[UPDATE] Me (Intern, 21M) with my boss (41M), I forgot to cancel a $600 software subscription on his credit card and he’s asking for reimbursement

A 21-year-old intern shares an update on his situation involving a $600 software subscription charge that he forgot to cancel on his boss’s credit card. After initially receiving a refusal from the software company for a refund.

The intern took further action by escalating the issue and ultimately securing the refund. His boss is satisfied with how the intern handled the situation, and everything has been resolved. Read the original story below.

For those who want to read the previous part: https://aita.pics/DBuvJ

‘ [UPDATE] Me (Intern, 21M) with my boss (41M), I forgot to cancel a $600 software subscription on his credit card and he’s asking for reimbursement’

So pretty much all of the advice in the original thread was useful, but some of the best advice came from users like /u/frehsprints (who pointed out that I was probably misunderstanding what my boss meant by “reimbursement”)

and /u/mawkish, who stressed going through every available channel with the software company to get a refund and making my boss explicitly request money. Anyways, on to the actual update. After I emailed the software company and they refused to refund it,

I emailed my boss letting him know that, and that’s when he dropped the reimbursement line. I still don’t know exactly what type of reimbursement he was looking for, but I’m fairly certain now that what he meant was that he’d have to get it from the budget of the small team I work in and he runs, which would be a waste of money.

He also CC’d our office assistant and told her to help me figure this out. A few hours later, she emailed back saying she’d talked to the software company on the phone and they stuck to their guns and offered a credit, and that was the best/only option.

After seeing all the comments in the original thread, I gave it another shot and called the company. I basically reiterated that we’ve been loyal customers and would like to continue, but that wouldn’t be possible if we weren’t refunded. I escalated to a manager, who was more than understanding and got the refund processed!

I then emailed only my boss (didn’t wanna make the assistant feel like I did something she couldn’t) saying the refund was being processed and sent him a receipt.

His exact response was “Good job /u/saltymuffaca. Stuff happens, the key is that you were adamant about it and got it fixed.” Luckily, my boss thinks I handled the situation well, and all is well!

Here’s the input from the Reddit crowd:

TickTick_Tick −  Well done! I’m sure this reflects well on you and your future employment there

099992 −  Good for you dude. You made it out of a seemingly impossible situation.

cursethedarkness −  Great job! HR here–you just learned more and got yourself a better reference than if you’d never made the mistake!

bozoconnors −  Nice. That “store credit” b**lshit is becoming general policy these days I’m finding. Had to return an item the other day & the guy was all “all I can do is store credit”.

I simply flat out refused in the most polite way possible & stated I probably wouldn’t be back in the store to spend the credit at any point in the future. Credited my card on the spot.

[Reddit User] −  This is an example of one of those stories you need to remember for future job interviews. When they ask “tell us about how you resolved a tricky situation at work,” this is a great example. You made a mistake, did research on what to do, fixed the problem, and learned a lesson. Good job 🙂

[Reddit User] −  You didn’t CC the assistant, but perhaps you should have at least spoken to them about your resolution, like “Hey, admin, I appreciate the help in getting this problem solved. I must have gotten to talk to the right person and now it’s taken care of woot woot! *~high fives~* Thanks again for your help.”

THEN jet off the email to the boss, being sure to cc the admin. This placates the admin and reinforces their role in the team, and shows your maturity to your boss, as he can see the CC’d parties. After all, the admin emailed YOU to tell you they hit a brick wall, not the boss (and wisely so), thereby exhibiting good interoffice diplomacy.

What you did could be seen as upstaging to both parties, so try to exercise better judgment towards your team in the future. There is no love for a team member who doesn’t (exernally, at least)

acknowledge combined effort (even if, and *especially*, “when”, others’ efforts are/were fruitless). On top of that, not being apprised of the resolution before taking it to the boss would understandably p**s someone off a little.

free_will_is_arson −  you should also acknowledge to your boss the work the assistant did, im sure that it is was because of the additional calls she made that helped yours get escalated to someone who would deal with it.

thruaways −  You’ve also learned a valuable lesson with dealing with people that answer the phones in these situations. They’re reading off of a script and might even be doing support for multiple companies at once. Their main goal is to get you off the phone as painlessly as possible.

I used to do insurance billing at a pharmacy, and on the phone with insurance companies I would be either sweet and charming or hostile as the situation warranted until I got a manager and got what I wanted. (I always got what I wanted.)

Dire87 −  It would have been VERY strange if your boss demanded that YOU pay for a mistake that happened at work personally. That’s what insurance and the company guidelines are for. Imagine every employee would be directly responsible for every mistake they made and had to shell out the money to fix them…nobody would work anymore.

Hooty__McBoob −  Good for you! My boss is similar, he says it’s how you fix the problem that’s the biggest thing.

It’s great to see how persistence paid off and the intern’s proactive approach turned the situation around. Have you ever had to escalate a problem to get a positive outcome? How do you navigate such issues when dealing with a boss or a client? Share your experiences and thoughts below!