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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to feel tricked and taken advantage of?

508 replies

OohMavis · 09/02/2016 14:28

I'm a cakemaker. Valentines is a busy time of the year, but last week DH's brother asked me to make a cake for his girlfriend, so him being family, I fit him in last minute with a discount, price was agreed last week.

He came to pick it up today but instead of paying me, he's told me to ask DH for the money, because DH borrowed it from him Angry and off he went with his cake.

I had no idea DH owed him money. It was for some tickets to a show they went to together which his brother bought on his card for convenience. DH just forgot about it.

AIBU to feel as though he's basically got a free cake out of me, and feel really bloody annoyed and tricked? I'm not going to be paid for the cake (our finances are completely joint, BIL knows this, it would be utterly pointless for DH to pay me). My time has been wasted. I turned down a paying order for him.

Just so angry!

OP posts:
Bragadocia · 09/02/2016 22:16

You were tricked, in so far as when BIL agreed the price with you last week, he did not say that he would like the cake to settle your family's debt to him.

If he had made the request as something like, "I'm owed £40 for those concert tickets last year. Could we settle the debt with a cake for my girlfriend's Valentine's gift?" that would have been a fair, honest way to have organised the transaction.

What he did was discourteous.

Surely you shouldn't be putting this through your books, as it would be subject to income tax, which is not applicable in this situation? It is not income - it is repayment of a debt. If your DH had paid the debt off in cash, it would be from your family's post-tax income. You shouldn't be taxed on this £30.

LovelyFriend · 09/02/2016 22:18

OohMavis You can totally argue that as there is no discount available on debt paying cake BIL still owes you. Debt paying cake must be charged/calculated at the full rate - the family discount does not apply to debt paying cake.**

** Can not be used with any other offer, scenario. You can have one OR the other - you cannot have BOTH! (you can't have your discount cake and eat it take it in payment of debt)

So now BIL actually owes you the difference between the full rate cake, less the paid debt.

It matches his logic! Go on I dare you!!

GruntledOne · 09/02/2016 22:19

I cannot believe how het up people are getting about this. She didn't lose any money.

Yes, she did, because she was tricked into repaying a debt that wasn't hers, and losing a potentially profitable customer into the bargain.

GruntledOne · 09/02/2016 22:23

As I've said previously, it's only a trick if the BIL honestly thought that OP was petty enough to remove a discount upon learning that her DH hadn't paid the BIL back.

Masterly misstatement. It could equally be phrased as "It's only a trick if BiL honestly thought that OP would be less keen on offering a discount if she had known he expected her to pay off her DH's debt from the proceeds of her hard work and willingness to turn a paying customer away."

Adeleslostbeehive · 09/02/2016 22:24

But if the debt was paid in cash there would be no cake

lorelei9 · 09/02/2016 22:28

I can't believe so many posters think this is okay
OP charged a discounted price for a business service which was doing the guy a favour.

Also her business should not be linked up to her OH debt.

Also OP could have given that time to a client paying full price who may have given her recommendations and repeat business.

I'd be telling BIL that and in no uncertain terms.

GruntledOne · 09/02/2016 22:28

But she isn't out of pocket...or at least no more than she would have been when she thought BIL was paying cash. She chose to charge him 30. She normally charges 60. BIL, rather than picking up 30 from DH on the way to pay OP, paid OP by writing off a debt. No additional money hit the account but a debt that would have had to come out no longer has to. So OP is 30 up

Now, that really is weird maths. How can she conceivably be £30 up when she has received nothing?

It makes no difference when BiL "plotted" this. The fact of the matter is that he had clearly plotted it, at the latest, by the time he came to collect the cake, otherwise he would have asked OP if it was OK to take it in lieu of her DH's debt.

GruntledOne · 09/02/2016 22:30

Could you really have taken money from someone who you were in debt to?

Lucked, OP wasn't in debt to her BiL.

I also don't get all this lost prophet angst. You made the decision to not take on a full price customer no one else, if you are going to do that I don't think you can wings about the lack of profit.

The point is that she wouldn't have taken that decision if her BiL had told her what he planned. Why is that so difficult to understand?

GruntledOne · 09/02/2016 22:32

Wow. Reading all this, I suspect BiL will be less inclined to buy his brother concert tickets again in future either.

Unlikely, given that in the past he has delayed two years in repaying a debt ten times as large he owed to OP's DH.

gooseberryroolz · 09/02/2016 22:32

But it ISN'T a free cake.

honeyroar · 09/02/2016 22:34

I've only read the first couple and last couple of pages, but it sounds as though both he and his brother have a rather Lassez-faire attitude towards paying family for things. I think he was cheeky, but unless you're unlikely to be able to get the money out of your husband I don't really see the problem in the long run. If you were really bothered you should have refused to give him the cake and told him to get his money off his brother himself.

Stopmithering · 09/02/2016 22:35

You did not owe your BIL any money.
You entered into a contract with him and a price was agreed.
You fulfilled your part of the bargain.
He took the cake but didn't pay.
He has shown a total lack of respect for you and your business by taking the cake in lieu of £30 which you didn't even owe him.
The joint finances of you and your DH are irrelevant.
Cheeky twat.

ElderlyKoreanLady · 09/02/2016 22:35

Why would there be no cake Adel?

bibbitybobbityyhat · 09/02/2016 22:36

Why are people looking at it in terms of hours/money/profit/loss/whatever?

Op did not owe her bil any money, her dh did. It was his responsibility to take care of his debts and settle them. It is not for BIL to decide to compensate himself for that debt by simply taking something to an equivalent value from op without even having the balls to tell her this was his idea before asking for the cake.

So what if the money in op's joint bank account is the same at the end of the day? So fucking what?? Bil has totally disrespected her as a buisnesswoman and a person in her own right WHO DID NOT OWE HIM ANY MONEY.

ElderlyKoreanLady · 09/02/2016 22:37

Gruntled if you start at -£30 and finish at £0, you're £30 up.

ElderlyKoreanLady · 09/02/2016 22:38

And FWIW, I don't see anything that shows he'd clearly plotted this.

RhiWrites · 09/02/2016 22:41

I told my partner about this and he said:
OP's DH gets the event the tickets were for
BIL gets a cake
OP puts in effort and gets nothing.
So although the books balance, she's karmically down.

Solution? OP's DH does something extra nice for OP to pay her back for paying off his debt with cake.

Bragadocia · 09/02/2016 22:41

Is the OP's time worth nothing at all? And the ingredients costs? This is a business - not something she does to pass the days.

Stopmithering · 09/02/2016 22:41

Whether he plotted it or not is irrelevant.
He agreed to pay £30 and failed to do so.

Adeleslostbeehive · 09/02/2016 22:45

There would be no cake because he wanted the cake to repay the debt. No reason to think he would've been willing to buy one at mates rates hAd there been no debt. Op says he hasn't before

ElderlyKoreanLady · 09/02/2016 22:46

The OP's bank account says otherwise Stop. It's £30 richer than it would have been if BIL actually hadn't paid.

ElderlyKoreanLady · 09/02/2016 22:48

So you're assuming he didn't actually want the cake Adel and it was all a plot to get his £30 back in some form? Why not just ask his brother for the money he was owed then?

roundaboutthetown · 09/02/2016 22:52

Because this way his girlfriend doesn't realise he's a skinflint who only gets her cake when he hasn't had to pay for it. Grin

Stopmithering · 09/02/2016 22:54

Eh?
"It's £30 richer than it would have been if BIL actually hadn't paid."
He didn't pay any money.
BIL was a lucky bugger to get a 50% discount and then didn't even pay that.
Cheeky fucker.
How anyone thinks it's ok is beyond me.

SweetAdeline · 09/02/2016 22:55

Presumably your dh has now given you the money for the cake (or it's been transferred). So you haven't made a cake for free at all. You've been paid exactly what you agreed in advance into your business account. It's just your dh has covered it because he owes your bil some money - is that a "better" way of looking at it for the sake of family relations.

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