What would you do? Friend asking for money AGAIN

[picolosmum]

What would you do in the following situation and am I being tight and unreasonable?

I have a friend, who isn’t a best friend but someone I do see a few times a month if we are both free, sometimes with children, sometimes without. Happy to help this friend where I can but does feel like it’s start to be a bit of a piss take now.

This friend is a single mum, which I empathise with as I know she doesn’t have it easy mentally (feels lonely) or financially (doesn’t work). This mum lives solely off of benefits (not judging that). My gripe is she is in her late 30s and awful at money management - benefits pay her and a week later she’s skint because she’s spent £90 on non essential items like rugs, candles etc and asking me for money for her direct debits so they don’t bounce.

in the past two months I have done 2 large food/toiletry/pet food shops for her, gave her £25 for her phone bill, money for her fags three times, now she’s asked to borrow £20 again (for something she genuinely needs) and I just don’t want to help but feel obliged to and feel guilty if I don’t. I just think learn to manage your finances better, it’s not my problem. However I’m too nice to say no and I hate it. She’s always grateful of the help but now I feel she may be taking advantage. I have also spent £100 this month on two trips out for us as a little pick her up treat.

Thing is I can’t tell her I don’t have the money, without disclosing my job, it’s obvious I have spare money.

what would you do? I don’t feel comfortable saying no or learn to manage your own money. Help!!

Shes very probably asking for money from all her entourage.
Tell her she needs to get a job, stop wasting money on superfluous crap,
When does it end ?....

Green and callow* youth! 🫢

It's like having a cocklodger without the cock.

This made me laugh! OP, next time she asks, remember @StopStartStop’s wise words!

I'd give the £20 as a gift and put an end to it.

Friend, I've given you about ££££ over the past x years.

I'll give you this final £20 to help last you until payday, and I might still sometimes pay for your coffee when we're out together, but I'm not giving you any more cash. I'm feeling used and it's spoiling our friendship.

I know you find budgeting hard though, so I'm willing to come round to your house on Saturday, go through all your paperwork with you and help you set up a budget that enables you to have a little money left at the end of the month, to save for emergencies.

However I’m too nice to say no and I hate it. She’s always grateful of the help but now I feel she may be taking advantage. I have also spent £100 this month on two trips out for us as a little pick her up treat.

I agree that you've been taken for a mug, OP.

Just tell her your circumstances have changed and you can't help any more. No more food, fags (I mean, ffs 🙄) or 'treat' days.

You have absolutely no reason to be bailing her out like this.

Yes stop. I used to have a firm 'no lending to friends policy. until a friend from a hobby group (she was in poor health so not working and on benefits) asked me to lend £20 on Monday until her benefits landed on the Weds. After the first prompt payment back I'm sure you can guess the rest. she ended up borrowing £50 on a regular basis and putting it back in the account in dribs and drabs I had to keep tally of, and taking it for granted I would lend her. When I decided to stop lending to her I said I would write the last £25 she owed me off but would not lend again. She said 'I'll definitely pay the last £25 back!!' (she did not of course)
I realised over time that though she had got a sad life for various reasons, she really was quite a transparent user. She pops up occasionally when she wants something- posted a birthday card through for me last year which was an in for hinting she needed someone to mind her cat😁

She spends all her money on non essentials like candles etc because she knows you will bail her out for the important things like food. She is a user and won't change. Just tell her you can't give her money again and it will be interesting to see if it's your company she wants then.

So you are working hard to fund her cigarette habit and other things. All that money you’ve spent on her could go in to a bank account for your own children.

If you have children. If you don’t, it’s still no

The lazy scouraging mare needs to get a job, any job and pay her own way like everyone else. Unless there is medical reasons.

LOL - you'll help her this once. And next time? Because there will be a next time? And a time after that. Until you say no.

I am also an idiot and lent money to a 'friend' who at the time was between jobs. It was £20 here and £20 there for taxis from the hospital. Buses are really bad where we live and finish early and she had already I presume fabricated serious medical issues. I had even been to the doctors with her and collected medication! Anyway each time she promised to pay me back. Then she got a regular job and I've not seen hair nor hide of her but plenty of posts on Facebook about her new nails, long weekends away and new clothes! It came to over £200 in the end and I'm on universal credit with a very irregular job eg I didn't earn anything last week and earned £90 the week before and about £90 this week. I've learnt a big lesson - I was very stupid and naive.

If she hasn't got £3 without borrowing it, then I'd suggest that £3 is a lot of money - yes? Easy when you're spending other people's money, isn't it? And what about the cigarettes - buying fags when you supposedly haven't any money?

The OP is being a complete mug, and the friend is a user. Once the OP stops giving her money, just watch the 'friend' disappear.

She sounds like my 'friend' except after religiously repaying me within a week stopped paying me back at all. I also looked after her 5 cats - and I don't even like cats. I must have had a sign on my back saying 'MUG'!

I actually think my 'friend' was buying hash for her off and on again boyfriend. I did ask her once and she said no it was for the taxis from the hospital!

I don’t feel comfortable saying no or learn to manage your own money

I voted YABU because of this.

Feeling uncomfortable is a great way of wording it.

Tell her to bog off and sort herself out

So she smokes, has pets, a child and no job.
These were/are her life choices, not yours.

Ive been where you are now, twice, because clearly, I don’t learn.
What ive learned since is that decent people don’t borrow , like your friend is borrowing off you.
My old school friend and best friend of 4 years, never asked for money until my circumstances improved. She was in a tricky spot, I spent money to help her escape a relationship. She came to live with me rent free for 6 months. Rather than me leading a clearly higher standard of living, I bought us good food and took her on holiday with me and my daughter. During this time, I lent her money. She got a new boyfriend and the time was right for her to move out. I paid for the deposit for a rented house for her, £800 on top of the 2k she had borrowed. She dropped contact, got a good job , but nothing was repaid. Less than a year later, I received a letter from the landlord I had paid the deposit to. I went to the rented flat to find envelope after envelope with my name on. Basically it appears that whilst living in my house, she stole some of my paperwork and used it to steal my identity , to get utility bills on credit, order from a catalogue. I had to pay an additional £8000 of her debt. I traced her and went to see her, where she begged me not to go to the police, told me how much she cared for me and promised to pay me £50 a month. She was pregnant. I didn’t go to the police. She has never paid me. This betrayal was premeditated, when she was at her lowest and I was treating her like a sister. It will hurt me forever.
Another person I was friendly, but not friends with was endlessly borrowing £10 or £20 every week. I stayed at arms length really- I knew the next sob story of hardship was going to end in an ask for money. Her mum died. I was there when the undertaker came, so met them. Unbeknownst to me she told them that I was paying for it all, gave them my details, forged my correct signature on the order form (I have no idea where she got my signature)and for whatever unfathomable reason they believed ,her didn’t double check with me and didn’t take payment in advance. The undertaker was very very pissed when he personally brought the bill to my house and I said I hadn’t ordered the funeral and wasn’t paying. On questionning my ‘friend’ said using me was the only way she could get credit, she was definitely paying for the funeral but now at £15 a week to the poor gullible undertaker. She did pay it off, and I’ve not spoken to her since.
Please dont lend money to anybody - ever. People take financial advantage in all sorts of ways. I’m sorry - she is not your friend.

You're not her mum, I would first say I can't keep bailing you out, candles are not necessary (I been a guilty of spending money I don't have on nonsense and learnt) and she needs a side hustle, she can make, I "think it's" £300 before they start taking money from her benefits.
She can do cleaning, pet sitting or ask shops or laundrette if they need help.

Don't feel bad op! As stated she is NOT YOUR CHILD!

I’m guessing you feel bad because of the kids and don’t want to see them go without but she is not thinking of them when she is buying rugs and fags out of the money. I would stop all cash handouts and if you want to help the kids a bit just invite them around for play date where you’ll feed them or maybe offer the occasional ice cream when you are at the park but you do not need to fund her lifestyle at all!!

Friend already has a tax free side hustle- rinsing the OP for all she's worth !

I am always surpirsed that people don't say anything in this context.

A couple of years ago I was helping out a mum from school gate. She had a cancer scare and some health issues and just to be nice I helped her with lifts to hospital (she didn't drive) and school pick ups and giving her a bit of moral support etc.

She never had any money. Genuinely money was tight, but she would have weekends when she would be messaging and saying that she didn't have any food to give her dd for dinner.

But if we went into town, she would stop at a charity shop and spend £10 on plastic crap for her dd, who has a room full of toys at home. When I suggested that she could just buy 1 thing because it adds up to a lot, she would say Oh but this thing is only £2. She could never see that the total for the lot was £10 that she didn't have.

And one day sitting in the waiting room at the hospital she was talking about how when her money came through on Friday she had booked to go to the hairdresser on Saturday for a full colour. At that point I laughed and asked her how she could afford it. She told me dead pan that her money came in she would spend it on the hair. So I asked her, and what will you use to buy food? Oh there's enough money for this week. And next week? Have you put aside enough for every single day until you next money comes in? Are you going to be texting me on a Saturday saying you have no food for the weekend, but now you are going to spend £90 on hair colour?

She really really struggled to understand that she needed to budget now for the end of the month. I pointed out that I never got a hair colour because I couldn't afford it. I budgeted and my budget didn't have a spare £90 for colouring.

She was bemused.

There is a great organisation called CAP which helps families like this with budgeting and plannign hteir money. I think your friend needs a referal to them.