AIBU to ask what cheeky things you've seen people to do in order to not have to pay

[IronFists234]

First off, this is supposed to be a cheeky fucker thread. This is not a thread laughing at people making attempts to cut back to save money. Just want to make that clear!

This thread is inspired by my friend I went swimming with yesterday. Our local pool does wrist bands that indicate what time you entered, so yellow for 2-4, blue for 4-6, etc...

My friend was very adamant we HAD to go swimming at the 4-6 slot. I didn't question it but found her insistence odd.

It turns out she had blue bands from her last swimming session! She had just kept them and not handed them in

When we entered the pool she shouted "oh don't worry I already have the bands" to the pool employees. So not an outright lie but they assumed she paid!

It's a busy pool as well, so I doubt they notice she hasn't paid

I asked her why she did it and she said she'd paid once and if she could get in for free by keeping the bands, why pay?

any other stories like this?

My father also once said he went to a barbecue where the owner requested everyone bring a 'portion of coal' but I still think that was a joke (or hope)

I know a couple who will lift the tip from the table after a meal (so everybody else's money!) to use themselves for a drink at the next place we're moving on to - as a group we make a game of calling them out on their blatant cheeky fuckery now.

When I worked in a small independent wedding shop, there was one customer... a rough as old boots traveller (not saying all travellers are like this but she really was). She bought a whole wedding outfit, navy dress and bolero, white accents on it, designer label, hat, shoes, handbag etc. wads of cash for the lot.

Fast forward a month or so, she comes back in complete with luxury carrier bag and tips the whole lot out on the counter. She wanted her money back as she decided she didn't like it. The shoes had suede inserts round the heel part and the soles were scuffed, the jacket collar was filthy round the neck part and had splodges of food down the dress, the hat had feathers missing. Diplomatically I said 'this all appears to have been worn'....

Well, she screamed blue murder that she had only tried the shoes on at home, and hadn't worn the outfit, never had she, she was blaspheming and putting spells on me, but I just said 'we will not be refunding you' repeatedly. She then threatened to get her sons onto me and I would roast in hell but I just stood firm until she eventually ran out of steam.

Funniest thing was ... my wet blanket of a Manager was hiding behind a pillar scared and after gypsy woman went, said to me 'you should've been firmer'. I subjected her to an icy stare and walked off the shop floor to cool down!

Some of these are shocking!

I had a friend who would order a cappachino, drink almost all of it, and then send it back saying she was on a no-sugar diet and didn't want the chocolate spinkle on the top. They'd usually just make her another one without the chocolate.

The same friend would also wait until everyone else had put money in for their dinner & a tip at a restaurant, then say she had no cash so 'I'll pop it on my card'. Of course she would keep all the cash and pay the exact total, no tip for the staff.

We eventually stopped hanging out with her, it was too embarrassing.

The lady who brings her family to the hobby buffets, why do you all sit there and let her do it. 'Oi, it's members only!' 'Hey, you need to leave some for everyone else.'

I did! I said in my post about it that I challenged her and it was water off a ducks back, she just grinned and carried on. I even complainted to the event organiser who just said "oh, you know what Susan is like!" I said it was not fair and if we all brought our families in for free grub it would be nothing for anyone!

It was like banging my head against a brick wall

My mum's colleague (let's call her Amy) was a reformed CF.
One of Amy's friends stole a clothing gun and thr plastic tabs to put labels in. Amy's group of friends (from secondary school) would go shopping on a Saturday and buy expensive party dresses, go out in them & then retag them and return them the following Saturday when they bought their new dresses.

My mum told Amy exactly what she thought about it. The longer Amy worked with nice people the less time she spent with her group of CF. Turns out it was so normalised with women from her area. Amy is mortified when she thinks back on it now.

Yes the amount of people that ‘rent’ clothing is extremely common. A reason why some brands use long exterior fabric tags for dresses; once the fabric tag has been removed it can no longer be returned (they can’t wear the dress without the tag showing as it covers the entire length of the dress.)

To that other poster: I wasn’t present at the event where bottles were being taken, I was just told about it. It was a large event with 100s of guests and so it was only discovered after the fact. The staff were fuming.

I'm wondering if I'm a stingey fucker.
When I go out with friends I always avoid getting into rounds.
We're usually in a group of 8-10 people and I am usually the only one driving so I will drink a maximum of 2-3 soft drinks all night, cost max £8 normally. If I bought a round for everyone it would cost £35ish usually, and that's more than half our weekly food budget, I'm not working at the moment so I do have to watch pennies.
I wonder if they think I'm stingey.

WhyamIBoredathome
No you're not. Don't worry.
Rounds only work if everyone drinks similar value drinks.
If I'm not drinking I never get into rounds.

What would be cheeky is when everyone is having a pint/glass of wine/gin anf tonic type drinks and then someone wants to get in expensive cocktails aka trying to profit off the rounds.

Whyam that's perfectly reasonable!

Partially cheeky fucker, mainly dirty fucker!
I once had a woman try to return a children’s bike to the shop that I worked in. Not only had this been used, it had been used pretty hard. Tyres down to the treads, stickers pulled off, frame scuffed etc.
This was a model that we sold a lot of and I knew that none of the damage was from a fault, that the bike simply hadn’t been liked after.
We refuesed to refund it so the woman screamed and shouted. We continued to refuse to refund so she screamed, shouted and swore a bit more.
When she finally realised that her foul mouth and threats weren’t going to get her what she wanted, she stood in the middle of the shop and pissed all over the floor!

Gone to a cafe with friend, ordered food, he lied saying he was getting it to go to save some money. Cost 1.50p difference to eat in.

I used to go out regularly with a group of friends to restaurants. We would all pay the bill and one friend would take the receipt home and her husband would claim the money on expenses from the company he worked for. It was often £200 or more.

The pizza family! Christ! I am shocked by all of these stories but especially that one.

I’ve worked with many, many people who were in the habit of arranging meetings over lunchtime so that they could call it a ‘working lunch’ and get free sandwiches. All of them well paid people. This was in the public sector...yes, this is where our tax was going. Some people never bought their own lunch, but enjoyed posh deli sandwich platters and fruit plates daily.

When the inevitable crackdown happened - there was a freedom of information question about how much our department had spent on staff lunches in the previous year and the total was jaw-dropping - the policy changed so that lunches were only acceptable if a third party was present AND it would be customary to provide lunch (so if a minister was coming for the entire day, for example).

People are surprisingly resourceful in their quest for free sandwiches, though. Suddenly, people from other government departments began to be invited to our building for meetings, always at lunchtime, and they wouldn’t really need to be there. But there would be a disproportionate number of attendees from our department, keen to get their hands on the free lunch.

I’ve never understood this sort of thing. Wouldn’t you just be embarrassed? I did notice that some people treated it as a combination of a game and ‘sticking it to the man’ though: they felt that they should be regarded as highly important and hence should be able to do what they liked, at public expense of course.

A local drugstore has "seniors' day" once a month - free coffee and biscuits. One time, the woman ahead of me emptied the entire plate of biscuits into her handbag.

And I thought I was bad for sometimes taking TWO biscuits...

I have just read Winky’s story. That has eclipsed the pizza family.

I have just thought of one. A new branch of one of my favourite restaurants opened, experience was poor so I sent them an email making some suggestions on what could be done differently. Restaurant emailed back offering me a free meal.

I told people at work about this and next week colleague announced that she and her partner had a free meal at the restaurant by doing what I did and sending in a complaint- only they'd never been there before. Boasted about how much th meal would have cost them. I was disgusted that someone would stoop so low and we're all on reasonable salaries too.

Confession - me and my friend pretended to be Lesbians to save money once!!
We went to an attraction with our 2 dc and she had an annual family ticket. When we arrived the lady on the desk said that it would be £30 for me and DD to go in but my friend and her DD were covered by the pass. Friend said it was a FAMILY pass for 4 so it should cover all 4 of us. Lady said we weren't a family, friend grabbed my hand and asked what made her say that?
We were all allowed in on the pass

What annoys me is that these are people who as a rule wouldn't down right steal anything, but they just can't see a problem with what they are doing.

I had a aunt who used to 'rent' clothes years ago. She is a very lovely, moral and upstanding person but saw no problem with doing this.

I worked in a school as admin staff about 15years ago. Two mornings per week the senior leadership team had a morning briefing lasting about 40mins. Every week during said briefing they had bacon rolls, fresh pastries and bucks fizz. All on the school budget, ie paid for by the taxpayer.
Same school had cheap value instant coffee for the staffroom, charged at 20p a time. Head and leadership team had fancy expensive filter coffee and boxes of posh biscuits, again out of school budget.
Most recent school I worked in, staff who stay for parents evening are given a sandwich after school because they will miss dinner (not usually home until 9.30pm). Said sandwich is two slices of bread with some value marg and tasteless cheese or ham. On a good day there is a small unripe apple to go with it.
Leadership team in this school have a weekly afternoon meeting ending around 6.30pm (plenty of time to get home for dinner!). every week they have a buffet including a full cheeseboard, a fruit platter, fancy pastries. And yet they are making admin staff redundant because the school budget is being cut.

Yeah hopping - that's cheeky

FIL was obsessed with free food and drink - if he came to ours or DHs siblings he would basically gorge himself. He would drink any alcohol going until he was in a total state.
He's stolen others food when they were out of the room and then gone mad because they have 'gotten 2 dinners' and where is his extra one.
At ours he would even eat bad/out of date food and made himself ill.
He had a tantrum once as we went for a massive late lunch and so I wasn't making dinner and he demanded he still wanted it (I didn't make it). Perfectly normal at home though?

One of his sons is one of those people if he gets a sniff of a split bill won't stop ordering drinks/steaks. It's amusing as his wife likes very much to give the impression of being well off - this always shows them up how cheap and poor they are.

I know but it was closing in an hour and was mainly some sad looking chickens so really not worth £30
Spent plenty on the gift shop so I felt better abut it though

Yes my mother last week.
Invited me out to lunch for my birthday then left without any mention of the bill leaving me to pay for both of us. It doesn’t really matter and it’s not like I couldn’t afford it it’s just the assumption that I’d pay it all that narked me.