To think you don't sign up your DC for a year of sport if you can't get them there?

[Sparklingbrook]

I feel like making a big taxi sign for the car.

Yanbu at all!

Just Say No.

Or hand them a bill for their share of the petrol.

Trading in your family wagon for a two-seater may be a little further than you're prepared to go, but it's always an option.

YANBU.

People who take continually advantage of others to sort out their ill thought through logistical problems really boil my piss.

I'm always happy to help people with an occasional problem and I'm happy to share a chore 50:50 if it benefits us both but I am not happy to be used and taken for granted. But as a SAHM it's something that has happened many times.

Say 'no'?

I don't mind the odd occasion when it's reciprocated but there's a couple that I think genuinely had no idea how they were going to get their DCs to matches/training.

Bizarre.

We have a seven seater-I like your idea Annie.

I mean we are going anyway with DS so i feel mean thinking it, but getting a call 20 mins before we leave-just taking the mick really.

It's rude of the parents to assume that others will help out. However, I would still do it if the children were going to miss out otherwise. Not their fault for having flaky parents.:(

That's why we do it I think Jinsei, for the kids and the team.

Personally I would be 'No DS you can't do it because we can't get you there'.

But as a SAHM it's something that has happened many times.

FWIW, it's happened to me many times as a FT WOHM too. :)

My two went to a village First School 6 miles away. One Mum got her child into the school then asked me to take her child there and back and she would pay me as she had to go to work in the other direction.

Did you say no to that mother? Or did you doff your cap and say 'Yes'm'?
People will take the piss as long as there are compliant victims to be had.

I didn't do it, but can't remember what I said to her Silver.

I have offered lifts, shared lifts and the like. What did make me smile, and I still remember it was the mum that had no car, couldn't drive and really couldn't afford either. I offered to take one of her kids with mine. She said that's really kind, to even things up can I do an evenings babysitting once a month? To me this is a perfect example of how it should be-fair exchange is no robbery.

That's lovely green-what a nice arrangement.

We are taking 3 others today. I have no idea of the reasons they can't get to training.

We have this every single week
Ds1 is 14. Most parents don't really want to get up at 7am to watch their DCs play. It's just me&dh and 2 other parents.

Every single Friday we get an email from the coach. A,B,C,D need a lift to the match otherwise they cannot play.

Every single week the 3 of us drive at least 20 minutes out of our way to pick them up and drop them off afterwards.

And their parents are at home the whole time
They just don't want to go

DOn't do it say no I dont drive and i would never ask somebody to take the dc anywhere if people offered that was lovely but more often than not if their dad wasn't around to drop them off we either walked or got the bus,

I agree, greenfolder.
I put myself out for people all the time, with lifts and skills that are useful and baby/pet sitting and the rest. But only when I want to, when it is something that I enjoy or don't mind. No unbearable pressure.
The minute I start feeling the beginnings of a martyr complex, I give myself a boot up the bum and rethink what I'm doing and why.

I think some of that goes on too Tantrums. *You pull up and there's two cars on the drive, all the curtains shut, and the player shuts the front door ever so quietly.

But there are a couple whose parents are at work/don't drive to strange places.

Why sign them up?

I've experienced similar over the years. I don't drive btw so it's not transport I'm asked for, but childcare! Living in a village and working term time only, in school hours, means I'm often the first person people contact if they can't make the school run, held up at work, older kids supposed to be making their way to their OWN houses after school only to find they've forgotten their key so can they stay at mine until their parents get back, etc etc!

Of course I don't mind helping in an emergency, and always do. I think it's the assumption that I'm always available that irritates me, the phone calls half hour before school run, 'Oh if you're going up can you pick up so-and-so as I'm running late, I'll collect her from you as soon as I can.' Or 'Do you mind holding on to my boys when school finishes, I'm running late but will be there soon!'

People are normally later than they say they'll be, kids often don't want to go home when collected so I can often find a couple of hours has been taken up, which I wasn't banking on!

I'm lucky, I know, working the hours I do but sometimes I feel like being totally selfish and saying 'No, this time is for me and my kids'. I rarely do though, if people know you're doing school run/going straight home it's difficult to say No! I can't pretend I'm doing something else either as somebody will see me, it's such a small place. So I sympathise with all you drivers who feel put upon at times!

I would only do it if the parent came as well.

It's the assumption isn't it Nectar? That's what annoys me.
I had one Mum that was continually asking me to bring her DS home from school.
He was the worst behaved child ever, very rude to my own DS and would spend the journey in the back of the car gloating about everything from school achievements to toys.

She rang me saying she was unwell one afternoon. When I delivered her DS her DH answered the door and said she had 'popped to the shops'.

I had the mother of one of my students come up to me after school one day a couple of years ago.

Mother: "I'm signed little Johnny up for the Xxxxxxx soccer club at Xxxxx Park on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons."
Me: "That's nice, I'm sure it will be great for him."
Mother: " Yes, and since you live near there, you can drop him off for me so I don't have to come to school on those afternoons."

Midnite that is awful. Even if you wanted to you couldn't anyway could you? What did you say?

No. No. Tell me it's not so.

I once had a mother ask me to look after her DD for a fortnight. I was on leave that fortnight. She could not understand that this was my holiday time and I did not want to spend it childminding her DD.
Some people are just chancers.