Headquarters Blog

I was really interested in this question posed to writers Jeanne Fleming and Leonard Schwarz. Basically, the reader got a letter from a restaurant claiming that when he had dined there two years ago, the credit card machine wasn't working and so, he was never charged for his meal -- and the meal in question ran $400! He doesn't remember the issue with the credit card machine and he doesn't even remember dining there! So he's asking, do I have to pay up?

Fleming and Schwarz basically say yes -- that he should check his credit card statements to be sure he hasn't already paid, but that they "don’t see how you can in good conscience ignore the restaurant’s request for payment". I....don't completely agree with them! For me, two years is simply too long to let the bill go unpaid, and I feel that the restaurant should have followed up more quickly for payment. (In this case, the restaurant had a copy of his MasterCard, presumably taken when they realized they were having issues with their machine. They could have run the card the next day or the following week -- but instead, they waited two years, so the card had expired by the time mailed the reader. I think that if you're waiting so long to bill a customer that the credit card has expired, you probably need to tighten up on your bookkeeping.)

On the other hand, I don't completely believe the guy's claim that he doesn't remember the evening -- or even dining there at all! -- especially if they have a copy of his credit card and driver's license.