Friend’s phone screen cracked a bit by accident

I actually imagine 99% of Mumsnetters use them 😂 I do not. Nor a screen protector. Living on the edge. But offer to pay for a repair OP.

Don’t make excuses, this is a lesson learned by your son. Fair is fair maybe call around see how much it will cost and then approach the friends mum and explain the financial situation and see if friend wishes to get screen fixed. Do not give friend or mum money directly as they may not get screen fixed and use the money. Offer to pay the shop or arrange for it to be given in and then paid. Accidence happen but you have to do the right thing. Even if the friend dropped it a hundred times. Your son dropped it and it broke, it’s simple.

I think you should at least offer to pay for the repair. The way those boys handle their phones this would've happened sooner or later, so maybe you offering to pay half of the price would be fair.

That depends on the phone. It cost me £150 to get my pixel fixed because it had to go to an approved workshop and local phone repair places wouldn't touch it.

I would and do. Keep buying son one but he cuts the top off 🙄 and then breaks it.

Why "should" they? They can choose to do whatever they like with their own child's phone.

I might have missed it, do we even know what the other parents view on this is?

Hard to also say that the phone wasn’t already cracked by the owner of the phone dropping it earlier! They should have had a phone case protector AND a screen protector on and if they didn’t then no i wouldn’t be paying for any repair!

From what is described it was an accident. I wouldnt expect payment from the parent of the child if my kids screen was damaged in this way so on that basis I dont think you ought to offer to pay.

If your child had deliberately caused the damage, by e.g throwing the phone on the stairs, then yes, you as parent should pay.

If your child was being reckless e.g threw himself onto the ground with the phone in his pocket and as a consequence this caused the crack, then yes you should offer.

I'm not sure whether this post was written in a panic, which is understandable, but I'd offer to pay and apologise. If this were me I'd expect this but I have insured my children's phones so I'd probably say not to worry about it. Accidents happen. If she pays and asks you for a contribution, make sure you see receipts for what work was done (don't mean to sound untrustworthy but...).

This

Learning not to let your friend use your phone for a sec? What a weird 'lesson'. I would let my friend do this and would expect them to be careful with it.

It never occurred to me to check the repair cost because in umpteen years of owning phones, I've never broken one, never had a cracked screen.

Bit weird that you say iPhones are the most expensive to repair, but also say you've only ever had Apple, and also that you wouldn't buy a phone that was expensive to repair. These statements are contradictory.

They are not, btw, "known to be fragile". With a good case and screen protector they should not break. Hence me never having broken one.

I don't have phone insurance, which I'm fine about. I can claim on my house insurance which I will be looking into.

I can't help but think this is why some people find it hard to make friends. Accidents happen, especially where kids are involved. Sometimes you just have to say oh dear and suck it up, not present a bill and demand ££.

If you cant afford to replace it or insure it, don't give it to a primary aged child to play with 🤷

DH discovered that the hard way with his watch...🤦

I wouldn’t pay. If challenged by the other parents I’d perhaps offer to go halves as a last resort.
but if you’re going to give a 9 year old a phone you either need to accept it may get damaged and it’s your cost, or put appropriate insurances in place.

for clarity my children went to middle school, so had phones from age 9 as they had to make their way partly home from school alone as parents couldn’t get near.
we have phone protection insurance in place with our bank for £13 a month covering up to 4 smart phones, travel insurance and roadside recovery. It’s not desperately expensive.

Yeah, this.

I'm a bit surprised at all the people saying @Nousese should offer to pay up TBH.

Surely it's just a cheap/old phone? It would cost far more than it's worth to get it fixed or claim on insurance.

If they expect OP to pay for a new phone or a £300 repair they are cheeky fuckers.

Plus, they should have had a shock proof case on it, if course it's going to get dropped by a 9 year old. It would be daft to give little kids expensive tech and expect it not to get damaged 🤷

That’s crazy and I wouldn’t have let them tbh.

Your car didn’t break the ring itself and neither did you. Friend A damaged the ring with their actions they should have paid up.

You need to speak to her ASAP to tell her that you are going to pay for the repair in full and will give her the money as soon as she knows how much the repair will be. When your child breaks something accidently belonging to someone else, you should always do this. Yes it's unfortunate that the screen protector failed, but that's the way the cookie crumbles. When you drop something, there's always a chance it will break.

Have the parents asked you to pay?

How bad is the crack? Does it actually stop the phone working?

I would speak to the parents and see what they want to do. They may not care less as long as it still works. I expect this is a second/third hand phone if it was given to a 9 year old to play with.

If my child had moaned to me that their screen was broken because they gave it to a mate and the mate dropped it, I would just say let that be a lesson in looking after your own phone then 🤷

Either way if ur child’s a kid or not someone needs to be buying a new phone screen for the friend.

🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️

@Negroany I can’t talk about those as mines have always been Apple.
But I do know that I wouldn’t buy a phone that can’t easily be repaired or at a reasonable price . (I mean screen in particular).
That would be a crazy move to me, if only because they’re known to be fragile.
Or with a great insurance on it to cover that eventuality.

If the OP’s friend have bought a phone like that to a 9yo, that’s on them. Not the OP. A cheap second hard phone would have been just as good.

Oh this is tricky! I’m trying to think of this happening to my daughter who is 11. I can’t imagine any of their parents expecting us to pay. Surely there needs to be a recognition that some responsibility falls on the child for handing it over, and on the parent themselves. I know lots of children that age have phones and I don’t mean that he shouldn’t have had one, but a parent makes the decision to get them one while accepting there is a risk it will get damaged because he’s a kid! It would be different if your child had been wilfully careless or was carrying on with it, but this was an innocent accident that could happen to anyone and almost did happen to the other child.
As a goodwill gesture I think I would offer to cover part of the cost, but not all. If the other parent challenges this I’d tell her it was a genuine accident and he didn’t mean for it to happen.

The repair shops will not have the screen, so they will have to buy it in, and then there'll be a mark up. So I may as well buy it myself. Though I am nervous about whether any would know how to do it.

The "small repair shops" seem to change weekly here so I very much doubt they hold much stock.

It's a OnePlus 13 Pro.

Well I had an issue before involving a ring and my car.
I was with 2 friends going somewhere together. Friend A close the door onto friend B hand and her ring.

Consensus was that, because it was my car, any repair for the ring was on me and I should use my car insurrance for it. Never mind I was the one paying for the price increase of the car insurrance or that I was not involved at all in the accident.

What phone do you have ?!?

I thought an iPhone or iPad what one if the most expensive brand to repair….
If I was you, I’d go and see one of those small repair shops tbh.

By that logic anything anyone ever damages of someone else’s the wronged person should foot the bill as they have insurance?

Smashed someone’s window oh well insurance. Red wine on someone’s carpet oh well insurance. Split a drink over someone’s laptop well that’s what insurance is for.

Nah insurance is for if I break my shit. If you break my shit you pay for it or make sure you have insurance to cover you breaking my shit.