Cards on the table, I made a booboo and got 'found out'. Bit of a long explanation but hold on...!
I messed up a friend's business twitter account, whilst trying to set it up for them [they were getting frustrated and I thought I'd do them a favour], ages ago and tried to delete it, after deciding that actually it was a sh*t idea: they'd ask me if they really did want me to do it; and so that there would effectively be 'no harm done'. I thought I actually had deleted the account and promptly forgot all about it, so didn't say anything as I didn't think at the time there was anything to apologise for.
However, last night they texted me to ask if I had tried to set up an account for them as they had finally got round to doing it, only to discover it was already there. They got quite angry about it [understandably], and I felt flustered as I really thought I'd not done any harm and had so to speak, covered my tracks anyway - if I had thought it was still there, I would have told them and said sorry at the time. I sent an apologetic text [it was after midnight by then] and gave them all the details of login/pwd/email attached/etc so they could get it going for themselves.
[a little aside: I then checked a twitter account I'd had for two previous businesses of mine, which should also have been deleted and found that they too still existed! How hard is it to delete a twitter account anyway?! I tried again to delete my own account and it just wouldn't 'go']
I waited until my friend came over this evening and again apologised. The conversation went kind of like this:
me : I'm sorry about my stuff-up. I had originally thought I was doing you a favour, but decided that it was a sh*t idea and that you would ask me if you wanted me to do it for you. I did what I believed I needed to do to delete the account and then forgot all about it as I didn't think there was anything amiss, having deleted it anyway.
them : I was really angry as I felt you'd interfered when you didn't need to
me : I do understand - as I said, I thought it would be nice to do you a favour but having decided on reflection that it wasn't really a good idea, deleted the account; and I believed it had been deleted; I knew you would have asked me if you needed help and I didn't actually need to set up an account for you; I didn't think to tell you as the account should not have existed any more
them : ok, but you really shouldn't have done it
me : I know and I'm sorry
Anyway, looking back on it, I did actually stand my ground didn't I? But why do I still feel embarrassed? I don't often stand up for myself and sometimes when I do, I make a balls-up of it and end up looking foolish. At least this time, I got an 'OK' which might be the nearest I get to 'I accept your apology' and that will do!
Any 'could do better' tips for next time? I'm happy to apologise for things I do wrong [I like to think I'm mature enough to say sorry when It's necessary], but don't like it if the person wronged doesn't explicitly say 'apology accepted'.