Friends asking for their money back

[Nicolasaa9]

Hi, I am not even sure if this is the right place to post this, but I really need to vent.

My two closest friends and I planned to go to an event together. I live in London, one friend is in Hertfordshire and the other lives up north. We agreed to book it in Leeds, get a hotel, and make a proper girls weekend of it, especially as the friend up north is usually the one travelling south.

Both friends have now said they are too unwell to go. They asked me to put their tickets up for resale, which I have done, and have also asked me to pay them back for their share of the hotel even though I am still going.

The hotel is non refundable, and I used around £200 of my own points to book it. There was an extra £60 to pay, which I asked them to split between them at £30 each, which felt fair given the points I used.

They are now asking for that £30 back. I am still going because I have wanted to see this event for ages, but it means driving four hours to something I could have reached in ten minutes on the tube, and spending the weekend alone.

Am I being unreasonable in feeling this is unfair

What crap friends.

Just tell them the room is still available and paid for if they want to use it. Was it just one room?

In theory, as they've cancelled, they should pay you back their share of the Expedia voucher they wasted. A £260 room would be £87 each, so they owe you another £57 each!

As they've been so crap, then I hope karma strikes and they end up with their tickets not selling. Is that likely?

Yes they do. The ceo office of boots added £5 points into my advantage card this week When an offer didn’t work at the till.

Customer services weren’t very helpful.

We had a weekend cottage booked for a group. We all paid. Then one friend realised she couldn’t go got a better offer. She didn’t charge the rest of us to make up her share as we were still making use of the cottage. Obviously that would have been completely ridiculous. It was on her that she couldn’t come. We would have booked a smaller / cheaper cottage at the start if we knew there would be fewer of us going. (As it was, I was somewhat peeved as we had booked the cottage to be close to her. A good 4.5 hour drive for me. And then she bloody well didn’t come!)

No one in their right mind would ask for that money. Only an utter CF. Seems you have 2 to contend with. Not sure if actually want to be friends with people like this.

Please tell me they’ve paid you for the tickets already..?

Do not pay them back! You’ve already subbed them £200!!! And let them deal with the tickets, if possible (probably isnt).
Disappointing friends. I always wonder why friends never cease to be disappointing 😪

The flakiness of this is annoying enough on its own, without the cheek of expecting you to refund them.

If you're going to be flaky and bail out of things because you've got a better offer or can't be arsed, you have to accept the financial penalty. I don't buy their 'too ill' excuse at all.

I’m so sorry you’ve got shit friends you don’t owe them a penny it’s their loss just remember this in future and only ever book for yourself hope you have a great time

I have never been so unwell as to not be able to attend a concert. I’d go with my eyes hanging out.

I know this response is superfluous because you've had great advice but tell them to get to fuck

How come suddenly they're too ill to go? It doesn't sound very likely. And why did you pay the ,£200 upfront yourself anyway,? They've let you down badly. See

absolute piss takers. I'd reduce their concert tickets to really cheap, so they actually sell, and then keep that money as well rather than refunding them. How will they know? Tight sods. Lazy as well, why is it up to you to try and sell their tickets? At least you got the money from them upfront, well done on that.

I know you've explained several times they won't refund the points but just wondering if there's any chance they'd let you swap the date as an alternative, so you and a partner/different friend could make use of it? If it's a chain they might even let you swap hotels as well as long as it's within the same brand? Worth a try.

I'd just send back 'lol'

I wouldn’t lie about it, your point about either travelling 4 hours to see it alone rather than being a few hundred quid down is good enough. Decent friends wouldn’t mind you making the most of it and wouldn’t want you to be out of pocket. Fuck em.

And maybe send them the tickets so they can do the admin of trying to sell them.

OP, are you Goldilocks?

I hope their tickets don’t sell.

yanbu

Or, “luckily, as I shared my points with you, at least you are only down £30 each”.

I really feel for you OP, this happened to me, and on another occasion to a friend, leaving us both several hundred pounds out of pocket. Now if I organise any event, I will not book it until other people have paid me, (ie I won't pay upfront out of my money) and I send out texts or emails saying that if they cancel, I will try to get refunds, but if refunds are not available, then they forfeit the money. If they object, I simply tell them of my previous experience and say I can't afford to lose money on someone else's behalf.

Sounds like you made a real effort to make the trip affordable for them OP so it’s a pity they don’t see this.

I have to say that I’m usually too nervous to book non-refundable hotel tickets though.
I know they’re cheaper but plans do often change! I usually take the ‘cancellation possible until 48 hrs in advance’ option. Was this not a possibility because you’d used your points? (Not sure how the points work.)

Loads of generalisations and chav bashing on here. Ewwww.

they paid for concert tickets, so the tickets belong to your friends. Send them the tickets and let them worry about what to do with those. Your 'friends' will otherwise for sure ask for a refund for the tickets as well, whether you manage to sell them or not.

Is it Strictly? There’s quite a few tickets available, do you have to resale through the arena or can you do a private sale and sell them cheaper? If you can sell privately try joining Leedsplace fb page and sell on there.

Are you reading a different thread?

Tell them that as you were only going to travel there as they were coming, you’d like them to reimburse you the value of your hotel points and travel.

Yeah I bought them and they gave me the money for the tickets and the hotel

A bad leg and a cold eh? Bollocks.

I get really annoyed by people who slime out of things by feigning illness or injury...and you always know when it happens.
Politeness forces a lot of people to feign understanding and sympathy in response, even though they know they're being lied to.
"Aw no worries, hope you feel better soon."
So, the let-down is let off the hook and in addition, has their bullshit smoothed over with well wishes too.
Fucking nah.

My response to those texts is this:
"Thanks for letting me know."
Just that. No emotion, no polite pandering or feigned sympathy. They're not ill or injured, they're lying to me.
What I mean is, "Thanks for letting me know you'll insult me with a lie to get out of our arrangement after I've put the free time and money aside to honour it. Won't do that again."

OP of course you don't owe them £30 each. I can't believe they'd even ask.