Technical Difficulties

The day after the story of the car that won't start....

“Hello, Dominion of Movies?”

“Hi, My name is Morgana and I was in yesterday to rent a movie. I didn't have a chance to watch it last night because our DVD player broke, and we had to go to town to buy a new one. I was wondering if I could have the movie for an extra night.”

“Sure, no problem. It'll just be an extra $1.50. You can pay that next time you're in or just leave the money in the case when you drop it off.”

“Well, I was hoping to have it for another night for free.”

Ye gods, not again. “Um....”

“Because I didn't get a chance to watch it, so I didn't get what I paid for.”

“I'm sorry?”

“I didn't have a chance to watch the movie at all.” Fernando was thinking to himself, and desperately wanted to say, that it would be silly for him to charge by the viewing instead of by the rental of the physical disc. There would be no way for him to ascertain if people were telling the truth when they would claim, upon returning the movie, that they had seen it zero times.

Instead, he took the somewhat tactful way out. “Right. But you'd still have the movie out an extra night.”

“That's why I'm calling to let you know what happened.”

“I mean, you'll have the movie out an extra night. It's like...like renting a...a jet ski for a day and not bringing it back because the car you're using to transport it won't start. You're still going to be charged the extra amount. It's not the full daily rate, it's not the full late fee rate. It's just the extra amount you would have needed to pay to have rented the movie two nights in the first place.” It overall seemed like an apt analogy to make.

At this juncture she starts getting snippy. “I didn't know I wouldn't be able to watch the movie!”

Fernando feels about done with facile attempts at good customer service now, as he's dealing with someone who clearly is making minimal efforts at being a good customer. “Neither did I. That doesn't change the fact you'll have it out for an extra night. Things happen. Life gets in the way. If I let everyone have movies out for indefinite periods of time for every excuse under the sun, I would quickly find myself without movies to rent. Fact of the matter is, you have the only copy of this movie that I haven't already rented out today. It could well be the case that someone else would want to rent it, but can't.”

“Well. Ok. Bye.” And she hangs up, as some people don't like being faced with facts.

Fifteen minutes later the movie appears in Fernando's drop box, and it is promptly rented out within twenty minutes of placing the rental tag back on the floor.