To ask your stingiest stories?

[iLoveFoood]

Tell me some of your stingy stories. The ones where you've had a friend out to dinner and they inspect the bill down to the last €0.20.... or the guy at the office who refuses to bring in the Friday biscuits but eats everyone else's!

I know a guy at my work who is a full time smoker but never has a box of cigarettes. Just asks someone different every time. He gets away with smoking ten a day, one off a different person every single day!

I asked him for one before after giving him my last few a couple of times and he said 'no, these need to last me 2 days' 😆

@username45, your friend is a thief. Don't you call her out on it?

I was friends with a woman who had terminal cancer (she’s now passed) She was famously incredibly tight and owned a large house outright and had £+++ in savings.

Anyway, when she had to go to the hospital for her radiotherapy if there was no one able to drive her she’d insist on using the bus as she was over 60 so could travel for free. But by making the journey on the bus it wiped her out for days afterwards, but she point blank refused to pay the £4 cab fare! So she wasted many, many days too ill to do anything as she was too tight to pay for a cab. It was horrible to see.

My Mum died and I used some of my inheritance to take her 2 best friends, their husbands and one of their sons and girlfriend to a nice restaurant, no expense was spared, think filet steaks, cocktails and champagne. Including tip the bill was an even £500. I didn’t mind as I’m sure my Mum would have thought the money was well spent.

The next time I saw the 2 best friends was a couple of months later for a more casual light lunch. I think I had a sandwich and an orange juice and they both had soup and a coffee. The bill came and they both looked it over and said “ok, so that’s £7 each”

Just to put it into perspective, they are both wealthy, huge houses and regular long haul holidays, usually business class. A lot wealthier than I am or my Mum was.

Years ago when our first DC was born my OHs brother and his wife who are notoriously tight (despite being loaded) offered to let us have some baby things as they had completed their family. We gratefully accepted. They duly dropped off several bin liners of stuff which turned out to be a broken steriliser full of black mold inside, a falling to pieces moses basket and a pushchair with only 3 wheels, plus some baby clothes that were covered in stains! We took the lot to the tip and in the interests of family relationships didn't say anything further about it. A few days later the brother rings to inform us that they were making a "generous gesture" to us. We would be allowed to use the items from them for as long as we needed them for the baby. Once we had finished with them we were to sell them and give him the money!

One of my favourites is that I was the one who usually bought the office presents when somebody was leaving, having a baby, big birthday etc and I quite enjoyed it. However, there was one person leaving who had no personality and was generally miserable and luckily, his team leader said he'd buy it. Two days before the due leaving date, said team leader complained there was very little money in the collection. (No wonder, the leaver was not the most popular amongst us). He didn't know what to buy. I came up with a few suggestions but in the end, the team leader gave him a shopping voucher which seemed a bit odd for a man in our group. He'd apparently had the shopping voucher at home and hadn't used it so handed this over as our office gift and pocketed the collection money himself. He was quite proud of this when he told me.

Why is it always those who are well off that are the tight arses?

That's why they're well off!

So many stories with ex H. Went on all inclusive holiday in August in Cyprus, it was boiling hot. Walked a mile to the town, wouldn't let me buy a cold drink because they were free back at the hotel. Another time we arrived in a car park which was free after 6. It was 4.20 and would have been £1, he made us sit there for 1hr 40 mins.

Another time we had a free sample of a new teabag, we both preferred it. I said, shall we have these in future? Yes he said, but still get the cheap ones for visitors.

My husband is a bit of a stinge, he's never brought me a birthday present, he pays for us both to go out instead, so it's not too bad and I don't mind because we don't get to go out that much. What I did mind about was that until the past few years he'd never brought me a card either. Good job he's fab in every other way :)

When I was little a friend's dad used to have a separate cupboard full of his (very nice) food that she and her mum were not allowed to touch whilst they had boring stuff. He never let them go into the front room when he got back from work either and spent the majority of his life in bed with a 'backache' that required him been waited on hand and foot. Horrible man.

My great aunt was known for her spectacularly tight christmas presents. One year my dad got a damp, solidified bag of granulated sugar with brown stains on, another year a head of celery wrapped in newspaper. She would give me and my sister broken toys and old books with bits of birthday card stuck over scribbles so you couldn't read them.

My mom's stinginess is in the kitchen. She went to cookery school in the 60s and learned some not very nice recipes typical of the era. She then spent the next 50 years scrimping on them, eg the hungarian goulash ended up as little more than pressure cooked gruel. When she made sandwiches, she would cut the ham into a kind of tesselation to avoid any possibility of overlap, and then put Branston pickle on making sure only one chunk went on each quarter of the sandwich. I used to get excited when I got the silverskin onion. She was pleased when Small Chunk Branston came out, because she could then put on even less - just the barest smear.

I worked with someone who divided a cuppa soup sachet into 3 portions for 3 days lunch. But when there was free food in the staff room she was right on it.
She was so tight. It wasn't evwb lack of money. She was very very well off. Guess that's how she made all her money

My df would never pay for car parking.
So when we went to town (about 3-4 times a year) we'd park out of town in the restricted parking rather than in the 20p for 2 hours park.
The restricted parking was 1 hour no returns, and around 25 minutes walk from town.
So we literally had to run there, run round the shops and run back (usually late). If we'd ever got a parking fine then it would have been more than 20 years worth of parking in the paid car park.

When I was a teenager I had a very stingy friend, as were her parents. She was known for it. My parents gave her lifts everywhere and her parents never reciprocated bar once when we were fourteen - they asked me for petrol money.

When we were about 18 we were at the pub with some friends, I started feeling ill. She was leaving early and her dad was collecting her. I started feeling really poorly and my house was on the way to hers - you literally had to go past the end of my street to get there. So I asked her if her dad could drop me off on the way. She phoned her dad to ask him, he sounded really reluctant (she sounded as if she was trying to convince him). Eventually she said yes but he would have to drop me off at the end of my street. I said fine.

We went to the loo before leaving and when I was in the cubicle she just left me there after telling me I could have a lift. I was speechless and have never forgotten it!

I had a boss once who was director level, on approx £120k plus bonus, who ‘never carried cash.’

When the company was being taken over, and the directors approved the takeover, he stood to gain approx £250k on his share options. He sent a low-paid junior accountant out to buy him a cigar to celebrate, and never paid him back. Because he didn’t carry cash

Fuck it, if my relatives read this it will fully out me

My DF had one of those huge expensive stacking stereo systems. None of us were allowed to even play the radio on it. We had no money and all of our furniture was 2nd or 6th hand from relatives so the stereo just looked ridiculous in this otherwise crappy lounge

He used to find things in skips and try to pass them off as birthday presents. The worst one was my Dsis and I asking for a TV when we were teenagers (mid 90’s) and for Xmas he went to the shed and got out a black and white TV with a dial he got given by someone. It had like a coat hanger aerial and a dial to change channels.

He also wouldn’t let my mum put any lights on in the house until it was fully dark no matter what she was doing - ironing or cooking so it was usually dingy and dark and bloody dangerous until you were ‘allowed’ the lights on. He also had a box of nice food of his own no one was allowed to touch

He has had 2 hefty inheritances over the years has blown them all on himself and despite living in a mortgaged big house with a nice car (I am single parent in rented with an old car) now is demanding I repay him every penny of my portion from years ago. He hasn’t given his grandchildren even a birthday card for years

Fuck you dad

@Wearywithteens - hand made/hand knitted gifts are proper presents! They are more than just the thing - they are the time and effort put into making them!

Babysitting a few years ago when desperate for money and the bill was £59.50. Mother only had £60.00 and made such a fuss about “not having correct change”, and “you’re going to have to remember to pay this back to me, Tasha”. Mother is a mega rich lie-back-and-think-of-England-type- spending her husband’s money all day.
I’d actually arrived early to sit her four unangelic kids, cleaned up after a dinner party, and had always put up with their drunk shenanigans when arriving back late for me.
I was so embarrassed that I said “how about I just take £55.00 if this is going to cause you worry”, until the mortified husband told me not to worry.
Hope she’s reading this and recognises herself. I have never forgotten it to this day.

Also, I have a very rich and extremely tight half sibling, who sporadically cooked for our father when we visited him together. Once I caught him handing her some money, so me being a nosey sod, skied why, to be told that he paid her back for the food when she cooked.

Note that me- better educated and hardworking yet poor- cooked on a regular basis for everyone and had never been offered a bean for it (nor would I consider asking for it, even when broke).

I tested both father and half-sibling a few years’ back, not getting in touch with them to see how long it’d take for them to contact me first. I’m still waiting.

A guy I know (but wouldn't consider a friend) went on a date with a girl. He paid but when he messaged her after asking her out again she said no so he replied immediately with his bank details asking for her half. I was happy to hear she refused to pay him.

I also have a very good friend who is incredibly tight, even though her family is really well off (as in buying a 3 bedroom house in London outright as a second home well off). When we were younger she used to ask me to go out with her to a pub or club then we would literally be about to pay to get in or have ordered a round and she would turn and say to me, "I don't have my purse so you'll have to pay tonight". Once we were in a supermarket together and I was just buying one thing. She did an entire shop, had it all on the conveyor belt and just as the woman starting scanning it told me she didnt have money and I'd have to pay for it. She hasn't done it since she tried it when we were out for lunch and I point blank refused to pay for her and she had to go home and get her purse. We're still really good friends as she's great in other ways but her and her family have some real issues with money, despite having loads, and are always falling out with each other about money.

A certain member of my family will visit the supermarket at discount hour, then barter with the staff to reduce them furthur. We are talking loaves of break down to 10p each and she will beg and nag and moan until she can get 2 or 3 pence off it. She will then bring it all home and expect us to all eat it and use it. It expires the same day as she buys it. Have you ever eaten 10 loaves of bread in one night? Worst thing was at the time I was doing all the food shopping! It was like saying “no toffee I don’t like what you’re cooking tonight, you will eat all this bread instead”

I have a friend who used to be terrible but she's not so bad now. Her stingiest moment was going back into a café we'd just left and taking the tip I'd put on the table!
A man I used to know would drive home from town if everyone he was with was stopping for coffee/food, make himself a piece of toast, then drive back to town, because cafés and pubs etc were a waste of money..

If there's no written contract, Pookie, tell him to whistle for it.

My DP and I agreed to go on holiday with his Mum and her partner, they live on the opposite side of the country so we don't see them that often so thought it would be nice.

We thought we'd book a holiday cottage somewhere and split the bill for it 50/50 between them and us. They decided they didn't want to do that so they'd bring their caravan and stay in that so we had to book a cottage and pay for it all, that's fine.

However we got there and they decided that they wanted to stay in our cottage since it's already paid for .

They are well known for it though, they'll offer to pay for dinner and go to a really cheap place - which is absolutely fine but when DP says we'll take them out for dinner all they want to do is eat at a very expensive restaurant and order whiskey and champagne all night. We aren't well off and they probably earn over double we do.