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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

What the hell with colleague

287 replies

SalemShadow · 30/05/2019 21:56

We have a colleague who is always instigating work socialising and organising nights out. Prob is she never wants to pay for anything. She never ever buys a drink. She always asks me and my colleagues to get the bogof drinks and she will get the next ones but she never does. She has blagged lunches off colleagues by forgetting her purse app and never paying back. We went out yest and my colleague said she would get the first drink but she needed to get the next ones. She never did. It was awkward as she just sat there with empty glasses. A couple of times she has been on lunch and said she needed a sandwich but forgotten her purse. We went in the sandwich shop once on her request and I'd already eaten a sandwich from home as trying to save money. She looked in her purse she only had some pound coins which she is collecting app. She then proceeded to ask me to pay for her sandwich as she can't spend her coins as collecting. She's asking me and a colleague to come on a few nights out with work in the next few months and trying to convince us to come for a break away. I don't know how to deal with her politely as she won't pay for anything! It's really starting to piss me off. Aibu?

OP posts:
powershowerforanhour · 31/05/2019 11:26

I don't even understand the "collecting coins" excuse!

Going for her girl guide miser badge perhaps?

irnbruforlife · 31/05/2019 11:28

She then proceeded to ask me to pay for her sandwich as she can't spend her coins as collecting. i dont understand why you paid for her lunch after her saying this. Any normal people would laugh in her face. Or offer to swap her coins for non collectable coins and hold them for her until she could buy them back if being generous. In a way its your own fault she is taking the piss out of you.

TapasForTwo · 31/05/2019 12:50

Why should the OP curtail her social life because of this CF?

I would just say that I'm buying my own drinks because I am on a strict budget, and not get involved in rounds.

Also, don't chip in to anything she is collecting money for because she will have inflated the price to cover hers.

WiddlinDiddlin · 31/05/2019 12:56

I am a serial money forgetter... OH and I share one wallet, one bank card etc so I can easily forget he's got it...

However I have always got my phone with me, so I paypal whoever at the time and now actually when I go out with certain friends/family, I paypal them IN ADVANCE so they've got my share already.

Next time she tries this stunt, just suggest she paypals you there and then, and if she hasn't got the app oh well she can set it up in minutes.

If she doesn't have/want paypal she can do a bank transfer on her phone easily enough.

And if she can't do any of that 'Oh dear I am so sorry but I've only got enough money for me.'

wibbletooth · 31/05/2019 12:57

Op, spend some time this lunch time writing a list starting with your sandwich money that she definitely owes you and then work back a month/3months/6 month’s of all the times that she hasn’t bought her round(S) or has ‘borrowed’ money and not repaid it. You know approximately how much a round costs in the different places you go - and the cost of an individual drink.

Work out how much she has cost you and the group as a whole. Prime a couple of colleagues who have also been affected then go up to her at the end of lunch when they’re around and say that you’re running short of cash so please could she give you the money back now please. And while she is at it, you’ve realised that in the last 6 months you’ve been on 10 evenings out together where everyone has paid for rounds and that you’ve realised that she hasn’t paid for a single round or drink for you in all that time. If it had been the odd once or twice in that time you could understand it as you don’t necessarily drink the full number of rounds each time but not at all is a systematic and deliberate intention to not participate. And this you would like a contribution back from her as there was no way that you would have been able to afford to take part in rounds when you not everyone was contributing equally.

Then hope the others chip in and ask for their money back too.., using some of the excellent phrases already suggested if she kicks off.

And then finish up with a ‘I hear you’re organising a summer gathering. I guess if you’re proposing to buy the drinks all night it should go a little way towards paying back everyone that you’ve taken drinks from before with -it seems- no intention of ever repaying the debt and we can be the ones that can forget our purses and save our coins for a change’.

Then she’ll know that her proposed summer gathering is not going to be the free ride that she is planning and you might even get a few drinks out of it.

And for the next few times you go out for a drink with her point out that for the last year (or whatever time it’s been) you/other colleagues have bought the first round and she hadn’t. So if she wants to go out then she needs to buy the first round for the next year to atone a little for all those times she didn’t ever buy a round by guaranteeing she has got a round in. I bet she won’t organise many events at all...

ElijahOrKlaus · 31/05/2019 13:03

Curious to see if OP has made a stand at lunch today...
@SalemShadow

SavingSpaces2019 · 31/05/2019 13:04

I don't even understand the "collecting coins" excuse!
I think in this case 'coin collecting' is the CF's way of saying she's saving her own money!

I can't believe none of you have been upfront/straight forward with her yet.
Nobody i know would keep doing this and not have said anything to her by now - and i'd take it further if she dared to bite my head off for telling her to pay for her own stuff.
She's like the school bully who nicks your lunch money off you!

missminagrindlay · 31/05/2019 13:07

I'm amazed at 'forgot purse' still flying when everyone's got a phone and/or smart watch. I mean, you can pay for the bus in most cities with contactless.

TapasForTwo · 31/05/2019 13:08

"OH and I share one wallet, one bank card etc so I can easily forget he's got it..."

Why? I find that a bit odd. Don't you ever go out without each other?

"If she doesn't have/want paypal she can do a bank transfer on her phone easily enough."

You can't with Nationwide unless you have already made a bank transfer with that person. You need a card reader to make new bank transfers.

Thecabbageassasin · 31/05/2019 13:10

How on earth have you let her scrounge money off you more than once and carried on doing it.
I’m generally a fairly laid back agreeable sort, but even I wouldn’t have given her any additional subs until she’d paid me back for the first borrow, or returned the favour.
Gob smacked that you’ve all carried on subsiding her and she’s now bragging about it in front of you all.
Are you scared of her op, that is the only reason I can assume you’ve let this carry on. In which case just distance yourself from her and make an excuse every time she asks.
Or if you’re feeling braver just say a firm no when she next tries it on. Bullies are generally quite cowardly and once they’ve figured out you’re not gonna tolerate their behaviour they’ll find another target.

TapasForTwo · 31/05/2019 13:10

"when everyone's got a phone and/or smart watch"

No they haven't Hmm
Not everyone with a phone wants to use it for payments. Most people I know don't own a smart watch either.

Frankola · 31/05/2019 13:16

Jesus. She sounds like a right cadger!

She's taking the piss and she knows it as well.

Stop paying for her and start declining her invites. If she asks tell her why. I can guarantee she already knows!

Aprillygirl · 31/05/2019 13:19

No wonder she's always organising nights out and outings when it's all free for her! Organise your social life yourself and don't invite the cheeky fucker. If she asks why she's not invited tell her she's clearly struggling for money but so are you and just can't afford to subsidise her anymore.

0DimSumMum0 · 31/05/2019 13:24

I think you have to either start saying no, or stop going out with her. Surely enough is enough of this always happens.

SerenDippitty · 31/05/2019 13:28

I’m wondering what happens at the works Christmas do - does she manage to get you all to pay for her for that too?

billybagpuss · 31/05/2019 13:30

To be fair on the collecting coins my DD does occasionally collect the 50p’s as they bring out special ones she has a set of Beatrix potter and Paddington etc. To my knowledge though the £1 coins are boring and OP colleague is a CF.

clairemcnam · 31/05/2019 13:31

You can't pay for buses in the city nearest me with contactless. And a lot of older people like me do not do mobile banking in our phones because arthritis or other issues makes a mistake too easy to make.
But I would never do what your colleague does. If I had no money I would just go without lunch. No big deal.

Drum2018 · 31/05/2019 13:33

Socialise if you want. If she asks you to pay for her sandwich just say no and carry on getting your own. Don't even make an issue of it. Or better still call her out on it by saying that you cannot afford to financially sub her anymore and you'd appreciate if she stopped asking you. Maybe other colleagues will follow suit if you stand up to her. Either way her asking other colleagues is not your problem to solve. Just ensure you say no every time she asks for money, lunch, a drink, whatever.

SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius · 31/05/2019 13:38

CF Colleague: "I'm organising a summer bash - are you in, @SalemShadow?

SalemShadow: "So you'll be paying for all our drinks and food, to repay us for all the free drinks and lunches you've had over the years - count me in!!"

clairemcnam · 31/05/2019 13:42

I would just go to the summer bash, but just say instead of joining in rounds, you are going to buy your own drinks.

kalopali · 31/05/2019 13:47

OH and I share one wallet, one bank card etc

How can you share one bank card? Totally bizarre and almost certainly in breach of the T&Cs of whichever bank that is.

Jux · 31/05/2019 13:48

Just say no, it's perfectly reasonable not to go out with colleagues, most people have lives outside work after all.

If you do go, then see your other colleague first and tell her you'll be buying your own and that you're just giving her a heads up because you both know that X won't be buying any....... chances are she'll decide that she'll be buying her own too...... (you can still do bogof, just have both yourself).

WiddlinDiddlin · 31/05/2019 13:59

Kalopali Tapas

We tend to go out seperately, one at home, one out - what we never do is both go out to different places.

We have other cards we don't use, and we use a lot of paypal - yes it probably is against hte banks terms but we've worked our finances this way for donkeys years and it works for us.

My point was rather than get into the long winded and complicated nature of my financial affairs --- there ARE other options than cash or card, available to most people if they wish to use them.

The OP could throw some of these options into the mix when the annoying colleague wants to do something ridic like collecting pound coins!

Some people are dreadful at remembering wallets, cards, cash (I am like the queen, I've NEVER got cash, ever, even if I have got my card!)... but that doesn't automatically make them CF's if they can find a way round it like I do.

livefornaps · 31/05/2019 14:51

If you go out with her, refuse to pay for any more drinks!

You're an adult - learn to say no. For god's sake.

And if you want a drink, go and get one. You don't owe her.

livefornaps · 31/05/2019 14:54

And if she asks why she isn't getting bought a drink just say "I'm not paying for you again, you tight cow!"

Sometimes people need to be shamed to learn their lesson.

She'll have seen you coming from a mile off

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