To refuse to give a colleague a lift to/from work?

[NotTonightDeidre]

A colleague at work, I'll call her Kate, gets a lift 4 days a week with another colleague, Jen. Jen doesn't work Thursday, but both Kate & I do.

I've given Kate a lift on several occasions but I find it awkward as she's not all that talkative & I'm a very chatty person.

We did some training last week & I was in the same team as Kate, she barely acknowledged me, let alone spoke to me.

We saw each other at work today (we're in different teams day to day) and she half smiled at me. Fast forward to after work & I get a text from Kate asking for a lift tomorrow morning.

AIBU to have replied saying I'm unable to offer a lift at the minute? I feel like a dick, but also, I don't want awkward journeys in my own car.

This. ^ The tedious #BeKind mantra is not very far away when it comes to trying to emotionally blackmail women into falling into line is it?!

If you don't - you're a cow, you're selfish, you're 'letting people down.' Women have always been made to feel that they should go that extra mile for everyone, and God forbid she says no,. Even if the person asking for something/wanting something, has never done a single thing for her, and has barely even spoken to her before!

Women are almost always expected to pick up most of the grunt work, and housework, and domestic chores and admin and childcare, and care of the elderly or infirm.. A man will never do domestic chores, or any kind of housework, or care, if there's a woman available to do it. And he will NOT feel bad about, or be berated for it.

It doesn't help that many women, (when they were girls,) were made to feel like this by their parents (mother mostly!) that they should #BeKind, and help people... I have a brother, a few years younger than me, and my mum never asked him, or expected him to do anything - EVER. And he never did!

I was given household chores to do, and sent out to buy her some new tights, or some bread, or a pack of 20 Embassy No 1, or whatever she had forgotten in the weekly shop! I was also expected to wash up the dishes, and run the hoover around, and clean the windows, and tidy up after dinner etc...

Not my brother though. The sun shone out of my brother's arse, and he couldn't do a thing wrong, and he never lifted a finger to help mum and dad. Now he's married with (almost grown) 2 boys, he is still the same with his wife. And his 2 boys are the same. Bone idle. Boys/men get away with anything (pretty much) and are never berated and derided for saying no.

But if you're a woman, you must #BEKIND

And please don't anyone waste your time telling me about how ALL the men in YOUR life do as much - if not more than you, and give lifts to everyone, even if they don't ask for one! Because in most cases, this does not happen!

She's not shy when it comes to asking someone to be her work chauffeur.

I dunno a text is pretty passive, a proper CF would have a good think about the conversation and then call out of the blue. (top tip for work btw)

Gosh. I don't even enjoy giving my wife lifts to work..

I’d only do this for a colleague I really got on with. No way would I be helping her out when she ignores you most of the time.

Indeed.

Spare a thought for the poor soul that is ferrying her around the other 4 work days....

I had one latch onto me at work when she found out I lived near her.
I agreed to pick her up and drop off from the high street which she tutted at.
Anyway after a couple of pick ups she was waiting for me with her friend.
Both get in a moan that they had to put their cigs out.
Colleague then says her friend needs a lift one day a week.
Next time they get in no acknowledgment ...they just carry on their conversation.
At work and was just finishing colleague shouts across the room Julie is getting in with us and needs a lift to (a street out of my way)
These colleagues never spoke to me at work.
So I get to my car and three of them are standing there waiting for me.
I drive to high street and say you can all get out here because I am not going out of my way.

Over the weekend I was in a local shop when I spot original colleague ,she wasn't going to speak but I walked over to her.
She said hi I hadn't seen you over there...I said so how do you know I was over there lol
She looked uncomfortable then said her and her two friends would see me on Monday at usual place...I said no you won't,you seem intent on filling my car with your friends and ignoring me and also not a single one of you has said thank you or offered petrol money
She said something about if it was a couple of pund I was after,anyway I just walked away and never did give them a lift again but first lady did ask one more time and was told no

I 100% believe every word of that ^ because I know many people this - or something similar to this - has happened to! (Including me.)

Why are most people who cadge/beg lifts such cheeky twats?!

Even my DH when he worked in a factory some 30 years ago (a mile and a half from our house) used to get people asking for lifts all the time, to the big council estate at the back of our little private cul de sac, (as it was only another third of a mile to drive!) They had got the bus, or shared a taxi previously, but suddenly wanted my DH to drive them. It was pretty much all women, but a couple of blokes. Obviously didn't want to pay the bus/taxi fares anymore.

As time went on, more and more people piled into the car, wanting dropping off a mile further away, then 2 miles further away, and then they started asking him to drop them off at the big shopping centre - 5 miles away.

After about 6 months - yes he let it go on this long! - he stopped using the car, as he was sick of it, and he got a bike, and started cycling to work and back. He was told by at least 4 people that was letting them down by cycling now, because how are they meant to get home now? He said 'get a bike.'

One woman said, 'I'm 10 years older than you, and not as fit, and can't afford the bus fares, so I am having to walk home, nearly 2 miles. I can't run fast. I hope you'll be happy when I'm raped because you're not giving me a lift anymore.'

Yes, yes she really said that. When DH told me I was like

.

To me I wouldn't refuse someone a lift because they were quiet. I mean surely it's polite not to bleat on about random stuff to someone who you're not very close to when they're giving you a lift. Also if you're very chatty maybe that makes her feel like she hasn't space to speak up?

Either way it's your car so of course refuse if you don't want to do it. You can just say you're busy straight after/before work.

If she was nasty and using you or your genuinely had other plans on the way to and from work I’d say of course don’t give her a lift. If it’s over her lack of chat with you, I’d likely still give her a lift because you both work together.
For some people being chatty is difficult - maybe use the next car journey to ask her about not acknowledging you and if her answer doesn’t suffice then say why.
just lack of chat can suggest a personality type or lack of acknowledgement can be rudeness - hard to know which.

She sounds introverted. Put on the car radio and give her a lift. Your reasons for saying no are fairly petty. Give her one more chance.

I worked in a school for many years, and on several occasions the DHT virtually offered my services to give people lifts to and/or from work on a regular basis because they knew I lived in the general area. Why do they apply for and accept jobs if they can't get there easily? I can remember off the top of my head 5 different people - ok one of them wasn't regularly. Once I had two lessons free to plan and someone had a child taken ill. He suggested they ask me to do them a favour, knowing full well how selfish I would look to refuse. I ended up taking her to her child's school, then taking both of them home, then going back to school and covering her bloody lesson. Fuck that! That was all my preparation time gone for the whole week. Honestly, it was more than 20 years ago - I have never forgotten and it still makes me angry!

She will come to expect it really quickly. If she is asking for a lift, she should at the very least premptively be offering to pay half your petrol costs and building some sort of warmish relationship with you (it's quite intimate being sat next to someone in a car even for a short journey). For me, this would be a no - I like to bat my own balls and wouldn't ask a colleague to do this for me.

This is a good response - it’s just honest and not overtly passive or shitty; just the truth is fine! It’s a perfectly reasonable response. Xo

Text back: “who is this?”

YANBU. She’s what we used to call ‘a user’. No thank you.

She only smiled at you when she needed a lift. Cheeky woman!

I'll do a lot for others but committing to commute lifts for colleagues is not something I am willing to do. I wouldn't mind every so often if it was snowing and it suited me but I agreed to a flex contract for a reason and this is not something I am willing to compromise on. I also have a young child so need freedom for coming and going

You don't have to do anything you don't want to, and I'd probably be reluctant to fall into an arrangement where it was assumed I'd be giving a lift. Could she be shy / socially awkward though, worth persevering with as a person?

It’s a car share, good for the environment at the very least.

It's not a car share. She doesn't seem to have a car to share, or at least doesn't drive it to work. She gets lifts 4 days a week from another colleague and now wants a lift on the 5th day from the OP. There's no sharing involved.

How far is it? Can she get there via public transport?

if it was difficult for her to get there I think she should offer petrol money for you and your colleague.

Im all for car sharing but it does feel too ‘take-y’ for me

YANBU and NO is a full sentence

It seems cheeky to me to request a lift tbh, lifts are offered not requested, unless you're close friends!

Don't overthink it, a simple 'hey, I can't sorry! See you whenever' will suffice.

Or just ignore it, and if she asks in person just say 'oh, my phone's been a bit funny lately' and leave it at that.

No to lifts.
She couldn't be bothered to ask you in person, and you work with her.

I started doing this once but it became everyday and I really regretted it especially as the person had their own car!! It was very limiting because I couldn’t do my own thing on way home from work or take calls from family. Unless someone is injured I’m not taking them home.