Editorial: Refund a pleasing solution

Fifteen hundred dollars is indeed a lot of money to pay for a jacket that retailed for $99, and probably cost Home Direct - the company selling it - half that.

And were it not for the intervention of a Whangarei rest home, and the Northern Advocate, a Whangarei woman would still be paying $20 a week to Home Direct, probably until her death.

The scenario arose after a Home Direct customer misunderstood the terms and conditions of her purchase, after signing a direct debit.

A direct debit is an agreement between two parties that requires both parties' consent for it to be cancelled - something the Advocate has helped facilitate this week.

After paying off her $99 jacket, our customer continued to pay $20 a week to Home Direct, and paid more than $1500 before Morningview Village in Morningside - the rest home that the woman lives in - queried the payments.

Alarmingly, the situation was only discovered after $400 - instead of $20 - was accidentally taken out of the customer's account.

Home Direct's initial response - putting aside the $400 error for a minute - was that the woman had not overpaid, she had repaid the jacket, and then continued to pay money into her Home Direct account which was now in credit.

However, the customer's intent had been to repay only the jacket.

Morningview Village Clinical director and nurse Michelle Wang took up the woman's cause. Home Direct advised that they would have notified the woman that she had repaid her jacket, however she has moved several times and says she did not get the notification.

Once the Northern Advocate's Kristin Edge also made inquiries about the scenario, Home Direct committed to a refund.

We think that is an excellent response to a situation where clearly, a vulnerable member of our community was distressed over a financial misunderstanding.

She did not want to purchase more Home Direct items, she simply wanted her money back.

And thanks to Morningview Village and the Advocate, she now has her refund.