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Journalism of Courage
An Australian journalist was in for a shock when an amount of $99,983.64 (Approx. 71 lakhs) was deducted from his account for a bottle of beer he drank in Manchester.
Ahead of the fourth Ashes Test match, Peter Lalor, a cricket writer with The Australian, ordered a bottle of Deuchars IPA at a Malmaison hotel. However, the drink, which was supposed to cost around $6.75 ended up being the “most expensive beer in history”. According to a BBC report, a spokesman for the hotel apologised for the incident and said they investigating the billing error.
Taking to Twitter, Lalor shared a picture of the drink and wrote, “See this beer? That is the most expensive beer in history. I paid $99,983.64 for it in the Malmaison Hotel, Manchester the other night. Seriously.”
In his following tweets, he went on to explain the incident. “I didn’t have my reading glasses when she presented me with a bill for the beer and when she had some problems with the machine I didn’t think much of it, but it was eventually resolved, I said I didn’t want a receipt and she went to leave.”
However, sensing that something was not right, he requested the bar attendant to read out his bill. “Something, however, made me ask ‘How much did I just pay for that beer?’ She checked, covered her mouth, started to giggle and refused to tell me, saying only there had been a mistake and she would fix it.”
On being told the amount, Lalor insisted the bar attendant to fix the mistake right away. “I told her it needed to be fixed and fixed right now. She ran to get her manager who took the situation far more seriously and went about attempting to arrange a refund.
She told me somebody would be in contact. Three days later I’m still waiting.”
In addition to being wrongly charged, Lalor also paid a transaction fee. “To add insult to injury they charged a $2,499 transaction fee. Until the money comes back I won’t rest easy,” he told the news website.
