Two men paid a Surbiton health business £1,000 after admitting they had broken the store front window the previous night.

Sage Parmer, 43, who runs Sage's Health Store in Surbiton, told the Surrey Comet she was surprised and happy after the response from the Surbiton community, adding that they had been instrumental in helping her fix the window of the new business.

The Surbiton business owner described the whirlwind of events surrounding her first 48 hours of trading at the shop.

Ms Parmer said: "It was my first day of trading on Saturday, and I put a message on Facebook promoting it and got loads and loads of likes, and that night something must have happened because on Sunday morning I started getting all these private messages from people I don't know saying that someone has smashed the window.

"That was really quite nice because if they hadn't done that I wouldn't have known about till I had come in on Monday."

This was only the first act in the community's response to the smashed store front, however.

Ms Parmer said that, after visiting the store on Sunday to inspect the damage, she was surprised to find a note of confession, with contact details attached, in the letter box.

Ms Parmer said: "I came in on Sunday, the window was smashed and there was a note on the letterbox with two names and numbers...This guy answered the phone and began by saying 'We're really, really sorry. My mate and I were messing around and I accidentally pushed him and he fell on the window and it smashed.'"

"Then he said: 'We're willing to pay for all the damage because we feel really bad about what's happened.' I said it was so nice of him to do that because most people would have walked away."

After getting an independent quote to fix the window for £1,000 she thought the two men would never pay it. The reality turned out to be quite different.

Ms Parmer said: "I called him up after I got the quote, thinking they were never going to pay, but he said 'no, send me the invoice...'"

"Literally within five minutes, him and his friend had both put their share of the money in. Five hundred pounds each. I was so shocked, I couldn't believe it and sent him a message saying thank you."

"A thousand pounds for someone they don't know...I've never met them, and they just said: 'we want to get your window sorted and we're really, really sorry.'"

"After one day all of these strangers texting me saying they were worried about it and then two strangers paying a thousand pounds because they fell on the window. Maybe it's a good omen or something...my faith in humanity has been restored."