What’s the stingiest thing you’ve ever seen a friend do?

[zappp]

I have an (ex-)friend who is very stingy. She earns plenty and is happy to splurge on herself and show off, but when it comes to others, she is mean with money to the point where I’ve felt really taken advantage of on multiple occasions. It’s almost like it’s a game for her; seeing how little she can pay and how much she can extract from others.

The friendship fizzled out when I started calling her out on it and stopped covering her costs (I previously didn’t want to make things awkward, especially in a group setting, but it got to a point where I was too pissed off to keep being polite).

Against my better judgment, I recently attended a group dinner that she was also part of - a mutual friend was in town and this was the only time we could see her. In the WhatsApp planning group, she’d enthusiastically agreed to the restaurant choice - it was definitely a nicer place, but not extravagant.

When she got there, she claimed she wasn’t hungry and didn’t order any food, only to ask the waiter for an empty plate and help herself - rather generously - from everyone else’s food!!! She also asked for a glass for the wine we’d already ordered, which would’ve been fine, except guess how much she chipped in to the bill…? Exactly, zero.

It was also a bit embarrassing towards the restaurant; it’s hard to get a reservation and the group was small enough that it was strange for one person not to be eating at peak dinner time, especially as we were seated at a big table.

This time I didn’t even bother calling her out - it was so brazen that she basically called herself out.

I know you never truly know someone else’s financial situation, but she’s certainly spending enough on clothes, holidays, and skincare to make me think she could afford a plate of pasta and glass of wine…

Anyway, rant over, I want to hear other stingy stories!

I was at Uni with a couple of people who I'm still friends with, who were very tight. They re-used teabags at least three times. OK, typical student behaviour. But what always made me chuckle was that they didn't like the toilets on trains and refused to pay to use the station toilets (which I think cost 2p at the time) so crossed their legs all the way from Grantham to Durham, then walked to their Halls to use the toilet!

I felt guilty for guzzling my portion - he'd doled out about a third each so there was some left. 🙄

You can't call him a hypocrite!

He's the tightest person I've ever met

My mother is too,unless its for herself

Shes been known to steal cleaning products/loo roll/food from work-its the cheapest of the cheapest but if its for herself,she'll buy the most expensive

I once got a christmas box (I was a skint single mum at the time) that was full of treats for the kids

She walked in,saw the box on the table and poked through it,picking out the best bits (I had to prise the turkey and chocolates out of her hands)

If I hadn't,I wouldn't have had anything to give the kids for dinner on the day

She was once told about those toilet disk things (they stick to the side of the loo and clean with every flush) by her sister who'd bought a few

She stole half the supply out of her sisters bathroom cupboard along with toothpaste

I once asked if she had any calpol as id ran out and she tried to charge me twice the full price of brand name calpol,but it was a half bottle of homebargains own

Oh and It was 4 years out of date

Baby dd (who's now 29) was rushed to hospital and we lived about 6 miles away

She tried to charge me £10 for every lift she gave me to or from the hospital

She did the same every Tuesday when we went to tesco-id pay her petrol,she'd fudge her timesheets so she got paid from work too and claim my points on her club card

She stopped paying for me as soon as I turned 12 and threw me out once the child benefit ran out at 18

Im now nc with her

Someone I work with brings water containers in to work and fills them to save water at home. He also takes handfuls of loo roll and the canteen sachets of condiments too. He'll shower at work rather than home and once boasted that he sends his daughter to his SIL for a bath (only allowed 3 min showers at home!). He always accepts a beer but never buys a round, it's become a game to get the next round in while he's in the loo so as not to keep subsidising him! Often seen wearing unclaimed items from lost property.

Another acquaintance asked for some leftover food (mostly mashed potato) from her meal to be packed up to take home, that wouldn't be that weird except we were going on to a club after dinner and she ended up asking the barstaff to keep it in the fridge for her and took it home on the night bus at 2am.

We took my husband's aunt for afternoon tea ( we paid) and left the waitress a £5 tip as she was really good. We got outside and aunt happily told us she had pocketed the tip from the table -she's not short of money. My husband made her take it back in.

@PinkNailPolish2026 the approach was very “Oooh, that looks so good, can I just have a small taste?” And then others felt they also had to offer. I think that in the name of group dynamics and avoiding awkwardness, no one was going to say no. It’s also not the type of friend group where people would typically challenge each other out loud; we’re good enough friends but there’s still a level of distance and politeness that you might not have with a closer group. And we all work in the same sector so no one wants to rock the boat too much. Hence why it took me so long to start saying something…

I considered saying no this time, but as I hadn’t seen her in a while, I decided it was more entertaining to sit back and watch how far she’d try to take it…

Wow! That beggars belief.

I used to have a friend who was very canny with money, always claimed she was skint but found out from her ex she had over £50k saved in the bank!

One very clever trick she used to pull is if we were out in a group, if anyone was buying a round, she would go to the bar with them and bring back the drinks the other person had paid for. So basically if you weren't really paying attention, which most people don't on a night out, you'd think she was buying drinks when she never spent a penny. She also used to insist we all bought each other birthday and Christmas presents, and her gifts to us were always random freebies she used to get from work.

@hueylouieanddewey omg - so sneaky! My “friend” is also very good at avoiding rounds, but that makes her look like an amateur!

Loving all the responses 😂 I need to do some real work now but can’t wait to read them all later

My parents have friends who are very wealthy. The husband takes a meter reading before they go on holiday and then another one when they get home so he can make sure the fridge isn’t costing too much money if it’s left on while they’re away.

This …. I also an intrigued 😂. I would not be happy to share my food , in this instance !

My friend had a bag of crisps once and I asked could I try one (it was one of those weird flavours Walkers do every so often). He got a crisp out of the bag and broke a quarter of it off and gave it to me.

My parents have loads of cash. They have one grandson (my DS). We were visiting at Christmas and played a board game they have which he enjoyed. My mother suggested she buy one for our house. When his birthday came around in January they sent him a gift cheque for £10 because they had paid for the board game. I have many stories like this.

@zappp she'd have got bugger all off my plate, just a fork in the back of the hand.

The usual trick that this kind of person plays, when there are a lot of people dining together, is to offer to go and settle up at the end, after collecting everybody's share including tips.

Supposing there are 12 people including the CF - each owing £30 and adding another fiver each for a tip - the CF will take the £385 total from the other 11, go and pay the £360 for the meals (without any tip), and then score themselves not only a free meal but also a £25 cash bonus... and they will milk it as though they've been kind by saving everybody else the bother of going to the till.

The non-cash equivalent is where everybody asks to pay their share by card - adding on extra for a tip - and the CF deliberately waits until last, when they claim to have forgotten how much theirs was, but say that they'll just pay whatever is still owing. Of course, the additional tips from everybody mean that there's nothing owing from the actual bill itself, so they get a freebie, albeit no cash bonus on top.

I buy Xmas cards and wrapping paper in the January sales. I don’t think that’s stingy - it’s sensible.

My son had a friend who was never hungry when they went out to eat but would ask for bits of food because it looked nice, or help himself to a few chips. He would then eat any leftovers on their plates.
In the end the other friends told him to buy some chips if he wanted them, or pour vinegar and tons of salt on the food if they left any. He didn't make himself very popular so they didn't care if he sulked at what they'd done.

Some of these are wild.

My daughter's ex when he visited our house for the first time, collected an empty tray from the fish & chip dinner that we had paid for - and put the leftover chips in it from people's plates to take home.

He wasn't on a bad salary, just stingy - that's why he's her ex.

She was full-on stingy in so many other ways. Too many to list here

When I was a student I lived in a shared uni house.

One of my housemates bought one £3 cushion for the sofa from B&M because she thought it looked “cute”. Then proceeded to ask me and our other housemate to transfer her £1 each to split the cost of it.

Don't give a shit if it is outing, but here it goes. WGH and London House accommodation. We are post-grads and are issued with a £4.00 meal voucher (yes, it was ages ago) per day to make sure we go and mix with other students in the Dining Hall, it was part of the accommodation contract, an obligation 'to foster community, etc.' Anyway, all students are post-grads, not a single standard classically poor student, and one of us, a student from Catalonia, on a mega-generous scholarship of La Caxia bank, plus her dad left her 5 million euros when died. We all pick up dishes quickly, always going over £4.00 voucher, top up with cash and enjoy our dinners in the gorgeous dining hall. She spends around 30 minutes every time, going around and picking dishes, changing them, picking chocolate bars and putting them back, to make sure she uses the £4.00 voucher to the last penny. In doing so she picks up fights with the canteen staff, as they refuse do take side dishes off her plate she has already put on her tray as her math is not mathing. She even brought a pencil with her every time, to write back on the back of the voucher the amounts to make sure. This shit-show is repeated every time. It was absolutely disgusting, but I think she was sick in the head, she did not mind us seeing it all.

I just thought she was a regular stingy friend til you mentioned her saying she would help herself to other people meals. Good grief, anyone who tries to help themselves to my food gets a fetching fork shaped puncture wound in their hand.

Charge £50 per guest for her wedding. The invitations had tear off strips at the bottom like old fashioned school trip letters with I can/can't come, how many people would be coming and the 'total remittance'. You could pay cash or cheque (this was in 1999). I was supposed to be chief bridesmaid and I was charged, as were her mum and dad and the rest of her family so at least there was no favouritism.

I was out of work at the time due to illness and couldn't afford £150 for me, DS (who was 3, it was the same price for adults and children) and DH. There was absolutely no way I could go and our friendship never really recovered. We stopped talking about a year later.

There was also a wedding list we were directed to buy a gift from, though if guests preferred we could 'donate' £100 (or more, if we were 'feeling generous') towards the honeymoon. There was a box to tick to say which we were going to do.

She and her fiancé were both in very well paid jobs, which made it even more insulting.

They split up just over a year later, too.

When I was dating my husband, I was round at his mum’s house, his sister was there too and still lived at home. His mum made a passing comment like, “Oh, you need to send your board over for the week.”
His sister replied, “Yeah, but don’t forget I bought the carrots, so that needs to be taken off.” My jaw fell to the floor, and his mum, after seeing my face just said, “We’ll sort it later.”

My friends husband has always been tighter than a camels arse in a sandstorm.
Whenever I'd visit i would always treat them to dinner or my friend would insist she'd pay etc We basically shared it each time.
After about 10yrs of this (and knowing that she and her husband had separate finances and he never paid for ANYTHING and was happy for her to get into thousands of pounds worth of CC debt bailinghim out when he quit his job) I called him out and said that he should get the bill this time round since his wife and I bank roll him so much! Well, talk about throw your toys out of the pram! He changed his order from a 3 course to one of the cheapest mains only and refused the coffee (that he would always have) at the end.
He wouldn't stop huffing and tutting at our orders and commenting on the cost that there were cheaper dishes available. Face like thunder when I enjoyed every last mouthful of my 3 course meal and wine!