to think MIL has ripped the piss?

[taxiforMIL]

Please help me to see straight with this.

My MIL picks my DS up from school on a Monday. DS is in P4 I so this arrangement has been going on for the best part of 3 and a half years since DS started p1. She always walked to to the school to collect him but since Easter she’s had bother with her knee and hasn’t been up to walking the distance to the school.

We offered to send DS to afterschool care but she insisted he came to her so we offered to pay for her to pick him up in a taxi (she doesn’t drive) and bring him back to hers. All seemed ok.

We decided that instead of giving MIL money every week we’d set up an account with the local taxi company and I’d pay the bill monthly. My DH knows the guy who runs the taxi firm so was no bother to set up. We explained to her what we’d done and the account was to cover her journey to and from the school to collect DS.

Anyway, to the main issue. Since April, I’ve been calling monthly to settle the bill and it’s always been roughly the same amount, give or take a few pounds.

I called at the end of Oct to pay the bill and it was higher than usual but I was busy at work at the time and assumed that there had been a delay at school one day or something had happened. Admittedly I forgot to ask DH about it. I called at the end of November to pay the bill and it was even higher again! For instance, say the bill is normally £30 a month, it was £45 in October then £75 in November. I didn’t pay the November bill there and then as the man in the office couldn’t tell me what journeys had been made on the account.

I rang my DH and explained to him about the bills shooting up and he phoned MIL who said she’d been using the account to get out and about and she didn’t think we’d mind a few extra pounds on the bill.

My DH said to her that she’s spent roughly £60 on taxis on an account that she knows was set up solely to collect DS from school.

She is indignant about the whole thing and even used the account again after we’d told her.

WWYD? I’ve told my DH that I want DS to attend
Afterschool care. It’s cheaper than £75 a month 🙈

Really?

How is your DS going to feel about this, OP?

Yes, she should have asked first and/or paid her bill herself.

But you've had three years of her minding your DS. It seems a slight over-reaction to me to send your DS to after-school club instead and cancel the account without telling her first. It doesn't come across as you wanting to take the cheaper option of after-school club, it's stopping your MIL doing something she likes regardless of what your DS would prefer tbh.

Yes I think your MIL should have asked before putting more journeys on your account but you do seem to be very focused on the cost of these taxis. You were obviously happy for her to collect your DS every Monday for 3 .5 years ( what happened in the holidays did she have him all day? But you didn’t actually value the time he got to spend with his gran because you were too busy comparing the cost of after school care versus the taxi cost. Does she help out as well if he’s off school sick?
She may be using the extra taxis to go shopping if she can’t manage heavy bags with her knee problems? Given the amount of childcare she has given over the years has her son, your DH, bothered to offer her lifts to a supermarket, perhaps doctor’s appointments? So that she doesn’t need to get taxis. Helping out members of your family works both ways you know.

Yes rather ungrateful

Coffee agreed. I believe she might’ve expected some sort of offer of help seeing as her knee is hurting her. from her DC.

So I hope your DH has been offering to take her around for things she needs, just like she was there for you guys all those years.

I really would think she felt deserving of some help, and perhaps was too embarrassed to ask but has moments where she felt a bit daring to push some boundaries and help herself to what should be the help she needed.

Not wise but understandable.

If that happened I would be totally embarrassed with shame and tell my DH, your poor mother was needing lifts and we should’ve offered her first.

Surely you can just tell the taxi company that the account is to be used only for journeys to and from school on a Monday afternoon and nothing else?

So do all the people falling over themselves to excuse the MIL and castigate the OP have an explanation for why MIL never even casually mentioned that she'd been using the taxi service for other trips than the one it was clearly designated for?

Surely you'd mention it to the person paying, even if you were practically a saint and nobly providing free childcare despite a knee injury?

The message I'm getting here is that if I generally do someone a favour then I'm allowed to take advantage of them without asking. Cool :)

What does your DH think? I would focus on her getting more help to resolve her knee problems and less on paying the taxi bill. Her cations are screaming that she obviously needs more help getting out & about. Have your DH offered to give her more lifts when he isn’t working or just generally?

Yes she should of asked to use the taxi but you are coming across as very mean and spiteful. This is your husband's mother, your DS GM ,

She did steal from you, op.

I am trying to imagine a scenario wherein I would be comfortable using someone else's money without their permission, even if I was disabled and felt owed a favour or two.

Nope, still stealing.

She knows taxis cost money, yes? She knows it was your money she was spending!

Unexpected bills this time of year are especially hard. The fallout from this might cause serious problems but it needs to be discussed. Maybe a break is all that's needed, and former boundaries set up for next term, but trust has been broken imo....

I can understand your annoyance but when you rely on family for favours they don’t really have any boundaries.

No. Just no.

Grandparents doing free childcare is a wonderful thing for which you should be very grateful and properly appreciative. It doesn’t mean you throw all your boundaries out of the window.

My PILs used to have a key to our home. They used it when doing childcare for us or when doing favours like lifting the mail when we were on holiday.

They started to use it to randomly enter the house when we were out and poke through our papers.

As soon as we found out we quietly changed the locks and stopped asking them to do any childcare that would require a key.

The OP’s situation isn’t any different.

This isn’t about abusing free childcare or the OP being ungrateful it’s about the MIL abusing their trust and the OP asserting proper boundaries.

There is a difference between “nice” and “doormat” which MN often seems to find difficult.

Nice does not equal doormat.

The MIL has stolen from her son and DIL. They are quietly making arrangements to stop that. It’s an appropriate response.

*firmer boundaries

I think she’s wrong. It’s stealing in effect.

She is completely in the wrong but I think it might be worth being the bigger person. If this escalated into a rift, you’ll all feel it. I’d cap the account at £50 a month - explain you can afford an extra journey or two but no more and thank her for all her help, but please don’t spend money without asking.

I find this one difficult, yes she has provided free child care, but that does not entitle her to more than double the taxi bill of a young family.
I also think DS would enjoy After school care as they get fun things to do.

Also, I imagine she feels there’s an injustice here to feel entitled to do this. She’s just not brave enough to come out with it.

YANBU! What cheek!

I think it's very cheeky, especially when she wanted to do the childcare. To not have asked and just started flitting around "on expenses" is not ok.

How do posters know the GM didn't offer to have her grandson for a couple of hours once a week when he started school? People are going on like the OP got the thumbscrews out and gave the woman no choice.

My MIL has done the same, of her own volition, and is disappointed if the DC have something on and haven't been able to make it.

I think it's a bit of a cheek on the GM's part.

absolutely you MIL should have asked first but when she says 'out and about' presumably that means getting to the shops to buy her groceries and all the sort of other little jobs that she needs/wants to do.

My DF drives, DM used to but hasn't in a long while and she spends most of her time inside reading and playing on the iPad. I'd happily cover a taxi account for her if I felt she was able to get social interaction and independence, unfortunately I know she would never let me do that

Nowhere in the op does it state whether she pays Mil or not.

And if the Mil did want to be paid all she had to was ask.Not take taxis on the sly

The line in the sand is: the account was set up solely for the purpose of two trips a week to and from OPs DS school, this was explained to the MIL.
Using the account for other stuff, without first asking / mentioning it is really rude.

If it was my mother I wouldn’t mind paying for a few of her taxis a month if she needed them , BUT she wouldn’t do something like this to me either.. and I would be extremely disappointed and upset with her if she did.

It’s rude and if this was a company, it would be considered theft..

Also a few people are toting up the cost of the childcare that’s past.. it’s crazy because presumably she offered it as a favour and also wanted to do it.. OP sounds like she has tried her best not to take her mil for granted and make the arrangement as easy as possible by setting up the taxi arrangement in the first place so I think all you people being harsh to OP need to step back and think a bit more!

Your MIL has potentially saved you 1000s in childcare...but she should have asked first! THAT is the cheeky part!

If you hadn't questioned it, would she have even told you?

Doesn't seem as if you saw any problem with her providing you with free childcare one day a week for what, four years? I'm with koolkatz here. So for the sake OK of what, under 100 euros, you're going to damage your and prob your ds relationships with her?

I d love to hear her view of things, really would.

My MIL is lovely, she is also not in a great place financially. She would be mortified if she somehow accidentally spent more than the account was set up for in this circumstance. Taking money without asking is what it is, however it’s interpreted.
Those suggesting OP’s MIL is entitled to spend their money because of childcare savings give away their own lack of boundaries.
You’re not BU OP. If MIL is spending your money through some kind of resentment or feeling of not being appreciated, as some have implied, then that’s even more reason to end the arrangement.