to feel tricked and taken advantage of?

[OohMavis]

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 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!

I would send him an invoice for the £60,tell him to keep £30 ,so know he owes you £30.After all if he can change the rules why cant you.

Gruntledone - that's not in the original post is it? The op drip fed that bit of information later in the thread....

Tbh I think it would be best if ops dh sorted out reclaiming the £200 from his brother asap by straight forward method of asking for it

FFS, ivykaty, there is absolutely no rule that posters have to put in the original post every single solitary bit of information that each and every poster might find relevant, otherwise it didn't happen. This is a discussion, ever heard of one of those? Conversation where people talk about a topic, contribute bits of information as they become relevant, develop their argument?

Or is your problem that you haven't worked out how to highlight OP's posts so that you can check relevant information before you contribute?

Tbh I think it would be best if ops dh sorted out reclaiming the £200 from his brother asap by straight forward method of asking for it

£300, actually, and it has been paid back. You really haven't read the thread, have you?

And the relevance of that is that both brothers have had a fairly relaxed attitude to these things, and that this is hardly a case where the BiL is in a position to get sanctimonious about the unpaid debt when he's owed much more for much longer in the past.

Yanbu. He was a cheeky sod - the debt was between him and his brother.

Well, you know what to say next time he mentions having a cake from you.

You: ha ha ha ha ha (light tinkly laugh) why? Does dh owe you money again? How much this time?

OP's bil certainly wants to have his cake and it eat it too!

Sorry, terrible joke

U2

If OP was feeling particularly evil, she could ask BIL's GF if she enjoyed the cake and accidentally on purpose let slip that he got her to make it for free.

Of course, that would only work if the girlfriend isn't a also a conniving, freeloading cheapskate.

"No actually. I've made my reasoning very clear, as have others, and the OP being female is not part of that"

I understand that. I disagree with your reasoning. I think women are in denial about the lack of respect men as a class have for us and I honestly don't think the BiL would have shown that sort of high-handedness to a BiL.

It's extraordinarily disrespectful. All the guff about owing money etc. is irrelevant. It comes down to respect. Most men respect each other enough, not to dare to treat each other like that. It's only women they treat with this level of dismissiveness, or younger brothers who don't matter or colleagues they've got an abusive power-relationship with.

It's just not the way you treat someone you respect.

Yes, I think you should send him an invoice. If he reiterates the comment about the debt, explain he can sort that out with your H but he still needs to pay you for the cake he ordered.

So someone is responsible for what their partner does or owes just by dint of being married to them.

It will be damn interesting to see how the next "DH has gambling debts" thread goes on the Relationships board then.

The OPs DH is responsible for this debt ...no one else.

BIL sounds like a skinflint who has bided his time.

Agree with AskBasil.

I the the two facts that ought to be obvious to everyone are:

1. OP agreed to make a cake at a discounted price.

1. OP agreed to give her BIL the cake in repayment of her DH's debt.

There wasn't any trick. It was a straight-up request from her BIL that she could have simply refused. No payment, no cake.

But as the OP agreed to it, she is BU for feeling aggrieved after the event. All she needs to do is get the money off her DH who now owes her.

This thread is really weird. I cannot see what the BIL has done that is so terribly wrong. The OP says her and her dh have totally joint finances and that her BIL knows this. They therefore as a couple owe BIL the 40 pounds from the show. On purchasing the cake the BIL owed the OP as agreed 30 pounds. I don't understand why the OP would have felt better if the BIL had paid her 30 pounds and then collected the 40 pounds owed from her husband. That 40 pounds would have come from their joint account. The same joint account that the 30 pounds would have gone into.

There is no free cake. A discount was agreed. The cake was made and paid for. End of story surely?

AskBasil is spot on.

If people genuinely don't see what the brother has done wrong or understand the concepts of honesty, transparency and goodwill then there's probably not much point trying to explain them.

nooka if it had all been agreed in advance of her making the cake I doubt it would be an issue.

The issue that people who agree with the OP have is that BIL decided to use her business time to pay off a debt owed by his brother, without prior discussion with her. More so because it doesn't appear that he was that bothered about chasing up the debt prior to this. Yes, technically the monetary amounts are almost the same, but the OP should have been given the opportunity to decide if she wanted her effort and goodwill used in this way.

Someone upthread said it really well -
OP's DH got concert tickets
BIL got a cut price cake
OP got to spend hours of her time making said cake and gets nothing.

Even if BIL didn't do it sneakily, she's still allowed to be a bit pissed off.

It's all going very well until you say that the OP gets nothing.
That is certainly not the case.

There was a debt to start with, so financially everyone gets the same regardless.
Nobody got nothing for free and the OP didn't work for nothing.

The only issue is of BIL presenting it as a done deal and not asking the OP's permission to offset the debt.

But it's not the OPs debt

But financially she ends up the same and she simply should have been given the choice (because it was not her debt)

See where I agree with you? But would please people stop saying she lost out because she didn't.

Lweji I thought that's exactly what I said the main issue was? Technically, yes nobody loses out financially, but emotionally it might not feel like that. Especially as the debt was not hers to repay, and she wasn't even aware of it! Her husband got the benefit of going to a concert, she didn't.

No, you lose the argument when you put back financials into it.
It's simply a matter of consideration to the OP not financials.

I don't lose anything, I'm just giving my opinion, which is different to yours.