Customer service complaint? Think again, says Taranaki resident

OPINION: For years I have been a complainer. I’d complain about everything from getting an Australian dollar coin in change, instead of a New Zealand dollar in change, to complaining about an event NOT being cancelled because of rain.

Yesterday I well and truly hit the jackpot when I complained to high profile pizza corp Dominos for putting too much cheese on my pizza. Pathetic, right? Well, maybe you’d understand if you saw what the pizza looked like. It was drenched in a slimy rich cheese sauce, and for someone who doesn’t like cheese that much, it probably wasn’t the finest way to go. The manager even admitted he wouldn’t eat it.

However, instead of complaining and taking the money like normal and putting it back into my account, I thought, what a dick I had just made of myself. Thousands of children from over New Zealand live in poverty and can’t even get food on a regular basis, little own the millions of kids who are in desperate need of clean water, every single second of the day.

I donated $18, the cost of the Domino’s Pizza, to World Vision’s World Food Programme, where $1 equals 6 people fed. I worked it out and my $18 could be multiplied into feeding 108 hungry kids from all over the world if I donated the $18. With the help of World Vision and the United Nations, we made it happen.

Yes I paid for an pricey pizza, with the money I worked for, to get an inedible pizza (Dominos manager words), and yes, I complained about it, all over social media, and then I put it back into a cause I cared about when I was offered a refund.

Why? Because I’d much rather donate my $18 to hungry kids, who may never see what an iPhone even looks like, rather than the CEO of Dominos Pizza in some flash estate in North America.

Next time when you’re complaining about not getting a service quite up to standard, think about where it could be better spent. Your pocket, a CEO’s pocket, or feeding the mouths of hungry kids.

To the next big company that rips me off – you might just help a child in poverty. Kids Can, you’re next. Moral of the story is not for Dominos to keep serving awful tasting pizzas, it’s to have a bit more compassion and awareness when you next complain that your hot dog was too cold.

And by all means – complain with compassion in mind.

Read more about New Zealand’s own Kids Can here: https://www.kidscan.org.nz/

Read about World Vision and United Nations’ World Food Programme here: https://www.worldvision.org.nz/ways-to-give/world-food-programme.aspx 

/MICHAEL RILEY with extra reporting from Community Taranaki