Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Flexible and made to last.

Meet the Other Phone.
Flexible and made to last.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to be the only person concerned that the PTA treasurer seems to have gone missing....

583 replies

PTAmissing · 16/05/2016 07:06

With all the PTA money?

She's been treasurer for years, no children at the school anymore.

She usually attends roughly 1 of every 4 meetings. She hasn't been to one for 6 months. She won't answer the phone or the door, doesn't reply to emails or texts. Chair went to her house and she didn't answer the door although it looked like she was in. We have no access to the money or accounts and the school is lending us money to get back off her at some indeterminate time in the future.

We have the school fate soon and she has all the info on stalls etc not to mention the money we need to buy things! She owes one of the parents about £50 for things they bought from their company for the PTA xmas fate.

Nobody else seems concerned! I really got angry about it at the last meeting and said this is ridiculous, we have no idea how much is in the account, we can't get hold of her, we have no working float. Apparently she has family drama at the moment and thats why she's unavailable but she still wants to be treasurer. I raised the possibility that there could be something dodgy going on and got shut down by the chair who said its not possible as there are two signatories on the account (because she couldn't just forge a signature???)

AIBU to think they should be taking this a bit more seriously given there is over £7000 (at the last count) of money that has been donated by the parents fgs, not to just sit in an account that nobody can get into?!

OP posts:
cozietoesie · 27/05/2016 20:24

Openness and rigour of application of the constitution.

cozietoesie · 27/05/2016 20:28

I'm actually pretty puritanical when it comes to accounts, Bolo, but I'm curbing my natural tendency to go in with the Sword of Justice and having a good long realpolitik and tonic. It's the way communities often work best.

Bolograph · 27/05/2016 20:29

Openness and rigour of application of the constitution.

But run by the same people as before. And you don't just assert "rigour of application of the constitution" you have to actually walk the walk, and given the tendency of small groups of parents in small schools to be friendly with each other, why will it be different a second time?

fraggle84 · 27/05/2016 20:32

Agree re calling police now, maybe 101 for advice?

cozietoesie · 27/05/2016 20:34

Because it can - there are plenty of people who have posted who serve on such committees who are horrified by what they've read and having had a wake-up call like this, people in the community will be watchful from now on.

I'm assuming, by the way, that the Chair will stand down sooner rather than later as the mess happened on her watch and due, it seems, to lax governance. Her position and that of the Head Teacher are .......not unsullied.

cozietoesie · 27/05/2016 20:36

That would be down to the HT and the Chair, fraggle. They've given an ultimatum, interestingly, and I reckon they'll stick to it.

Bolograph · 27/05/2016 20:39

Anyone who gave money to the new PTA would be an absolute mug. The committee allowed one of their friends to run off with five years' takings, then having realised what was happening did nothing about it until provoked by an outsider, whose attempts to deal with the matter were delayed and dismissed. But it's going to be different now, honest.

Someone might also like to ask about which insurance policy the last few fetes were held under, and what the school did to check that such a policy was in place. You'd be a mug to have anything to do with organising future events, too, given that neither the PTA not the school troubled themselves to check they were insured.

cozietoesie · 27/05/2016 20:40

Oh it's a mess, no question. But with a new committee and the future wellbeing of the school community at stake........?

cozietoesie · 27/05/2016 20:43

Anyway - the question is now moot. The OP has resigned and people will do what they will do.

ProcrastinatorGeneral · 27/05/2016 20:44

I've been following this thread since it started, and I'm gutted for the school and the PTA members who have been trying to do their best. This sort of shit makes it so hard for groups to do anything for their schools.

cozietoesie · 27/05/2016 20:46

Yes. It does.

hippydippybaloney · 27/05/2016 21:16

What a sad situation. I am in shock at how brass necked a person could be as to turn up for more money when she's been caught!

unlucky83 · 27/05/2016 21:58

When I spoke to our umbrella organisation about this issue they said there was one case where the treasurer went on foreign holidays and was driving around in a new car - all paid for with the PTA funds.
When they got caught most of the money had been spent anyway... the bit I found really hard to understand - was they had the brass neck to carry on living in the community - seeing the people they had swindled every day. How could they do that - and what about their children?

Baconyum · 27/05/2016 22:49

'I'd be going to the police now. It sounds a rum do to me.'

Me too! But then I think police should have been involved way back!

I'm sad and sorry this has happened op but not surprised.

Giving her another week + to cover her tracks is CRAZY

I also said I think the head is at risk of losing their job over this, I think that's even more likely now, especially as a pp said with it being clear today there's a likely crime been committed but STILL not involving police. That will look like (and possibly is) collusion.

With it having been going on over 5 years that suggests an amount of around £20k!

cozietoesie · 27/05/2016 23:12

In real life, I suspect that much will depend on the local community and the relations between the people. It would be almost impossible to prove large amounts went missing over an extended period and you would run the risk of people taking sides, talking about 'this poor woman being witch-hunted over her voluntary work', a woman who was possibly ill, caring for sick parents or something, a 'pillar of the community' hitherto and - moreover - someone who might be liable to lose her job and pension if she were charged with fraud. (I think the OP said that she worked in Finance?)

I don't like it but I would be surprised if any police involvement resulted in charges/trial. I think the OP posted that another parent/committee member even expressed shock that the OP was talking about the Police? That it was 'OTT'? I think that that indicates how feeling might go.

The Chair should consider her position forthwith. (The HT as well in my view.) But the treasurer? She might well escape formal punishment - although the community would long remember her actions. If it's a close community, she might have preferred to avoid that kind of continuing censure.

NightWanderer · 28/05/2016 03:21

At least it's out in the open now.

It does sound like the police needs to be involved. How on earth do you progress from here though?

Surely you can find PTA guidelines about how these things should be run and managed, things like getting two people to count fete takings or having funds audited?

The Head really needs to take responsibility for how bad this situation became.

GoudyStout · 28/05/2016 03:45

If there is any kind of insurance policy in place with cover for fraudulent activity then the police would have to be involved - there would need to be a crime number in order to make a claim.

TheMaddHugger · 28/05/2016 06:21

Treasurer is not picking up the phone to the school at all now.

After she didn't turn up she left a message with the school asking if someone could drop the money off to her at home as she couldn't make it shock

Oi What a cheek

our step grandma gave her DD [at the time 60 yrs +] rights to look after her accounts. Her DD had an undisclosed Gambling Problem
Yup. We all know what happened next :(

NightWanderer · 28/05/2016 08:47

I think the OP said this woman had been Treasurer for 10 years. Shock

I really couldn't blame the current Chair for this. She hasn't been in the position that long and it sounds like there have been problems in the PTA for a while. It's such a mess.

Pengweng · 30/05/2016 18:47

OMG! I can't believe she has done a runner!

retrorobot2 · 30/05/2016 20:56

I repeat my comment of several days ago that if, as it should be, the PTA committee contained an equal number of men as women the presumed level of embezzlement would never have happened. If, as we are told, men and women deal with things differently and we need to work for 50% representation of women in Parliament, we need to work for 50% representation of men on PTA committees.

ProcrastinatorGeneral · 30/05/2016 23:09

retro I've been involved in school PTA and friends associations for the last decade in three different schools. I've never once known a man join in any capacity. More often than not there aren't enough members to do more than just fill the basic 'job' vacancies. There simply aren't enough people willing to get involved to start throwing unnecessary spanners in the works.

retrorobot2 · 31/05/2016 00:59

ProcrastinatorGeneral: Maybe more needs to be done to encourage fathers to participate. Maybe the perception of the PTA as being a mothers-only group is off-putting. Balanced gender representation is relevant to PTA as much as to Parliament.

CaveMum · 06/06/2016 15:38

Any update?

anoldiebutagoody · 06/06/2016 16:16

There should be no reason why the Head and Chair of the PTA can't ask the bank for a statement/ balance of the accounts held. The bank should allow any two people named on the mandate to request statements.
At least that would prove whether the money has gone or not.