(Photo courtesy flickr | soonerpa)

With Lightening McQueen back in town, it was just a matter of time before we had to make a trip to the cinemas. While making reservations online, I ran into connectivity issues that left my transaction incomplete – a depleted bank account, but no reservations. Having heard of prior instances, I readied myself for time consuming multiple calls to the vendor call centres. The reservations were completed with a new transaction (twice the amount spent so far) & the sorting of the issue relegated to the weekend.

After having watched the movie, we grappled with a bout of flu over the rest of the weekend. The task of having to recover the extra ticket money was a nagging thought through the weekend & Monday.

Come Tuesday morning, a surprise awaited in my mailbox. A mail letting me know that the ticketing vendor has initiated a refund for my failed transaction! And I had not called any call centre yet. It was such a thrill, a relief & a hope-instilling event. In this big bad world where opportunism rules people’s behaviour, it was pleasant to experience something as basic as a fair business practice. There is hope 🙂

The incident reminded me of what I had read about one of Omidyar Network’s investing philosophy – investing in ventures that promote mutual trust via online business. I so understand this thought process now.

Update (19th July 2011): Check out this article (Digital Oxytocin: How Trust Keeps Facebook, Twitter Humming) that postulates that Internet use (the likes of Facebook & Twitter in particular) promotes trust amongst its users.