The reply that owns it

A parcel arrives in Manama four days late, and the customer posts about it. The shop that sold it has two ways to answer.

The first blames the courier, the delay at the port, the holiday rush, the way the address was written. Every word of it may even be true. It still sounds like a shop asking to be let off.

The second says that this was theirs to get right, that they did not, and what they are doing about it. No list of reasons. No dispute about whose fault it really was.

Lately it can look as if complaining works. Protest loudly enough about the conditions, contest every decision that goes against you, and sometimes you come out ahead. People watch that happen and decide it is a method.

It is a fragile one. Blame has to be renewed every time something goes wrong, and something always goes wrong. Each excuse spends a little of the goodwill the next one will need. And the audience notices who is talking. The business that keeps insisting it was not its fault starts to sound like a business in control of nothing.

Owning it reads the other way. Only someone with confidence, and enough in reserve to absorb a mistake, can afford to say plainly that it went wrong and it was theirs. That is exactly why people believe them.

If you want to look strong, take the blame that is yours. It says more about your standing than any excuse can.