To tell friend I can no longer afford our long weekend?

[SlinkyDogDash]

My friend leads quite an affluent lifestyle, earns well, no kids, all good. I earn a much lower wage and most is spent on mortgage and bills, I'm a single mum and feel I need to be careful with money.

Friend asked me to go on a long weekend with her. I sorted childcare and agreed, its v rare for me to be able to do this. Then the pressure started... friend suggested flights, immediately wanting more expensive morning ones to maximise time away, I had wanted afternoon as cheaper, she is a very insistent person!

We had agreed to book a cheap hotel room, friend was happy with this, then last minute changed her mind and booked one with a view for twice the price! There was a lot of pressure to accept this 'but this is a one off long weekend away' I felt quite forced to accept the change and paid her my share.

Now she wants to book some expensive trips 🙈 I feel like the whole thing has become about her whims and wants, she is very used to getting her own way in life. She certainly isn't considering me and she knows I have a much tighter budget than her.

So far the flights, transfers and hotel have cost £360 each for three nights. Realistically my choices are to say I cant afford to book trips, car hire etc but feel under constant pressure to do so which would spoil the break, as I mentioned she is a very insistent person. She wont want to do trips etc on her own.

I feel like it would be easier to accept that I've lost £360 and say I can no longer come, she can give my ticket to someone else. I feel mean to do that but equally I think shes been selfish to basically railroad me into a bookings I cant afford when we agreed at the outset that it would be a cheap break. I would estimate that my further costs would be about £300 if I go on the trip, based on food, taxis etc. I dont think £660 is a cheap long weekend, if we had stuck to the cheap flight, standard hotel room and just sightseeing whilst there it could have been £350ish.

Aibu not to go?

Sorry op but I don't understand why you didn't say straight away "my budget is x, things are tight at home and I just don't have spare cash to spend more than the original plan". She too should have consulted though and she seems to be on a different planet if she doesn't understand your outgoings will be high when incomi gs are reduced.

you just have to speak up

over and over

My friends and I are always really considerate regarding other people's budgets.

This year, a friend wanted to go to Greece with me for a week, I know you can get the sort of holiday we want there for £600 for a week in low season, but the costs then spiralled to £1400 and it's now a place where you pay 5 Euro for a coke. So I bailed before we booked (at least she did not book on my behalf!).

She does not understand, but then she's not one of my "real" friends, and lives in a bubble where everyone has mega jobs. Some people really lack imagination about what other people's lives are like....

when she says thats good value waste not to - you just say
'no i cant afford it'
room with a view
no i cant afford it

after a couple of time of this you proabbly do need to say to her stop bullying me - I will not be coming if you do not stop

If she can relistically get someone else to come that woudl pick up teh costs eg the hotel then you maybe better not going - as tehre will be costs once you are there too
you are prevaricating ....and you need to be blunter with her

I'd email her back now and be very honest:

"Dear Friend, I am really upset to have received your recent email about the £40 trip. I told you just this morning that I can't afford to book any trips! It feels like you're not listening to me. I can afford the trip if we switch to the cheaper hotel room - is that an option? Otherwise you'll have to go on the trip on your own. Please stop suggesting any more trips or I'll have to pull out of our weekend away as this is making me feel really stressed."

Its sort of typical to be like that when you have never had children.
Selfish to the last.

Seriously? What anyone who does not had a child is selfish and anyone that does is a paragon of saintliness?

I also don't understand why you couldn't be honest at any point. There is no shame at all to say you can only afford X. I have the opposite issue, would love to go away with my best friend, and as I know she doesn't have much money, I'd be more than happy to pay for her as I can afford it. It wouldn't bother me at all to do so, would be sincerely happy to treat her as she gives me a lot back with her friendship, but she just sont have it that I pay for her! She,'à trying to save.ut I know she has other things she needs to save for. Oh well!

Change tack with your friend.

"Book yourself on the trip without me"

Some time apart whilst you are there would be a good thing!

"Dear Friend, I am really upset to have received your recent email about the £40 trip. I told you just this morning that I can't afford to book any trips! It feels like you're not listening to me. I can afford the trip if we switch to the cheaper hotel room - is that an option? Otherwise you'll have to go on the trip on your own. Please stop suggesting any more trips or I'll have to pull out of our weekend away as this is making me feel really stressed."

This

It might possibly have been a communication issue (although surely she must already have been aware of your financial situation compared to hers?) up until the latest update.

I don't think she's being deliberately mean or selfish - I agree with the pp that many well-off people/high earners just cannot comprehend those who have much less than they do.

Most of those who do get that you have less money available will assume that you don't want to spend the money on something - maybe you resent it and see it as not good value to you - rather than realising that you simply do not have it. They're often the ones who will try to 'help' by patronising advising you how much you could save by simply giving up your daily Starbucks visits or meals out etc. when such luxuries are not something that would ever cross your mind as being achievable in the first place. They'll make 'wise' investments that pay back many times over and say that you should do the same when there's the little matter of the tens of thousands initial investment when, at a push, you could just about get your hands on tens of pounds.

We're pretty much skint atm and making do, but we might succumb to buying a treat or two that we really don't need costing a fiver or so just after pay day and regret it at the end of the month. Friends of ours who have moved out to a country in Africa showed us a picture of one of their African friends, hard at work, and happened to mention to us (in a context of feeling very fortunate themselves) that his wage would be the equivalent of £1 a day.

Likely, you or I wouldn't quibble over spending 50p on something frivolous, whereas the African worker would simply not be able to countenance spending half of his day's wage on a non-essential. Your friend sees £50 in the same way you'd see that 50p - however much people might try to explain to her, she just can't get it out of her head that it's any more than back-of-the-sofa coppers.

Hopefully, your friendship can survive, but there's always going to be a disparity where spending what is to her an insignificant amount of money would open up far more options and make everything instantly much more enjoyable; whereas having to find that same amount of money (or even a fraction of it) will mean to you that the activity is either impossible or just about manageable at a stretch, but with a lot of worry as to how you will now be able to afford other essentials or things that would have been much higher on your priority list.

Sadly, one of you is likely to end up feeling frustrated or worried.

@KUGA but that’s just bollocks, it’s not typical of people without kids, that’s a terrible (and frankly stupid) thing to say mums and dads can be just as thoughtless!

You really do need to be honest and straight with her. Otherwise you will be continually fighting this throughout the whole weekend.

I'd give her the choice - she can pay for the upgrades (ie all the extra) herself or find someone else to go with. It's quite rude to be spending your money without your permission and if she were your dp this would be financially abusive

I’d be curious to know the costs of the restaurants she wants to eat in.

When you add on the costs of lunches, dinners, drinks, coffees you're probably looking at £100 per day if it's a city break. I'm assuming she'd want taxis to maximise the time to do things. I would pull out now and write off the money unless someone else could use the trip. If you've got the house to yourself wallow in the ability to do things when you want to without interruption.

If you go you won't enjoy it as it will be way too stressful and unpleasant. If you do go don't take cards just cash and let her know exactly how much you have to spend and that you're not taking any plastic. Don't accept any offers to loan you money to pay back when you get home. Just keep saying during the planning "Don't book that for me as I've already exceeded my budget for the whole trip. Please feel free to get someone to take my place so that you can have a break doing exactly what you'd like to do"

@KUGA what a ridiculous thing to say. I'm probably less selfish as a person without children as I often adapt plans around friends with children as it's easier for me. I've supported friends on maternity leave and treated them to lunch etc when skint.

Having no children bares no negativity on how I am as a friend. In reality parents can be bad or selfish people/friends too. This is a communication issue and her friend not listening properly not because she doesn't have kids because that's her personality!

Either she really isn’t listening to you and I’d wonder what sort of friend she is or you really haven’t made your situation clear. I’d give it one more try-with a ‘I will have to pull out of the whole trip’ if any more costs come into things.

What do you think she’ll want to do for dinners/lunches/drinks etc

Point out that she doubled the hotel cost without your agreement and that she's made other expensive choices that you hadn't budgeted for and now it's getting to the stage where you're running out of money available for the holiday.

What happens when she wants to eat in expensive beach bars and drink cocktails instead of cheaper places - some of them aren't cheap - DP and I did without lunch once and just had a beer each - it was a little beach in a fairly remote part of Mallorca - it cost 10 euro for two cans of beer and it would have been close to 100 euro if we'd had lunch and a couple more drinks there.

£360 each for just hotel and flight is a lot - we don't usually pay much more than that for a week and when we had 3 nights in Mallorca a couple of years ago, it was just under £500 for both of us for the hotel, flights and car hire and that was with a morning flight.

"but I told you, I don't HAVE any more money for this - I'm already £x over budget because you've spent more than I agreed on flights and hotels"

Then silence - let her fill it. Don't respond to any more requests for money except by restating the above. See if she comes up with anything new.

“KUGA

Its sort of typical to be like that when you have never had children.
Selfish to the last.
Tell her straight that you have a family to bring up and money is needed to do that.
She is lucky you even have you as a friend.
Make this your last holiday unless she sees sense.“

Say that doubling the agreed hotel cost took away your budget for any trips and also for expensive meals out

Tell her your entire remaining budget for food etc too or you'll be spending £100-200 per day just eating & drinking

Regarding your comment on page 3, OP - I think you're not getting it yourself. She's not being a bad friend, YOU are being impossible at communicating. YOU are the one who has the limited budget, it's up to YOU to make it clear from the outset what your limit was and what your expectations are.

I have been dirt poor (unable to eat poor) and now I am doing pretty well and can therefore afford decent holidays without much thought. I understand both sides. People tend to spend to their means, IME, and it's very difficult to imagine a different financial scenario in terms of ramifications on what's a "good deal" or considered "cheap." I fall foul to it now and I've been on your side of the fence!

Honestly, just because your friend can't read your mind, or has difficult in understanding your situation does not mean she isn't a friend. I'd wager someone who refuses to communicate their circumstances to someone they call a friend, particularly when leaving that person to organise a holiday without giving them very defined concrete specifics on what your expectations are, the gets pissy because the other person isn't a mind-reader isn't a very good friend.

Yes, you said to her you can't afford expensive excursions but did you actually say "I literally can't afford ANY more"? What did you say when you agreed to the increased hotel price? Did you set a budget for that prior (as opposed to just vaguely agreeing to the hotel room she suggested)?

To me, this smacks of you feeling bad you can't afford it (which is understandable) but deflecting that onto your friend so you can blame her for it.

Sorry, OP.

Your 'friend' is an unreasonable cow! I went on a cheap break with my DSis last year. She's skint, so we did everything on a budget, but we still had a great time. There is no reason why you have to skimp on experiences, just because you're doing things on a budget. You're going to have to be firmer OP. And if she witters on about hiring a car a) tell her you can't afford it and b) suggest you get the bus - that's what we did and it was absolutely fine.

Just say that you've checked your finances and have reached the limit of what you can currently afford, and so regret that you can't go on the trip unless it's scaled down. I've been on both sides of this myself (though in both cases my friend/I realized the financial problems at an earlier stage), and once it was communicated, all was fine.

OP you need to be clearer!
Your ‘friend’ obviously isn’t getting it or taking the hints so you need to be VERY clear.

‘I’d love to have done that £40 trip and if we’d booked either the original hotel room, or the afternoon flights, I could have afforded to. Unfortunately with all these add ons I now how £XX left for the weekend and that’s for food/drink! Tbh I’m already feeling this weekend has gotten out of hand so if you have another friend who would like to replace me that’s fine- I just can’t afford to add anything else on at this point!