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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To tell my neighbour she has to pay for my son's bike?

177 replies

Bikelema · 28/06/2018 09:56

We are terraced houses and we share a passage to back gardens.

It has a gate on with a padlock.

We have a few bikes that are in the back garden (ours) but my son uses his daily so it usually stays in the locked passage.

She had a gardener come once in a while to mow her back garden.

Last time a friend was visiting he locked his bike in the passage and my neighbour had taken his bike and left it in the front garden.

I came out and moved it into my back garden. I asked the gardener not to take property from the locked passage and leave it unattended in the front, he said neighbour had told him to put it in front garden.

We live in a shit area.

I also knocked on the door and said this to neighbour

She apologised.

It happened again. Only this time I took the bike into my house whilst they were both in the back.

Sue her knocking on door panicking that bike was gone.

I told her I had it but not to leave the bike in the front.

So guess what.

It happened again but only this time it was stolen for real :(

It was a £800 bike that we got 2nd hand for £150

AIBU to ask she pays for it?

OP posts:
headinhands · 28/06/2018 10:37

*Just claim it on household insurance. As far as you were aware it was locked away and now it's been stolen.

Report to police for a crime number and then put in the claim.*

So you're happy for your premiums to go up because other people don't take proper responsibility for their own property?

PurpleCrazyHorse · 28/06/2018 10:37

Doesn't matter if the neighbour doesn't mind it being there, you know the gardener can't get the mower down there with the bike in the way and the gardener pops by at any time he's in the area, which you can't predict. Yet you still left the bike there. YABVU.

JessicaJonesJacket · 28/06/2018 10:38

YABU. It sounds as though the gardener moves the bike because it is blocking access. Despite knowing this, you continued to leave the bike there. You've been inconveniencing your neighbours so your son doesn't have to wheel his bike an extra few feet into his own garden.

PurpleCrazyHorse · 28/06/2018 10:39

Leave your stuff in your garden, end of (especially if it's a bike that you got a brilliant deal on). You took a risk and it backfired.

MilkTwoSugarsThanks · 28/06/2018 10:43

So you're happy for your premiums to go up because other people don't take proper responsibility for their own property?

My premiums go up anyway 'cause people do stupid shit with their stuff all the time! I don't think this is much different tbh.

HarryLovesDraco · 28/06/2018 10:43

It's not an £800 bike, it's a

MoreAndLess · 28/06/2018 10:44

Tricky, your neighbours gardener was stupid to put it in the front garden but you were a little silly to leave the bike in the side alley when he had done it twice before.

Is it insured?

It was a £800 bike that we got 2nd hand for £150

Sounds like it was a bargain. I hope it was a legitimate sale 😅. Maybe look out on gumtree etc to see if it goes on sale.

FlyingMonkeys · 28/06/2018 10:45

Possibly the neighbour was being polite when she said it was okay to keep it there. Presumably when she stated she didn't mind it being there overnight she was thinking 'the odd time - not a permanent fixture'. I'd imagine your neighbour and her garden have better things to do with their lives than piddling about moving your sons bike in and out every month.

Clandestino · 28/06/2018 10:48

If this happened repeatedly, you'd be completely U to expect any compensation.
You should have kept it in your own garden or house. She's not to blame and a small court would laugh in your face if you expected her to pay for it.

LIZS · 28/06/2018 10:48

You knew it was not secure, and blocking common access.

pinkdelight · 28/06/2018 10:50

It's not 'once in a blue moon' though, clearly, it's often enough to be a problem. No point saying the neighbour has no problem with it. There is a problem because it's been moved and been nicked! Honestly, bikes get nicked from locked sheds so no idea why you'd think storing it in a passageway was a good idea in a bad area. Your DS needs to pay for another £100 bike (what it was worth at best) and store it properly.

AfterSchoolWorry · 28/06/2018 10:51

I wouldn't risk leaving my belongings on a communal area and trust someone else to be reliable no matter what they said.

I'd have kept it in my own garden.

Imchlibob · 28/06/2018 10:57

We talked when she moved in and she said it was fine for us to put a bike or 2 in the passage over night.

Either her gardener is coming overnight, or you are not sticking to this agreement as your son's bike is also there during the day.

Trinity66 · 28/06/2018 11:04

She should pay, you can't move someones things to an unsecured area like that whether the passage is shared or not

PeppermintPasty · 28/06/2018 11:08

Yes, I agree with pp who say yabu. In my view this is nothing to do with the neighbour agreeing to the bike being in the passage, it's about locking up and keeping the bike secure, and that is you/your son's responsibility.

It's totally foreseeable that now and again someone will either forget to lock the passage, or need access and have to move anything blocking the way in there.

I used to share a passage like this in a middling-to-shit area. The neighbours were fastidious types and would lock the passage pretty much all the time, but there is no way I would say that responsibility for my stuff in said passage was theirs if by chance the passage was left unlocked. No way. Or vice versa.

Trinity66 · 28/06/2018 11:12

The neighbours were fastidious types and would lock the passage pretty much all the time, but there is no way I would say that responsibility for my stuff in said passage was theirs if by chance the passage was left unlocked

That's not what happened though, the neighbour actually physically moved the bike to an unsecured area. If this were on Judge Judy the neighbour would be paying Grin

agedknees · 28/06/2018 11:13

Yabu. You’ve made it a problem by storing stuff in a community area. You should have kept it in your back garden, then it wouldn’t have been stolen.

Takethemdown · 28/06/2018 11:14

It's possibly the gardener that has moved it rather than her.

As someone who has ended up in this situation with someone blocking a communal area with bikes after me feeling obliged to say I didn't mind when they asked to leave it there once when they were going back out she is probably too polite to tell you no.

If it's council they will tell you to not block the communal areas.
If it's private then the same.

Notlivestock · 28/06/2018 11:17

No, she shouldn't pay. You are responsible for your own things, and you made the decision not to keep the bike somewhere more secure (such as inside, in your own garden, or locked to something). A shared passage isn't secure, as evidenced by the fact that the bike was TWICE moved before it was finally stolen. You had notice that it wasn't a safe place for it, and you should have found somewhere else.

You are also unreasonable not to have insured such an expensive bike! Unless it is insured and you just don't want to claim, which is... still unreasonable!

PlatypusPie · 28/06/2018 11:18

We also have a terraced house with locked access passage. My DD has a £1000 bike ( triathlete) that is locked to itself, locked to two other bikes and all locked with a heavy motorbike chain to a hook concreted in to the floor of a metal bike shed in our already small enough garden , secured on two sides with very heavy duty locks. Bike theft is rife in our ‘nice’ area and I swear the thieves must be physically as well as morally snakes to get in some of the places they have struck.

She also has an older bike, worth about £100 now, that she uses to get to work early on the morning - keeps that in the secure shed or sometimes brings it into the house the night before. The thought of leaving something that is valued ( either monetarily or for usage) and portable unlocked in a communally accessible area is silly, no matter what the habit has been. If you do that you have to accept that there is risk attached which you cannot then pass on to someone else.

brieislife · 28/06/2018 11:19

Going against the grain I think YANBU.

  1. The neighbour barely uses the passage and has said she is happy for the bike to be left there. Whether she really is or has said it to be polite is immaterial - you’re not a mind reader. If she has a problem with it she should have said so.
  1. The bike when left in the passage is secure behind a locked gate. It is the gardener who has changed this situation by moving the bike, not further into the garden where it would still be secure, but out the front where it no longer is. Fair enough he needs to move it but he should be moving it back straightaway or moving it to the garden. If he came on fixed days you should move it in advance so as not to inconvenience but seen as he doesn’t, you can’t. Again, you’re not a mind reader.
  1. You had addressed the situation previously with your neighbour who agreed it shouldn’t happen and promised to rectify. If at that time your neighbour had been unwilling to help or unapologetic then it might have given you a hint that maybe the safest solution would be for your son to change his habits and leave the bike in the garden instead. As it was she didn’t so he didn’t. And then it did happen again. Therefore I think your neighbour is at least partially culpable. Probably more than 50% so.

All that being said, I doubt you’ll get much cash-wise out of your neighbour and I guess you need to decide whether it’s worth souring neighbourly relations by pressing the point.

catinasplashofsunshine · 28/06/2018 11:20

She agreed to the bike being in the passageway overnight, but presumably the gardener doesn't come at night? So the bike is in the passage in the daytime.

I agree she probably agreed because, like many people, she struggles with conflict or standing up for herself and saying no.

You can ask her to pay.

You cannot with any reasonableness "tell her she has to pay" as in your title.

She doesn't have to. You might be able to bully her into it, if you are a bit intimidating and that is why she struggled to say no in the first place. That would be unreasonable, obviously.

Reasonable would be for your son to keep his bike on your own property, not blocking a shared passageway and making the security of his unlocked bike the neighbor's problem.

SaucyJack · 28/06/2018 11:21

"If this were on Judge Judy the neighbour would be paying"

Except that she wouldn't, because legal right of access supercedes any moral duty to keep your neighbour's belongings from being stolen from their garden.

Notlivestock · 28/06/2018 11:24

Can you imagine the reverse of this?

my neighbour asked me if her son could keep his bike in a communal passage at night time, and I agreed because didn't want to make a fuss. Son started leaving bike there during the day, meaning my gardener had to move it to the front garden so he could get the mower down the passageway. Now the bike has been stolen and my neighbour wants me to pay even though I have never moved the bike in my life, and it got moved because her son started leaving his bike in the passageway during the day, which wasn't what we originally agreed. AIBU to not pay?

Guarantee the responses would be telling her that it wasn't her responsibility!

Trinity66 · 28/06/2018 11:24

Except that she wouldn't, because legal right of access supercedes any moral duty to keep your neighbour's belongings from being stolen from their garden.

She would, I've watched similar cases on JJ before. She moved the bike from a secure area to a non secure area