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Original poster

To be fuming with DD

322 replies

Snowisallaround · 15/08/2022 18:55

For ringing the switchboard to speak to me while I was at work today!! To ask if she could go to the cinema with her friends this afternoon! She’s 17 if that makes any difference. She did try to ring and text my mobile but I was in a meeting! I just feel she should have waited for me to see her message or missed call instead of calling the switchboard in an effort to reach me

OP posts:
Cherchezlaspice · 15/08/2022 23:33

@VladmirsPoutine ’We must all suffer together’ made me cackle and I’m not even sure why. 🤣

saraclara · 15/08/2022 23:35

ImprobablePuffin · 15/08/2022 19:24

So you're allowed to take calls and you won't get in trouble. But you're fuming.

What's the actual problem here?

I'm bewildered too. You've never had a conversation with her about what constitues and emergency and when she can and can't call. She only called because you'd not answered and if she waited any longer she wouldn't be able to go.

She did nothing wrong. She didn''t know you were in a meeting, nobody minded.

This is down to you for not communicating what the number was for, yet you're steamingly angry with her. poor girl.

saraclara · 15/08/2022 23:36

She does get an allowance at the start of each week but I forgot to transfer it this morning/yesterday evening

You get more and more unreasonable with each post.

Saz12 · 15/08/2022 23:56

At 17, she should have a grasp of what constitutes “emergency”. This wasn’t one!

Many people wouldn’t get into trouble at work for doing things that are unprofessional, but that doesn’t mean that people (clients) don’t think less of you.

17 is old enough to have an insight into what’s appropriate at work. Crashing a meeting because Mum forgot your allowance & you want to go to the cinema is not remotely appropriate at her age.

SleepingStandingUp · 16/08/2022 00:10

At 16 you have a national insurance number you can get a part time job if you try to get one. McDonald's and dominoes both take 16 year olds. Kids are so spoilt and entitled these days it really annoys me bloody hell, kids spoilt and entitled because they're financially dependent on their parents during their childhood!! Don't be so ridiculous. And yes, i worked from 16, through A Levels and all through Uni, got a temporary job immediately upon leaving Uni and had to pay my 1/3 of household bills. So this isn't coming from a sense of entitlement!

SleepingStandingUp · 16/08/2022 00:14

Snowisallaround · 15/08/2022 20:55

I assume she didn’t tell the admin team what was urgent about it, because it wasn’t urgent and she knows that!

Well it was urgent because it was a time limited need. By the time you'd got back to her, she'd have missed going out woth her mates. And whilst that might not be important to you (oh just go another time!) It's a huge deal at 17 when you cant go out cos you've not no cash and all your mates are going.

RenegadeMatron · 16/08/2022 00:32

<waits for the OP to be ‘identified in real life’, and for this thread to go ‘poof’>

Honestly, my ‘threads I’m on’ is a wasteland of disappeared and deleted threads - they all go the same way.

Either trolls, or people having their arse handed to them wanting their thread removed….

NumberTheory · 16/08/2022 03:15

SleepingStandingUp · 16/08/2022 00:14

Well it was urgent because it was a time limited need. By the time you'd got back to her, she'd have missed going out woth her mates. And whilst that might not be important to you (oh just go another time!) It's a huge deal at 17 when you cant go out cos you've not no cash and all your mates are going.

Show quote history

I think that sort of low expectation of a 17 year old is pretty infantilising. She really ought to know that it isn’t urgent enough to interrupt a meeting at work. Even if she has no work experience she ought to be able to extrapolate from school - people wouldn’t expect a student or a teacher to be answering that sort of message in a class. By 17 she should realise that’s disruptive.

Original poster
Snowisallaround · 16/08/2022 07:13

I’m going to have a word with DD after work today and explain how she should have been more patient and waited for me to see her message and missed call and that I would have then transferred her allowance asap. I’m also going to explain to her when she can and can’t call the switchboard number and also ask her why she thinks it was appropriate to call it yesterday

OP posts:
diddl · 16/08/2022 07:14

If it's that important to her to always have money available to her she could remind Op to pay her allowance in or make sure she doesn't spend it all!

I think that she could take some responsibility!

Original poster
Snowisallaround · 16/08/2022 07:17

diddl · 16/08/2022 07:14

If it's that important to her to always have money available to her she could remind Op to pay her allowance in or make sure she doesn't spend it all!

I think that she could take some responsibility!

This! She didn’t check either yesterday morning to see if I had transferred it or not before I went to work

OP posts:
lot123 · 16/08/2022 07:17

I think teenagers inevitably have a self-centred and skewed view of what's important. She probably thought it was a near emergency (knowing how much they treasure their social lives). I'm sure she's learnt her lesson for next time.

AliMonkey · 16/08/2022 07:55

@Cherchezlaspice, @KnockedInn

Annoyed/irritated is how I feel when someone forgets to put the milk back in the fridge / it rains when the washing is on the line. Angry/furious is how I feel when someone deliberately does something inappropriate, such as what OP’s DD did by lying about it being urgent. Doesn’t mean I’ll be cross for hours, but I will let the person know what they did was wrong and it’s not to happen again. Then we’ll move on and I’ll forget about it. So maybe your furious is different to mine.

My 17yo gets an allowance. If she got a job, she’d still get an allowance as doing otherwise would be like punishing her for getting a job, given we can easily afford it. Not having one is then her choice and means she can’t buy as many clothes as she’d like, but she always makes sure she has a positive amount in her account so she can afford to eg go to the cinema at short notice. We’re happy for her to concentrate on her A levels but will expect her to get a job eg during uni holidays.

Zingy123 · 16/08/2022 08:04

The more you post OP the more you annoy me. You are in the wrong not her.

stuntbubbles · 16/08/2022 08:09

such as what OP’s DD did by lying about it being urgent.
But it was urgent. If she didn’t get the money by X time, she’d miss out on the cinema. Urgent just means “requiring immediate action or attention”, which it did to resolve the problem. It wasn’t an emergency, and to someone other than the DD it wasn’t important, but we don’t know that she said it was an emergency or important: she said it was urgent. Which it was.

laravix · 16/08/2022 08:23

She used her initiative. In her world, missing out on cinema with friends in the school holidays when there's not a lot else going on is probably a big deal. I couldn't get worked up about this if it was my daughter, particularly as it was you who forgot to transfer the money over. Just set up a standing order and move on.

BitOutOfPractice · 16/08/2022 08:28

I have to say it’s easy to see where the DD’s self absorption comes from 🙄 And I speak as someone who has been interrupted in meetings many times by calls from the school or from kids asking inane questions. If my clients have a problem with that they can find another agency frankly.

Quia · 16/08/2022 08:30

Snowisallaround · 15/08/2022 20:08

I accidentally forgot!!! People forget occasionally!!! I’ve not forgot it before! She still could have waited for me to see her text/missed call on my mobile though before ringing the switchboard

Show quote history

But you've accepted that, by the time you saw her message, it would have been too late. This really is all down to you not doing what you had agreed to do in terms of transferring money.

Anothernamechangeplease · 16/08/2022 08:31

Well, yes, ringing the switchboard and interrupting your meeting was inappropriate, but it was pretty shit that you left her in that position in the first place by forgetting to transfer the money. It's so easy to set up standing orders for that kind of thing.

Teenagers really don't want to miss out on stuff with their friends, so it probably seemed more urgent to her than it did to you. I agree, though, that she should have borrowed the money from a friend in the short term.

Quia · 16/08/2022 08:45

NumberTheory · 15/08/2022 22:28

With OP’s update it’s clear the DD wasn’t unaware of office protocol. She lied to the receptionist about the nature of her need to speak to OP, so clearly did realise it wasn’t the done thing.

But I still agree the fuming is OTT.

Show quote history

She didn't lie. She told the receptionist it was urgent, and it was.

Quia · 16/08/2022 08:50

jammiewhammie65 · 15/08/2022 22:28

At 16 you have a national insurance number you can get a part time job if you try to get one. McDonald's and dominoes both take 16 year olds. Kids are so spoilt and entitled these days it really annoys me

Show quote history

School? Homework? To say nothing of the fact that neither McDonald's nor Domino's are guaranteed to be in every town and village or to have unlimited jobs for 16 and 17 year olds.

There is a certain irony in complaining so ungrammatically that parents prioritise their children's education over making them go out to work.

roarfeckingroarr · 16/08/2022 08:51

Does it matter? Really? Couldn't get upset about this

Quia · 16/08/2022 08:57

Snowisallaround · 16/08/2022 07:13

I’m going to have a word with DD after work today and explain how she should have been more patient and waited for me to see her message and missed call and that I would have then transferred her allowance asap. I’m also going to explain to her when she can and can’t call the switchboard number and also ask her why she thinks it was appropriate to call it yesterday

How are you going to tell her she should have been more patient when you admit that, by the time you saw her message, it would have been too late for her to go to the cinema?

I hope you also explained to her that you realised you should have set up a sensible system for transferring her allowance and that you caused the entire problem in the first place.

Quia · 16/08/2022 08:58

Snowisallaround · 16/08/2022 07:17

This! She didn’t check either yesterday morning to see if I had transferred it or not before I went to work

Show quote history

She presumably didn't know then that she would be asked out that afternoon, or that you would be in a Very Important Meeting and unable to rectify your mistake quickly.

Quia · 16/08/2022 09:01

Angry/furious is how I feel when someone deliberately does something inappropriate, such as what OP’s DD did by lying about it being urgent.

She didn't lie. If she'd claimed it was an emergency, that would have been a lie.