Mother left bad review of my business because of how we treated her 3 year old

[user1480264682]

I run a soft play centre in a small town. It closes at 6pm weekends but sometimes it closes at 3:30 for private hire parties.

Last Saturday it closed at 3:30pm. We did put that it would be closing
On facebook and on an A4 piece of paper outside the door of the centre. I We put the notice up three days before the early closing.

At 3:14pm one of our workers saw a young mum and her 3 year old arrisve excitedly for soft play. She took his coat and shoes off and handed over her £4.00.
The worker told her that the centre would be closing in 15 mins.

She was upset and said that her son would not understand why he couldn't go In and she had travelled half an hour to get here.
She told him that soft play was closed and he didn't understand so she asked if he could play for 15 mins. My worker said that if she wanted to play for the remaining 15mins she would have to pay full price. She said she couldn't afford £4.00
For 15 mins as she would have to occupy her son for the remaining hours afterwards so would need to take him somewhere else.

She said okay and was nice not annoyed. She never said she was upset at the time. She then left with her son who started screaming crying saying he wanted o go in soft play and she had to pick him up screaming crying. The worker didn't see or hear him crying but another who was outside did.

The mother has since gone on to write a bad review on out facebook page. She used to visit our centre up to three times a week and she has said it was very mean not to let her clearly disappointed son play for 15 mins as he was so excited to play and at his age did not understand it was closed. She also said she was willing to pay just not full price.

She has said she will never be returning and her son cried for an hour on the way home trying to run back.
I would have done the same as this worker and she is not going to be in trouble for this as you have to pay full price no matter what time you arrive.

AIBU? It may have been nice to
let him play for 15 mins but shouldn't be expected. In hindsight we may have considering the circumstances but we feel it shouldn't be expected.

As I said in my first post today: you are a tough crowd.

I think it would have been good public relations not to have charged her just for 15 minutes. It would have cost nothing and the review has probably done a lot more than £4 worth of damage. You said yourself she was a good customer, what a shame she will take her 3 times a week good custom elsewhere.

Oh, didn't realise it was an old thread.

Why do you care?

Because MN is a 'real time' forum for debate and it's bloody annoying when you plough through a long thread to find out

a) the OP has long gone
b) the issue has long gone
c) you come across yourself commenting 2 years ago!

No we don't all check the dates. MN puts an OLD THREAD ALERT on the text box for a reason. I wish they'd keep it there past the first re animating post.

I don't understand why anyone can't understand why it's daft to purposefully reanimate old threads!

@Mumsmet

It's good to keep threads open in case OP has an update.

I just checked the thread to see there was no update from OP.

Your point was probably made by a dozen others. It's a bit arrogant to re-open a thread with 470 odd posts.

It would have been a lot worse trying to drag the child out after only 15 minutes. Better to explain it was closing and do something else imho. Shit happens, we need to teach our kids that sometimes we cant do what we want to do and its ok to be sad about it but thats life. If she was a regular as she claimed surely she would have seen the sign on the door if it had been there 3 days?

I would have said, sorry we are closing and we need to prepare for the party.

When my kids were soft play age they didnt close for a party they just had a sectioned off part for the dining tables, adults to sit, kids just joined in with the other kids in the play area.

Honestly mumsmet I think you were unreasonable to expect a three year old to understand it’s closed without experiencing disappointment, but anyway, the thread is old and it’s not an issue anymore so why bother?

If people arent supposed to look back (a) there wouldnt be a search function (b) the threads woudl be locked down.

Frankly if every topic that had ever been covered before was prohibited there wouldnt be a functioning forum.

.

OH FFS! WHY JUST WHY?
Why the freak would the OP update over a year later? I am sure she has forgotten she posted by now.

Frankly if every topic that had ever been covered before was prohibited there wouldnt be a functioning forum.

This is fine for general problems, life issues.
Specifics like this is hardly going to do the slightest bit of good to anyone. OP will have moved on, the kid is a year older, who cares? It doesnt matter a year after the event!

well if she is a regular surely she should know that it sometimes closes for private parties, she shouldnt have promised her child without calling to check if it was open first. if not then maybe put signs up stating we often close on x days for private parties, please call in advance to check if we are open.
i personally would have said to my child oh this one is closing today will we try find something else to do and come back another day, instead of walking by a sign saying it was due to close and making my child upset!

c) you come across yourself commenting 2 years ago!

Ha ha, definitely this

If people arent supposed to look back (a) there wouldnt be a search function (b) the threads woudl be locked down.

People can search old threads because they may be helpful to them, but posting on them is a bit pointless.

Just to reiterate:-

z o m b i e
t h r e a d

Why don’t people pay attention?!

If you run a business and are on social media then I am afraid that you just have to suck up a bad review for the sake of the bigger picture. I would have been annoyed if I was the mother as soft play can be a god send and a break.

If it was my business I would write an apology under the review and ask her to contact you. I'd then get her no. off your records and call her up, apologise and offer her some freebies. You make think she is in the wrong, but the bigger picture is that bad reviews affect your business.

Oh bloody hell. Fell for the zombie thread nonsense.

@user1480264682 haha

You ought not to have taken £4 off a Mum for 15 mins play. Yabu

@TheCatsPaws Why should I not comment? How power craved are you?! As I said, if we were not meant to comment surely Mumsnet would archive them.

Because it’s no use to the OP anymore...?

@Willow2017 The OP has not and does not need to comment but that does not mean that I could not comment if I wanted to. Wow! So much hate for commenting on a old post.

@TheCatsPaws Three year olds can comprehend a lot and would totally be able to understand closures. Sure, they will disappointed if a place is closed but they can be easily distracted if offered say the park or something instead.