AIBU to think that if an adult breaks something they replace it?

[worridmum]

Sorry its long one with a tiny bit of a rant

AIBU to think that my "D"sis should replace my DH computer that she broke when warned not to do something. My sister thinks I am and says she will replace with vastly cheaper item that is not a a suitable replacement or we should suck up the £500 excuss on our home insurence and she thinks I am being tight in insisting she replaces like for like. since if we claim it will push our premiums up so in effect paying double for her grave laspe in judgement.

basically the story is we have just finished renivating our new house so decided to host a family get together to celibrate the hard work we had put in and to finally have resolution for a problem from work (in my prevous thread)

And so we hold the get together have some well desvered wine (children at camp et) and basically hold a mini tour of our house with the expection of my DH study as this is his primairly work space so has important documents and his custom built computer (needed partly for his job as a software engineer and partly his hobbies which had cost just under £3000) and everyone was told this room was offlimits. (its up a flight of stairs that leads onto its own floor and so doesnt have a door)

So my sister takes expection to not being shown this room goes up by herself with a large glass of wine about an hour after we had shown everyone around and somehow procceds to fall and not only manages to smash one of the monitors by landing on it she also manages to spill her wine down the back of the mainframe of the computer (which was turned on due to complining some software) which causes the computer to short circuit and basically ruined the entire computer (which was only bought a month ago)

Before I start the ranting section Dsis was completely fine

And so my DH and a couple of other people run upstairs to see what happened where then my sister says shes "darn goofed" and shes had a little accident and tries to down play everything as after we made sure she was fine DH was frantically trying to damage control the sistatuion etc

Which too my Dsis is very very funny and proceeds to laugh and joke about the entrie sistuation which just wond up DH even more and said quite loudly DH should take a chill pill as its only a computer. Which understandable was not taken well by DH whole sadly got really angry and shouted at my sister and ranted about how is it funny that a months long project has possibly gone up in smoke (computer was actully smoking at this point as he could not turn off internal power source in time) and that is has cost us alot of money and read her the riot act and asked her to leave the house.

(I am not excusing my DH but he was not abusive to her per say as in was not swearing / abusing her was just shouting, this is totally out of charater for him hes normally so calm and passive but he most likely shouldnt of reacted like that)

We leave it a couple of days to see just how much was damaged etc (thankfully back ups werent effected so only lost the compling time so project wasnt effect) but the computer, monitor and mainframe were total right offs.

And my sister contacts me to see how everything is and to apoligize to me about what happend and asked is there anything she can do to sort out the mess she made, which i replied she could replace what she damaged and apoligize to my DH. So she said fine I will replace the computer but I will not apoligize to DH as he was totally out of order etc and I comment that she still should apoligize as she was out of order etc and she hangs up.

So my DH sends a invoce for the computer parts (he can get the computer parts direct from manifactur etc so cheapest possible price ) which was £2600 which understandalbe is a quite a large number replys that she will buy a computer from PC world as she has seen one for £300 and that we should be greatful to even get that and I reply thats not a suitable replacement etc

(she has the money to replace it as she is in a well paid job and last week told me /boosted she had saved up £24,000 for her next years around the world holiday).

Sorry its really long but I thought I needed to include everything so not to accidently dripfeed later on

So AIBU for insisting she replaces the item she destoryed or I am being tight in expecting us not to be even further out of pocket for her totally avoidable mistake.

Ps sorry for spelling and grammer posting on a tablet (because the computer is out of action at the moment) without spell checker and I am dyslexic.

Sorry, that should read replacing not repairing in my first line. Repairing should be fine - ad would be a lot cheaper than replacing en masse (I am not at all a computer person but replaced the water damaged circuit board of my mac myself for about 20 quid).

Jilted, that's nasty.
Sounds like your DSis did it deliberately out of jealousy!

She should pay the full amount.

Go round to her house and accidentally damage an expensive piece of furniture. Offer to replace it with something from Ikea. See how she likes it. (not really but it might be worth pointing this out to her so that she understands)

Reading this again it doesn't sound like you've actually opened up the computer and seen which parts are damaged? If not, I think you need to do that. The cost of replacing a circuit board for example is low. You can also replace a smashed monitor screen without buying a new monitor. If you don't feel confident inspecting the damage yourself (water damage is quite visible in my own painful experience) then you should take it to a professional to look at. One glass of wine can't have damaged every component in the computer and it will be vastly cheaper just to get new parts. If you husband is computer-y he can just buy them online and replace them himself, or it would be reasonable to get her to pay for labour. But not reasonable to make her pay for a replacement without looking into this option. Also, if you buy a new computer then you still have the old one which will be valuable for parts so some deduction needs to be made for that in any case. I think you're angry and demanding a replacement without having made any inquiry into actual costs.

Theycallmemellow are you serious ?

DH does not need to apologise! She was so very very clearly in the wrong (Dsis). I think DH was rather restrained. And her offer wasn't good enough ! She sounds like an awful woman OP -ddon't let her get away with that selfish, appalling behaviour.

TheyCallMe - OP already said the computer was a month old, and £2300 is the cost of repair, not replacement. It's an almost brand new mainframe used for rendering, not a desktop PC for internet and spreadsheets.

she has owned up to it and offered to make amends.

Seriously? You think offering a shitty £300 computer from PC World to replace the expensive business set up the OPs DH had is "making amends"?

She needs to pay the full amount, and for those that said she should've just showed sis the room or had a locked door - why? It's her house, she can do what she wants.

jilted don't be such an idiot. I'm guessing you didn't even read the full op.

She is clearly in the wrong but tbh I would push for the £500 excess and claim the rest on the insurance.

As much as she might have the full amount stashed away and she did break it, it's a huge amount of money to ask someone to pay and insurance is there for a reason.

She should definitely pay for what she broke. Why should her mistake mean you have to settle for something cheaper? What an appalling way for her to treat you.

YANBU

I'd do a lot of talking to her about your feelings and have "how would you feel?" type questions.

It's a very expensive piece if kit to have at home. Forgive me asking, but is your DH self-employed? If so, then it seems to me as though this should be recorded as a company asset and the insurance premiums paid from the company accounts. So any hike in premiums will come out of your business accounts not your personal income.
If he's not self employed, but is expected to do this work from home, then again, I think the kit should be supplied by his employer.

I agree with (practically) everyone else though that your sister is in the wrong, and should recompense you.

She covers the excess and you claim for the rest on insurance. That's only £200 more than she has offered so she should be OK with that.

She was stupid and entirely at fault but it was an accident and this way you get some remedy from her without turning it into a massive resentful feud.

"The DH should have apologised for his bad behaviour" theycallmeyellow - are you for fucking real?? He lost his rag and shouted, perfectly understandable under the circumstances. The sister was lucky not to be thrown out on her ear, quite frankly.

Jilted why comment if you've got nothing useful (or kind) to contribute?
Yes she should pay. Work out the full cost of claiming on your insurance (including hike in premium) vs the cost of repair/replacement and give her the figures.
Completely different values here but I once spilt a glass of wine on my friends laptop . It was thankfully insured but I paid the excess. Why should she be out of pocket when it wasn't her fault?

I' m another one of those who have suspicions that this was not an accident. The OPs sister deliberately went somewhere she was asked not to. The OP and her DH have a perfect right not to allow guests into certain areas, especially a workspace.
If someone came to my house and couldn't respect my wishes or privacy they would be asked to leave and I doubt I would ever ask them back again.
I think your DH was very restrained in the circumstances.

Her offer to replace the computer with a £300 laptop or whatever is ridiculous, it's the equivalent of saying oops I managed to spill oil over your range cooker and set it on fire but I've seen a camping stove that I' ll get you and be grateful I'm even supplying that.

Morally I think you are right in that she should replace what she has damaged, realistically are you likely to get any money out of you sister OP?
Would she even pay your insurance excess?
Would you be happy to go as far as taking her to small claims court if she doesn't pay.
Personally I'd say she should pay , she chose to go into the room, she knew she'd been asked to stay out of there. She caused damage either accidentally or deliberatley but the fact is she destroyed a high end work related computer.
Your DH is right in sending her an invoice for the repair.

In the long term it's more than a computer that's been damaged

She's rude and uncaring and very disrespectful to you your dh and property. If one of my siblings behaved this way it would take apologising and payment offer before I gave them the time of day.

Someone laughing after damaging my expensive work equipment and ruining project...she lucky she wasn't thrown out the window. It doesn't sound like nerves to me, sounds like dsis was drunk and gets what she wants when she want and to hell with everyone else! Or she would have apologized right off and tried to help, and not gone up there in the first place.

How do you and dh feel about dsis now with her laughing and refusing to pay and demanding an apology? Is this something you would put up with or something you'd tell her to do or you wont be interested in her anymore?

Tbh this is what insurance is for. I definitely think DSis should cover the excess though.

Hi op I totlally agree with the pp who say she should pay the full sum.
It sounds malicious. Does she have form for this?

And the nly bad behaviour here has been dsis. I despair that anyone would think that it's bad behaviour of someone who was not abusive just upset that another had ruined property, been rude and disrespectful before and after, to shout. If one of my dhs siblings or friends was that way and dh said I owed the apology the door would hit his arse hard on the way out. And if I acted the same to him I would also expect door meeting arse.

I too don't think your DH has anything to apologise for, who wouldn't be angry in these circumstances? she went somewhere she's been told not too, damaged expensive equipment and then stood there laughing.

YANBU, she should definitely pay the full repair costs. I've worked in IT for a long time and I know how expensive components for specialised machines are, and how you can't necessarily 'get by' with a consumer model.

It's all very well saying she should pay the excess, but if OP's insurance is hiked as a result of their claim, they'll also have extra to pay month on month potentially for years.

Someone as selfish and irresponsible as this sister is hardly likely to continue to pay the ongoing additional expense even if she did grudgingly agree to the excess - she's bound to make excuses, or refuse to commit to payments which no-one can realistically make a call on re: how long they'll last.

Under those circumstances I'd therefore want the full cost of replacing this upfront, especially since it's known she does have the ability to pay it.

And frankly, someone who disrespected my wishes and who then bloody laughed about it and saw nothing wrong in leaving me thousands out of pocket could fuck off (once I'd got my money back).

I agree it sounds deliberate. Id be furious. Even if she paid up the full amount I wouldn't forget her bad attitude over it in a hurry.

hmm. imagine if this was a car.
what would you do then?
costs similar to a car