Keep the money or give it to friend?

black sheep

Fri, Mar 14 2014, 12:21 am

it wasn't the potatoes that got the discount, it was your catching the mistake that got the discount. so it would be your money. if you overpaid, you would be responsible for the overcharge, not her. same for the discount.

rosenbal

Fri, Mar 14 2014, 12:28 am

I would definitely ask a rav if we were talking about a larger amount because we "care" about a larger amount, it makes a difference to us practically. So then to be consistent, I'd still need to ask. Halachically, it doesn't matter if it's 1.99 or $199 or $1990...the answer would be the same. I don't know the answer on my own. I'm really curious who the halachic owner of the potatoes was or if the refund was for the mistake or what the pertinent details are. Please tell us!

librarygirl

Fri, Mar 14 2014, 10:28 am

I'm no rav, but I fail to see why the money doesn't belong to you. The store is reimbursing you because they made an error, which you caught and took care of on your time. The price of potatoes is the same.

Had you not noticed the error until you came home, would you then charge your friend 2.99 a bag? I doubt it. Or if you never noticed the error, you would have been the one overpaying.

The error was on your money, you caught it, you should keep the reward.

That said, the answer is whatever Halacha says.

FYI, for all those enjoying the mental stimulation, buy the book"what if". It has similar halachic discussions for the shabbos table. My kids love it. We hash out the scenario and then read the answer.

amother

Fri, Mar 14 2014, 10:55 am

From a non-halachic perspective, IMO the correct thing to do would be to give the money to your friend. The correct thing for your friend to do would be to tell you to keep it for yourself.

Ultimately I think the money is yours.

amother

Thu, Mar 20 2014, 11:56 pm

So what did you end up doing?

I'm curious because I recently bought diapers for a friend and used a coupon that I had. she was very grateful.
she paid me the amount of dollars that I paid, and only afterwards I realized that I lost the value of the coupon that I could have used towards my next purchase of diapers.

I didnt expect her to pay me for the coupon, but I realized afterwards that I was dumb to use the coupon and lose out on it.

zaq

Fri, Mar 21 2014, 12:23 am

black and white wrote:

I would charge her back what she expected to pay originally for the purchase you made for her.
And the remaining difference put in Tsedaka.

Yep, that's what I would do.
No reason to give the $ to the friend--it wasn't she who was inconvenienced, it was OP. It was OP who did the shopping and OP who bothered to have the error corrected. I don't see where the friend comes in at all, any more than she would have come in had OP found money on the floor of the shop.

Frumdoc

Fri, Mar 21 2014, 6:36 am

I would charge my friend exactly what the potatoes cost me to buy, not the expected or predicted cost, so the money goes to her. If I hadn't been buying the potatoes, I wouldn't have gotten money back, so it had nothing to do with the rest of my shopping that cost the usual amount.

Otherwise I would be in profit from bargaining down a price (effectively, because of their mistake), for my friend's shopping, not mine.

Another question, if it was a two for one offer, and she asked for one, and you wanted one, would you charge her full price and take the free one, or charge her half price and pay half price yourself?
I don't know the answer, just throwing it out there.

Tablepoetry

Fri, Mar 21 2014, 7:04 am

What I would do? Give her the money. It's peanuts, and I'd feel weird keeping it.

What is the 'right' thing to do? Well, you can't go wrong by erring on the side of generosity. But if it had happened the other way around (I'd asked her to buy me potatoes), I'd let my friend keep the change. It's a huge hassle to ask for your change back in the supermarket, and it would be a small price to pay.

shanie5

Sun, Mar 23 2014, 12:39 am

I paid for her purchases separately. So if I had not noticed the mistake, and just given her the bill, she would have paid the extra money for the potatoes.

If I noticed the mistake after I left the store, I would feel guilty and let her decide if she would pay me back the extra $3 or not, as I had told her the price was less.

No, I did not buy potatoes for myself. If I had, I would not have any problem keeping the money for myself-as 1 bag was free, why not my bag?

What did I do? I deducted the full $4.99 from her bill. If it was more money, I probably would have called the rov, but it just wasn't worth the time and effort for $1.99. If I kept the money without her knowledge (easily done), I would still be wondering if it was gneiva on my part.

If this were s/o elses question, I would say best thing was to split the savings-$1 to each person.