Sears, Roebuck & Company to become the country’s largest retailer.

Walton was responsible for a lot of the success. His vision of a discount retail store in rural areas was accompanied by the founder’s hard-charging, demanding style. Walton, who often began his work days at 4:30 in the morning, expected results from those beneath him, and wasn’t afraid to change course or reshuffle his personnel if he didn’t like the numbers that came back to him.

Even in the grips of a recession, Walton’s stores proved successful. In 1991, as the country was mired in an economic downturn, Walmart increased sales by more than 40 percent. But that success also made Walmart a target, especially for small-town merchants and other residents who argued the giant chain was wiping out a community’s smaller stores and downtown retail. Walton, however, tried to meet those fears head-on, promising jobs and donations to local charities, which the company often delivered in some fashion.

Final Years​

An avid hunter and outdoorsman, Walton portrayed a humble image right up until his death. His vehicle of choice was a red 1985 Ford pickup. With his wife Helen, whom he married in 1943, he lived in the same house in Bentonville, Arkansas, since 1959. The couple had four children: S. Robson, John, James and Alice.

In 1985 Forbes magazine named Walton the wealthiest man in the United States, a declaration that seemed to irritate the businessman more than anything else. “All that hullabaloo about somebody’s net worth is just stupid, and it’s made my life a lot more complex and difficult,” he said.

Over the last several years of his life, Walton suffered from two types of cancer: hairy-cell leukemia and bone marrow cancer. He died of the latter on April 5, 1992, at the University of Arkansas Medical Sciences Hospital in Little Rock, Arkansas.

Just a month before his death, Walton was honored by President George H.W. Bush with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
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Interesting I wonder what his faith was
Sounds a bit like the Warehouse here, founded by Stephen Tindall and similar things happened in the smaller towns.
 
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