Back in January I was approached by an old friend to do some support work for his daughter, she is a similar age to me and I am a support worker professionally so it made sense.
I asked not to be paid but they insisted I did get paid so I said I would work for £8phr as long as my travel costs were paid.
This was all going okay and I would meet with them about once a month/every 2 months to collect a bit of money and have a chat about how things were going.
They wanted me to take her out of her property and do things with her, be it painting or making things, shopping, going into town (about 4 miles away) etc.
Often this would take over 2 hours which is what they initially asked me to do and so they just said write down on the calendar how long you have been for and we will sort it out when we see you.
They were due to go away last week and I said I would spend some more time with her over the weekend, unfortunately on Tuesday I found out I would need to work in my new job over the weekend so I phoned, let them know my availability and offered to go on the Friday, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday (if needed)
They were clear this was not ideal for them but there was really nothing I could do, I had been told I had to work or I would lose my main job.
Prior to this there were a few issues where the lady in question had some issues at her supported accommodation and had moved to her parents for a while, so my days/hours changed and I was expected to do more/less, this was no problem for me and I did have my car break down once and had to move the appointment to the following day, but I think three separate times I had my appointment cancelled/moved as well.
Yesterday I went to settle up with them, began to explain what I had been doing and basically got a bollocking for half an hour about how I wasn't doing this and that (all stuff that they had directly told me not to do) and offered me less money than time we had agreed and refused to pay my diesel. Which IS fine, I had said I would do it for free so really not bothered by the money, at one point I turned the little pad (that she was frantically tapping while shouting at me) upside down and said 'please don't pay me'
They have said that it is not 'workable' for them not to pay me, that they won't accept that but my issue is that I left feeling terrible about myself, they had accused me of doing things I hadn't done (like not telling them about my availability over the weekend before they went away) and also rather aggressively pointed out things I wasn't doing (like domestic chores and cooking) that I had offered to do but had been told was not what I was there for, that I was needed more as emotional friendship support than anything like that.
So I left with a bit of money in my pocket and promptly burst into tears on my husband, I have just had a month of trying to do things right and getting everything wrong and it was really hard.
I really wanted to go and give the money back but that would have screwed us over for easter, because of a number of factors but we were relying on some money from them as that was the agreement in place.
WIBU to say that I will not accept money from them anymore? That I will see her on a casual basis as a friend but will not get involved in the money side anymore? I realise they might say I can't see her and that would be a shame but unfortunately I would prefer that over having to go through that experience again.
Any advice would be great.