Short Measures

When buying many products, it’s often possible to tell when selecting them whether we are being ‘sold short’.

It’s obvious if a loaf of bread is shorter than its neighbour, or whether a bar of chocolate doesn’t fill out it’s wrapper as much as the next one. But the way in which some products are packaged can mean that we don’t know that we’ve been given short measures until we get home from shopping and open our purchase.

At least you can see how many eggs are in a box

Multipacks of crisps, biscuits and sweets may often contain fewer bags than the stated amount. But let’s be honest, do you always count?

I recently bought a multipack of Curiously Cinnamon Cereal to take away on a short break. The packet was supposed to contain five bags of cereal, but in actual fact there were only four inside, leaving me short of breakfast supplies.

Although this wasn’t a major catastrophe, I decided to write to Nestlé with my complaint. Well, I say complaint,  I kept my letter light-hearted, adding humour, and was rewarded with a reply within the space of a week. Not only was it a reply, it was an apology accompanied by £8 worth of vouchers to spend on cereal.

I have to say I was impressed by Nestlé’s speed of response, the fact that they held their hands up to their mistake and more than reimbursed me for the shortfall. I, in turn, would like to thank Nestlé for their efficiency in dealing with a customer complaint and congratulate them on having a customer services department that actually works for the customer, as opposed to defending the company at all costs.

In my early days of blog writing, I wrote posts about ‘How To Complain’, ‘Saying Sorry’ and ‘Saying Thank You’. I think this blog post illustrates all of the above very nicely!

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