How to get out of something that I didnt agree to?

[KungFuPandaWorksOut16]

I am very close friends with a group of 5 ladies, known each other since high school.
We all have children ranging from the ages of 1-6.

Friend 1s child started reception this year and has joined the PTA aswell. Friend 2 & 3 already have children at this school. Friend 1 is the only one on the PTA.

Friend 2 has just text me, saying she didnt know I was offering a prize at the christmas fair.

Me: What?
F2: One of the raffle prizes is a colour & cut at KungFus Salon.
Me : Must be an error and mean another salon.

Cue a whatsapp message of friend 3, with a screenshot of the flyer and the message "kept this quiet. Its lovely of you though"

In the flyer it mentions how the school will be grateful for donations etc etc, raffle tickets go on sale after the school holidays for X price. It then goes on to give a "sneak peek" for some prizes up for grabs and sure enough their is my bloody salon 3rd on the list offering a colour and cut.

Text F1 did she sign me up. Yes she did, that was her contribution (?!)
I asked F1 will she be paying for the voucher. She has responded No, she wont be because its for a good cause and the rest of the community has donated bits and bobs.

Now Im stuck.
I didnt agree to any of this and now leaflets have been given out advertising my salon donating one of the prizes.
All the money goes to the school so it is a good cause, but i just see it as my child doesn't attend that school or any school for that matter. This "donation" will leave me anywhere from £30-£45 out of pocket.

Would i look horrendous ringing the school up and explaining what has happened or shall I suck it up and just do it.

midnightmisssuki you can do this kind of thing too! Half the battle of being a non-doormat is sticking to a no even though you feel bad about it at first. After a while it feels less alien to ignore another person having the hump. Feel the fear and do it anyway. No change worth making is easy.

And all ptas are part of the national association I thought. But to my knowledge they don't publicise the amounts raised by every pta to all members.

That's not what I said. We used to share information about events that were good fundraisers.

SuburbanRhonda was only asking. It seems like a hell of a lot of money so finding out what raises it seems perfectly reasonable in case it can help another school.

Slightly off topic, but isn't there restrictions on what PTA money can pay for in the school? I have a vague memory of lots of complaining because the school couldn't use money towards something the PTA wanted for some reason.

@SuburbanRhonda I guess you have far fewer kids in your school, size of school is definitely a factor. But just because your school doesn't raise as much there's no need to do a sarky face to those in large schools who do. Not on. Rude. No, pta funds are never spent on teachers. They don't go to the basic running of the school they are spent on extras. Paying extra teachers would not be acceptable use of pta funds at our school and anyway a teacher costs more than that when you include the NI, pensions contributions and other costs of employment.

My issue is the sarky face and disbelieving tone of @SuburbanRhonda. She wasn't asking for help with good fundraising ideas she was suggesting that people were making up amounts.
So when you say as a member of the pta association 'nobody was raising amounts like that' actually that's nonsense as a school could have 10 events that each raise £2k. So you would only be aware if the £2k and not the £20k total. So actually you've no info at all via the Italian association on the totals raised by other schools.

It's so ridiculous that she thought her donation could be someone elses time/money.

Our school raised more than £100k over 2 years. It can be done.

@JigglyTuff exactly, our school hardly raises an unbelievable amount others raise far more.

We considered a Christmas tree sale but by the time you'd factored in the costs of buying the trees, transporting them to the school, storing them and hiring the gadget to put them in a net bag, it just wasn't worth it. I'd love to know how PTAs make things like that work.

Can we stop derailing the thread with PTA arguments and fundraising tips?

I get there's a link but it's not really what the thread is about.

You're right, 2014newme, I was sceptical. But only because we could never dream of raising that amount.

I think you've probably more than made up for my emoji with your own reaction though.

You can stop if you like, blather.

No-one's breaking talk guidelines.

And if you change your settings to highlight the OP's posts, you can just read those.

@SuburbanRhonda the forestry commission will deliver the trees on the morning and supply the netting machine. No transporting to school, storing them or buying a netting machine required. You do need a lot of people to unload. You can sell them at the Xmas fair. Lots of publicity needed so people know not to get their trees elsewhere. Easy money

No need to change my settings. The Ops posts are already highlighted. Just bored to death by the one upmanship and the 'My PTA can raise more than yours' crap.

Derailing the thread may not be against talk guidelines but it's disrespectful to the Op.

Thanks 2014.

Probably too late for this year but I'll try for next year.

As you were, blather

This thread is now veering into PTA banalities. It's not about breaking TalkGuidelines SuburbanRhonda and 2014newme, it is about basic courtesy. Can you please be courteous to the OP and other posters and not derail the thread? Thank you.

Not really people can chat while waiting for the op to update. Feel free to join in.

Sorry, OP

OP - has PTA lady come back yet?!

AND - did your lovely cheeky friend keep texting you? Bet she is!

Why do anything but pretend this woman has been a twat? Stop all this nonsense of how has this happened, is there a typing error, etc. You know what has happened 100%. You have all her texts and given her ridiculous messages why keep it nice from now on? Only she benefits from this action.

I know it sounds vindictive but I would want to be very clear to the PTA what happened here, as otherwise it could well be assumed that maybe OP changed her mind about the type of hair treatment she offered as the prize. (Especially if F1 implies that OP was flaky for example.)

I think it would be advantageous to this school's PTA exactly what kind of person she is. They do need to have the measure of her. She can't be trusted, full stop. She has tried to dodge the blame for this mess but she is totally responsible. Maybe someone with the morals of a cat is fine to have in the PTA, but I would certainly want to know that rather than thinking she was trustworthy and it was all an honest mistake.

Contact Chair of PTA. Tell her F1 has offered a raffle prize of school pickups/drop offs for a month. See how she likes it.

at the whole thing, and F1, generally.

why doesn't she just pay the £15, out of embarrassment?

Well done OP. Hope you hear from the PTA lady soon.

The Chair of the PTA may not come back for a day or two. There’s a good chance that she has a day job and won’t be checking messages in the daytime.