A return that changed my mind about buying online

The lamp arrived with a cracked shade, and I assumed I had lost the money. I had read enough stories about returns to expect a month of messages.

I photographed the box before opening it, which turned out to be the thing that mattered. The seller replied the same evening, agreed it had been damaged in transit, and sent a replacement before I had returned the first one.

The refund on the postage came four days later. The whole exchange was six messages, and none of them were an argument.

I am not going to pretend every order goes that way. But I now photograph every box before I open it, and I buy differently — from stores that answer questions, not the cheapest listing on the page.