Friend I haven't seen in 15 years wants to borrow money

[ONte]

Old childhood friend that I haven't seen for about 15 years. We were close at one point but she spread around some sensitive personal information about me as teens that caused me alot of upset and embarrassment. I forgave but never forgot iykwim.

Anyway we have one another on Facebook now and are both mothers, exchanging congratulations when our babies are born and occasionally having a little catch up.

Today she messaged me out of the blue asking if I can lend her £20 for gas as her children's father hasn't paid her and it's left her in a difficult position.

I know it's not much but we don't have alot of money, we live in an expensive (overpriced!) area and have been surviving on one wage since I had to stop working during my pregnancy due to health problems. Said pregnancy is now a 3 week old newborn.

I'm not sure I feel comfortable doing it as I've no way of guaranteeing she'll pay me back and £20 is two tubs of formula to me, I live 250 miles away now and she used to have form for borrowing things and not returning them (not money, clothes etc)

She does have a large family and I'm assuming other friends she can ask.

WWYD?

Not a chance. Or if you do, do so on the understanding that you’ll never see it again. And she will ask again.

Only give what you can afford to lose OP.

Just say no; I doubt you’ll get it back and you’ve no way of knowing what it’s really to be spent on.

Absolutely not.

Cheeky twat.

No

Say no, and that you can't afford to. Ask if there's anyone else who can help her, or suggest she speaks to her health visitor/food bank/children's centre to see if any can provide an energy voucher.

No way
Cheeky moo
You don’t have to justify by the way - just say no and don’t caveat with a sorry

Absolutely do not give her the money. She's a CF. Just say, 'sorry no I can't'.

It would make me think she was sounding you out as her next cash cow... ask for a small amount now and see if you are willing. Then next it's £100, or £1000.

She must have used up all her goodwill with her closer friends.

Ignore it. You can’t help and haven’t seen her for this long and she showed you no loyalty when you were friends. You owe her nothing.

To be honest you can’t even be sure it is from her. A pal of mine had her FB profile cloned and the cloner sent out loads of messages to friends purporting to be from her. It might be a scammer, so if it was me I wouldn’t even bother to reply.

She's probably run out of other people to ask and she's 15 years down on her list of 'friends'

Don't give her a penny. It's CF behaviour.

Just be honest. You can be sympathetic but tell her you do not have money spare and can't help her at this time.

That's a strange request, and you can (and should) say no. "I'm sorry to hear things are tough and I wish I could help, but we're also on a really tight budget and I can't spare anything"

I definitely wouldn't be lending money to someone I hadn't seen and had barely spoken to for 15 years!

Say no. You are nit working atm so dont have spare money.

You’ve not seen her for 15 years, so she’s not really a ‘friend’ is she? (If you’re both living in the same country.). So no.

Are you sure she sent it and she hasn't been hacked? This sounds like a familiar scam. Either way, just say no.

Say no.

Ignore and block.

No way.

Absolutely not. She'll always come to you and ask whenever shes short

Delete her as a friend and forget about it. You know you’ll never see the money again and you can’t afford it either. No brainer.

No brainer, say no.

If I could afford to lose £20 I might give her the benefit of the doubt and lend her the money, but you can’t so you simply tell her no you can’t afford it. 🤷🏻‍♀️

It's got to be a No