Can I ask them to pay? play date dilemma, need advice!

[Amislytherin]

My daughter attends a sensory group (she has ADHD and sensory issues once a week). out of this group have come some lovely friendships between the mums, one in particular. We sometimes meet for a play out with the group and yesterday was one of these days and we met at my house. Her son was very hyped up with my daughter and they were playing nicely if a little on the boisterous side (which I more than understand as both have significant sensory needs)
Anyway, I’d asked them both several times to stop running around so fast, and then directly asked her son to stop gently while holding quite a heavy sensory ball that he always carries. I was worried he’d hurt himself or bang into my 1.5 year old who was toddling around. My friend was trying to catch up on work emails at the time so was aware but distracted. .
next thing I know, there is a bang and a smash and we run upstairs to see that the window has been cracked by the ball being thrown at it. It’s a huge crack and will 100% need replaced as looks like it can shatter at any time.
cue hysterics from all kids, me trying to calm everyone down and mainly just checking no one was hurt which luckily they weren’t. My friend left shortly afterwards saying she was sorry, this often happens in their home so she knows how annoying it is and she can send me the number of their glazier.
sure enough she sent me
the number last night with a “sorry about today, here is X number they are really
good. See you at the group next week, remember it’s dress up day xx”
I guess I was hoping / assuming she’d offer to pay but she hasn’t. I’m now in awkward position as my default is to just leave it and avoid confrontation but I really really can’t afford a glazier cost of what I’m estimating to be around £200-250 as it’s a slightly awkward shaped double glazed window.
Is it reasonable to ask Her to pay for it? Go halves? or do I just suck it up and stick it on my credit card and accept it’s part of play dates? We don’t have any other play dates so I don’t really know what’s the norm for breakages in someone else’s house ☹️thank you in advance

She should have definitely offered to pay. So that would change my view of her. Plus sat there doing emails whilst you have to do all the supervising and constant telling off of her son. You sure you want to stay friends??

Don’t send a passive aggressive message. Annoyingly, if you want to stay friends you’ll probably have to suck it up. You could say thanks for the glazer’s number and you were surprised at the cost and see if she offers.

Or be blunt and ask for the money. But not sure the friendship would recover. For whatever reason she’s a cheeky one and thinks she shouldn’t pay.

I hope she pays! I really would not want a friend like this to be honest. Whether she pays for this or not your friendship is affected forever. I'd never be able to let something like this go. I would always worry it would happen again.. be constantly living on my nerves when her son was around.

If it was my son I would definitely be offering to pay for the full damage and even then I'd still feel so bad for the inconvenience of it all.

I am not sure she is much of a friend.

She has a boisterous 8 year old with additional needs and comes to visit. While she is catching up in e-mails (ie on her phone) you are hosting, presumably providing tea etc, and being left to supervise 3 children - 2 with additional needs and a toddler, all in a small flat.

When you visit her does she watch all 3 children while you go on your phone?

Are you the childcare?

Of course she must pay.

Surely that's on her home insurance.

If I was in the friends position and it was definitely my child and my child alone that did it I would be offering to pay. Have the children said it was just him or is this assumed as he was the last one with the ball? If you can’t afford it and need the money there’s nothing stopping you from asking. You mention that his mum was making work emails but your both equally at fault, you had already seen him with a ball and let him continue to play with it inside and neither one of you were watching the children as you say you ran upstairs when you heard the noise.

Also, when I had play dates with ‘friends’ we’d chat and drink coffee (occasionally wine if it was tea time). It’s rude to sit there on work
emails whilst you supervise. She may as well have just dropped him and ran. Doesn’t sound like much of a friend.

Really bad that she didn’t offer to pay. 100% I’d have offered to pay, she really should and I find it incredibly cheeky if she has a problem with you asking her to pay

Have you got a quote yet? Get a couple. When you have txt her, tell her the amount and say "shall we split the bill 50/50. My bank details are xxxx".

And don't do another play date at your house with this family this winter. Outside play only when the weather is warmer. Tell her that as well.
Breakages happen indoors. Stuff gets spilt etc etc.

I'm appalled at this woman's selfish behaviour. I don't think she's much of a friend.

She knows her son has a tendency to break windows with his sensory ball. She brought him and that sensory ball to your home. She didn't supervise him, not even when his behaviour has getting out of hand.

HE broke the window with HIS ball that HE brought into your home has HE has done many times before at his own home.

Your daughter being hyped up at the same time, and you not grabbing him in the 20 seconds it took him to run upstairs and do it (& why would you have predicted he would smash a window?) does not make it your fault.

Send the text that assumes she will pay. 'Thank you for the glazers details. Did you let them know to invoice you or should I do that when I call them to set up a time?' Sort of thing.

Having a SEN child can be isolating so I see why you don't want to lose a friend, but she doesn't sound like a nice person.

Window aside, sitting there answering work emails instead of chatting with you and being present with the kids, is incredibly rude and strange. She's treating you like a babysitter and your house like a play centre! Swanning off when she should have helped you clean up and insist on paying for the damage her son caused is also careless and selfish.

I wouldn't have that boy and his ball back in my home. This time it was a window, it could hit your toddler next time.

Just to add - neurodiversity is highly genetic. It is possible the mother is missing some clear social cues here.

I wouldn't send a vague 'the window is expensive' message and hope she'll connect the dots. She knows windows are expensive- she's replaced a lot of them.

Spell it out that you expect her to pay otherwise she might read the text literally and miss the implication.

Have you replied? Could you say thanks for that,I didn't realise this was a regular thing with the window breaking ? Any idea how much this will cost ? I'm pretty skint atm

Have you asked your daughter exactly what happened?

This is the best message.

Don't feel awkward about it OP. She's the one that should feel embarrassed.

Sadly, as she didnt immediately offer to pay, I think you WILL end up losing a friend.

I think she will deny responsibility - "it was in your house", "go through house insurance", "it could have been your child who did it" etc .

But you are 100% correct to EXPECT her to pay.

I get the impression this woman is no friend to you:

• getting on with her work emails which means you’re the default supervisor. She knows this will be hard work for you because she knows what her son is like. She’s likely come round for the play date specifically so that she can get her work done as she’s finding it hard to do at home.
• the children are getting boisterous but she acts as if she hasn’t picked up on it.
• she has the brass neck to admit that her son has form for this, so much so that she has a glazier’s number to hand yet makes no offer to compensate you.

I wouldn’t lose sleep over the likelihood of losing this friendship. Anyway, the proof of the pudding will be in the eating. Her response to your text should be interesting.

sorry just catching up!
I messaged her at dinner time to say “Hi H, thanks very much for the glazier’s number. They didn’t answer but I’ve left a message and I’ll let you know once they’ve been round to do the quote and how much it is. I don’t want to make things awkward as I really value our friendship and that of our children but I really can’t afford a big bill just now. Would you be willing to talk about sharing
the bill 50/50? If you want to talk about it we could
talk on phone tonight once kids are sleeping? Love R
x” I also attached a pic of the window which does look AWFUL.

she read it and hasn’t replied 🤦‍♀️and she’s one of those people who always seems to have her phone on her and replies instantly.

the shy awkward bit of me is hating this!

If she’s a decent person she’ll jump in about paying for all of it. If she’s a half decent person/struggling she’ll jump at the chance to pay 50/50. If she tries to get out of paying for 50% you’ll have to be not so nice in your next reply.

Such a horrible awkward situation. She doesn't know what to reply so she's ignored it. Are you likely to bump into her face on tomorrow? Be interesting to see if she blanks you or just refuses to mention it. I think the lack of response highlights that she has no intention of paying.

Maybe she’s looking into finances. If my child broke something I’d offer to pay 🙈

Offering to share 50/50 is incredibly gracious of you. If she doesn't agree I wouldn't consider her a friend or a decent person TBH.

I think 50/50 is fair if you can’t determine exactly how the damage occurred.
But did I read the kids involved are 8.5 years old? Did OP’s 8.5 year old give an account of things? Apologies if I missed that bit.

Ultimately the problem is this isn’t proved. Yes he has never given to anyone else, however it sounds like there’s no proof this wasn’t the first time he unexpectedly did. Or if it was a genuine accident like he tripped over an item left out and went flying.
I get the balance of probability is he threw it, but it’s not sure. He could even have acted in self defence in rough play and flung it out. It’s speculation.
Her line of thought May be different. She may be thinking ‘he never ever lets go of that ball, he’d never throw it at a window and risk loosing it!’.
What do the kids stories say?

that's a good message OP - clear and fair. I hope she gets back to you with a positive response

I think this is a bit of a weird one, if she was busy doing some work at yours on the proviso that you were supposed to be supervising the kids, I'd feel a bit annoyed about you asking me to pay for something that happened on your watch while the kids were unsupervised (even briefly).

Saying that I'd feel terrible if I thought it was my child that broke it so I would offer to pay 50/50 at least.

I think you've approached it in the right way with your message, hopefully she'll pay up the 50/50 and that's that.

No we only see each other at the sensory group once a
week unless there’s a meet up arranged out with that so, at least I don’t have to worry about bumping into her, I actually think the shy part of me would jump behind a bush I feel so awkward now!