Comment: Why say no when you could say yes?

When I was a camp counsellor, I often asked myself "Why say 'no' when you could say 'yes'?". It served as a reminder that making a child's day was often as easy as ruining it.

Last week, the "why say no..." phrase came back to me when I dealt with Rainbow Songs, a provider of music classes for babies.

The issue at hand is one of make-up classes. Babies are not the most predictable creatures on the planet, so it's rare to get one to show up to 3 months of weekly activities without fail. Given that my attendance record is hardly perfect, I've taken BabyBear to 2 make-up music classes this fall. When I tried scheduling a third make-up session this week, Rainbow Songs provided this response:

Unfortunately, due to our large volume of clients we can only provide two makeup classes per child per session which you and C took on October 28 and December 2. Sorry about this.

Just a remind that our winter session is filling up fast!

Rainbow Songs said no, when they could have said yes. The class that I wanted to attend was not full. It was not that logistics prevented things from working out for me. Rather, policy created an unhappy client. (And it's worth noting that unhappy clients don't rush to register for more classes.)

Not to be discouraged, I asked for an exception and suggested that some flexibility now would help me commit to the next session. Once again I was shut down. That's right, Rainbow Songs told me that their policy meant more to them than my future business.

Perhaps things will change when the Canadian economy cools off a little more and the moms of north Toronto opt for the free music classes at the Ontario Early Years Centres. Personally, I'm looking at attending Babies Boogie Too at a neighbour's house this winter.