CF tightarsedness

[BorisAndDoris]

Inspired by another thread, I'd love to hear your experiences of CFers being tight arses, never putting their greedy paws in their own pockets.

Mine was an ex when I was a youngster. Maybe 16? 17? I was financially independent (okay, skint on min wage but paid my way) and rented my own place.
CFBF and I were in the early stages of dating (maybe 1 or 2 months in).
I was running errands one day and needed to pick a few things up from the supermarket. He tagged along.

I went round the supermarket and he kept chucking items into the trolley. Fine with me, no point in 2 trolleys.
He put his stuff on the conveyor (sans divider!) whilst I was packing mine. I didn't notice until he said he needed to pop to the loo. He left me to pay for everything.! I was mortified and hadn't grown the lady balls yet to stand up for myself well. I paid and asked him for the money when he got back. He told me he forgot his wallet and would give it to me when he came next time. He didn't.

In fact the next time he showed up I was leaving for the cinema with my best friend. We told CFBF we already had plans. My Best friend was paying because it was his turn and I was skint (thanks to CFBF's shopping which he forgot to bring his money for again!)
I locked up the house and we all walked to the bus together. CFBF got on too as it was also his bus.

We got off in town. CFBF got off with us. Okaaaay...
We got to the cinema. CFBF still with us.
I asked if he was heading home and he said no, I'll come with you! Hmm.. whatever, I couldn't really stop him.

He walked in just ahead of us. The desk clerk had the tickets printed when we got there and best friend paid. It wasn't until we were at the concessions counter he realised he'd paid for three, not two. CFBF has asked for three tickets and not paid his one. It was so awkward that best friend couldn't bring himself to actually say anything.
I stopped answering the door to CFBF after that night and best friend and I have been laughing about him for 20 years now. I should have realised when he only turned up at mine in time for dinner and I'd feed him not wanting to be impolite!!

Not my story, particularly, but someone I once worked with got a real head of steam up about her husband's family and their sudden wealth. Her husband's sister and her man had run a successful business for many years, and were made a dream offer - their business was bought by someone else, to the tune of several million pounds. Bear in mind that setting up the business had been hard work, they'd done without holidays, without luxuries, without time off. They'd worked hard.

Apparently, this colleague decided that her sister in law's family should share their new wealth with their siblings. She expected at least 25% of the "massive profit" they'd made to be given to her own husband, as he'd "supported" his sister over the many years of hard work (by simply being her brother - they lived about 300 miles apart so he did nothing practical to help).

When the "fair share" of the money didn't happen, this colleague had a total hissy fit about it. I was shocked that she truly thought she was entitled to part of someone else's money.

I should have added - this colleague sent her children to a pretty expensive private school. The parents in law paid for it. Three kids, at a £6k per child/year school. Plus she expected the PILs to pay for the uniforms and extra curricular stuff. That was 6 years at £18k she'd had from her in-laws, and she still wanted a chunk of her SIL's business sale.

Gosh, I've even got that wrong. I've just checked the school website. The £6k is PER TERM!!!! So that's three terms times three kids times £6k, which is a whoooooole lotta money.

SIL has a four day a week job 2 hours away from home. Its a hell of a commute, so she stays in the place she works overnight for 2 or 3 nights a week, each week. She earns a six figure salary.

Except that she doesn't have a home in the town that she works in, and doesn't rent anywhere either. Or stay in a hotel/B&B. She stays with family and friends and basically couch surfs and stays in spare rooms. Friends and family are expected to put her up for free.

I am amazed at it. She doesn't often stay with us, so it doesn't affect me enormously and therefore I don't talk about it. None of my business, really. But it does amaze me.

We invited SIL and BIL. They rocked up without so much as a bottle of wine, enjoyed their dinner and our wine, then left.

They have history for doing this and I think it’s so selfish. Once, I thought they’d turned over a new leaf as they did bring a bottle. BIL took it home with him on the grounds that we hadn’t opened it.

This thread makes me remember to NEVER talk about money in front of my mil

A friend I made a couple of years before having my first child. She was a lovely, generous woman in many ways, but would wriggle out of paying for anything (cinema, drinks...). It came to a head when we both had babies - I was being made redundant during my maternity leave, and my husband was out of work. We went out for a coffee, and she made some excuse to go outside with her baby when the bill came, and then didn’t have cash. This was a cafe in between her house and a cashpoint - literally 5 mins walk from each. That finished me off, frankly, and I gradually fizzled out of the friendship.

@MulticolourMophead

I didn't need to. I was getting letters from the finance company addressed to me about the non-payment. I told them they shouldn't be sending the letters to me as the finance wasn't in my name. They said it was. Luckily they were decent (huge company) and I was able to prove it wasn't me who signed. It also turned out the finance agreement hadn't been done on licensed premises (ex managed to take the papers away to sign, hence him being able to forge my signature) so the finance company contacted the police themselves.

The repossession destroyed my otherwise great credit rating but because it was sorted legally it was restored. How the fuck he escaped jail time is beyond me.

One of my friends is notoriously tight and had been since school!

I remember as teens we would go on the bus or train for shopping trips to different towns and rather than save money for the bus home she’d spend it on clothes, make up, food etc and then just ask random strangers at the station for money to get home!

She also once reminded me that I owed her 7p. Still cracks me up to this day lol

I did an evening class and we all used to go to the pub for a pint or two afterwards. Unspoken rule / politeness in my book that if someone gets the first round in you 'owe' them the next one. Even if I left after one drink I'd always make sure I bought the kind person one the next week and so on.

Anyway one evening this bloke (a fellow student I didn't know very well) sort of hovers right next to me whilst I'm buying a drink, so I naturally offer to get him one. We move to a table with our drinks and join a bunch of others. After about half an hour everyone is reaching the end of their drinks. This bloke suddenly leaps up and moves to sit down at a different table with another group of people, not saying a word! Leaving me to go get myself a second drink! To top it all I witness another kind person on his new table offer to buy a round and see him willingly accepting! I realised of course that this was a sly tactic done each week when he would hop across to a new table at the magic time his pint was reaching the bottom!

OhWotIsItThisTime that is awful!!

Sorry, I'm new to mumsnet. What is CF?

I always wonder, in situations like Simply's, what if you literally did not have the money to cover their bill? For a long part of my adult life I had no overdraft or credit card. If someone tried to bilk me, it would have been literally impossible as the money just wouldn't be there to pay for it.

The CFers knows exactly what they're doing. They feel entitled.

Yep had a friend who would never pay, always around when drinks ordered and disappeared when bar person ready for payment... never had any money on her, always skint but always had the latest iPhone etc etc.

Found out she borrowed money from several friends and never paid any back just disappeared.

I went out for pizza with a couple of new friends as I’d just started uni.
We ordered two pizzas between four of us. At the end of the meal two slices were left. Friend A gets the bill and suggests we divide by 4, I was fine with that, friend B insists on dividing the pizzas cost per slice and had mentally noted who had how many slices. The left over two were divided between all 4 of us, we paid up and she asked for a box so she could take the two left over home! I was always about her she did this type of thing many times. I was just too naive to say anything ever.

Second CF in my life is BIL, he complained to PIL that he couldn’t go on holiday as single supplement was too costly. They felt bad for him booked a Villa holiday with other SIL & BIL. So three rooms. CF BIL divided the costs between each person not per room so the two couples basically paid his single supplement. The hire car was divided by him by just the two couples as he told them he wouldn’t be driving and he crammed his clothes into MIL suitcase so he didn’t have to pay for a suitcase. Utter CF he does it with so many things now and we’ve taken a step back so it’s comical.
Although he did buy a bike from us, it was expensive we gave it to him cheaper than Price we were after, he handed us the money in pound and two pound coins it was £75...in a plastic bag.
I didnt count it, it seemed rude.
When putting it in the bank later that day I just filled the slip in and the cashier told me I’d made a mistake the bag only contained £59. he does this type of thing so much.

Lol I don’t know what CF stands for but get the idea! I had a friend at uni and often we’d go out as students and then grads and she’d be saying she is broke. I’d feel sorry for her and buy rounds etc, because in my mind broke is BROKE...ie cash point won’t give you any more money, maxed out your credit card, used your student loan etc...BROKE BROKE you know! Well few years post uni I found out she had saved up over £20k for a deposit on a flat (c 20 years ago) as what she had always done was have a weekly budget worked out at the beginning of the month, keep that in her current account and transfer the rest into a 90 day savings account! Her broke actually just meant she had spent her weekly budget!!!

Unfortunately I think I could possibly be in the CF category. My DBF is a very generous person. The whole time I've known her she's always been better well off than me. She likes to go out for lunch and coffee alot, and a few times I've had to decline, citing various reasons as I was embarrassed to tell her I was skint (she doesn't think much of my DP but that's a story for another day). She got paranoid it was about her and confronted me on it and I told her I just can't afford the things she wants to do several times a week. I offered to have her round and I would cook, or bus to hers, or something cheaper. She didn't want to always do this (although she was happy occasionally). She started offering to pay, which I refused. But if we went for coffee she would just buy it anyway. She buys me new clothes without asking, and has paid for dinner before I even get a chance to pull out my purse. Nearly every time we go out now we have this tussle and I've started giving up argueing with her! I'm So terribly grateful and pay her back with childcare when I can, and I never come to expect it. But she insists, and I know she won't take no for an answer. Our work schedules changed around a year ago so we don't meet as often as we used to and I have managed to treat her to lunch and coffee a few times by saving up for it.

Oh I’ve another one,
Huge CF former friend on several occasions came to dinners, kids parties etc at our house, didn’t ever bring anything ever, but always managed to go home with a bottle of our wine or some cans of beer to save her “stopping at the offy” on the way home. She did it with kids toys and DVDS too we never saw anything of ours again.

Boomah, I don't think you are being a CF. Your friend has the money to spare and wants your company - she is choosing to pay for you and you clearly do a lot to help and support her.

I've said this on MN before, but we live near a quite famous festival that happens in the summer. For about 8 years a friend of DH's used to crash at our place for the week..... and would usually brings friends. Fine, we had 2spare rooms and some blowup beds. Whatever.

Until someone told me quietly that I needed to understand that actually said friend was subletting our place on the quiet and was pocketing the money himself.

I have twice taken my PILs out for lunch/dinner and when the bill comes my FIL hands over £30 and says "that's all I'm prepared to pay for a meal" and leaves me and DH to pay the balance. Since then, we either don't go out or we offer to pay for everyone - I don't mind being generous, but I hate being fleeced.

@thejustine Cheeky Fucker. LOL!

Next door neighbours, pair of CF’s once gave us a box of chocs for our anniversary, opened with some eaten.

I've had people pull the 'I have no cash on me' and I honestly couldn't afford to sub them. I didn't have the cash to do it so had to tell them sorry but they'd need to go and get money as I didn't have enough.

Just thought of another one. The mother of a friend of mine went into a big ice cream parlour and couldn't decide what flavour to have... "can I try just a little bit of the caramel swirl please?..... can I try a little of the chocolate chip crunch?.... can I try a little bit of the vanilla and honeycomb?..." etc. Eventually she'd had a spoonful of every flavour in the place then said, "Actually I'm quite full now so I don't think I'll buy one". I both loathe and admire this woman.