AIBU to refuse weekly lifts to a neighbour's hospital appointments?

[IGotDreams]

We have lived in our house for 4 years and know the neighbours to say hello to, taken a parcel in for them occasionally, we chat sometimes but we don’t know them well. We are friendly but not friends. We are busy with work, kids and general life.

One of the neighbours has asked if we can take her to a hospital appointment once every week for the next 4 weeks. One of their adult children can apparently bring her home.

Technically we could do it if we moved things around without too much difficulty, but as we don’t know her well, we said no. She looked shocked when we said we couldn’t help and she walked away without saying goodbye.

I mentioned it to my parents in passing last week and they said I should have said I’d help but I explained we are busy and she can make other arrangements. When I spoke to my parents last night, they asked me if I had changed my mind and was going to help the neighbour out. I said no and that we hadn’t even thought/spoke about it since as we are busy. My mum said I should be willing to help people more. I disagreed. We are busy and have enough going on with our own family and friends and that the neighbours aren’t my responsibility. In my neighbours situation, I wouldn’t ask for help from neighbours who we hardly know.

Would you have helped? I won’t be changing my mind and helping but wondered if people would generally be more helpful than me. I did say to my parents that they could help my neighbours out if they wanted to but apparently it isn’t there place to. They said they would do it for their own neighbours if asked.

That is not what neighbours are for. They live next to you, that's all. You should be considerate of not causing them problems, being mindful of where you park, so they can access their drive, not being excessively noisy but nobody is entitled to their neighbours giving them lifts to hospital appointments. I would probably take 1 of my neighbours if they asked because I know them well, but not just a random neighbour

I do t actually think you are unreasonable but the way you said it might have come across as such.
You wfh but are required to do your hours so something along the lines of "sorry neighbour I wfh and I'm on online meetings so can't help.. Can I help you look into taxis?" would have come across better. Even if you didn't work 2 hours weekly for 4 weeks is a lot
My FIL once demanded I drove to his house (4 hour round trip) to take him 5 minutes down the road for a flu jab as this was" more convenient for him". He hasn't worked for 30 years and has ample time to call a taxi.
I would probably have explained the work issue but said I would check if there was one week I could do.

Totally understand why you would say no as you barely know the woman.

if it was a close friend or family - I think you would do anything to help them out - but this is a big ask of an acquaintance and as hard as it was for her to hear ‘no’ - when she’s obviously got quite a lot on health wise - it really isn’t your issue to sort but hers.

I haven’t changed my story at all. We could have made it work, but we didn’t want to do it. It would have required moving things around and I’d have done it for someone I was close to.

You don't have to and I do t think you should be criticized for not helping but I would of . I always think why not help if you can and believe in just being a geniune nice person . Same goes for ppl who got out of their want to be awkward or blunt and prove a point it's just unessaracary . But I'm so sorry would of like to helped but we have committments at that time ourselves if perfectly acceptable

of course YANBU. I might have felt a bit more obligated to do it if she hadn't any family (although you still shouldn't have to!) but if she has several adult children of her own that is just a complete pisstake!

Unless there's history of CFery, which doesn't seem to be the case, I would help if I could. I wouldn't take annual leave or anything, but if I was available, I'd help. I would think someone would need to be pretty desperate to ask a neighbour they hardly know, and the world needs more kindness generally.

Difficult is relative.

I regularly drive my mum into Central London for her hospital appointments.

It’s not difficult in the sense that I put them in my diary, juggle work meetings and other commitments.

But would I do it for a neighbour who can afford a taxi, has a partner and adult dc? No, because that is too ‘difficult’ for me.

Ah, the WFH thing where people think you can just swan off for over two hours with no repercussions.

I would do it for my immediate neighbours if they asked because we're friendly in a 'not-in-your-pockets' way. Also I'm retired so I have free time. I wouldn't do it for any other neighbour that I barely know. I would never ask a neighbour to do it for me, even the immediate ones, as I hate to impose on people. I wonder why they can't get a cab? Perhaps they just expect people to do things for them for free.

My guess is that she thinks you don’t work and are therefore free. She heard the word no and started to panic about how she would get there, hence appearing rude. The problem we have with taxis is that trying to book one around the beginning or end of the school day is impossible as they do the school runs. Maybe she had tried to book a taxi and hit the same problem. Personally I would have refused a 2 hour round trip for someone I barely know. But OP, your general attitude around neighbours and helping out seems a little near sighted. Let’s hope you don’t need someone in an absolute emergency. When we had a disaster in our house many years ago, neighbours we barely knew rallied round to look after our son, store items for us and bring us meals. We are eternally grateful for their help.

No, she didn’t mention money. I wouldn’t have done it for money anyway.

Wow OP I find your selfishness kind of astounding.

Like many I have kids, full time stressful job, activities every night and on weekends and I absolutely would have said yea.

Your neighbour asked because she needed you not because she was trying to inconvenience you. Maybe she has had a bad experience with a cab and didn’t have anyone else.

If she is having chemo she may be scared and alone.

YABVU because you think it’s cheeky.

'Could have made it work' isn't the same as 'it's no cost to me'. In most jobs, even if you can move meetings around, there's a limited amount of goodwill from your boss or from the other people those meetings are with, as well as the admin of trying to move things when everyones diaries are busy. Most people have enough of those favours to ask when they've got children that they can't really be asking for more to do favours for people they barely know.

How do we know she can afford a taxi?

If I was available, I wouldn't deem it to be too difficult for me so I'd do it.

I don't know. I think I would have done at least the first week and probably showed a bit more concern about why she had the appointments.

I think her children should really be helping. If she didn't have children I would have done my best to accommodate her for all the appointments

Appreciate you have your own stuff going on OP but I would have done this for a neighbour. It’s part of being in a community.

I never ask people for favours. I arrange everything myself. Taxis or public transport. Especially people who hardly know each other!

Kindness? Like when the neighbour, who is basically a stranger, bollocked off in a huff without saying goodbye when the OP said no? I can't believe a person of that age cannot sort travel to a hospital appointment for themselves. I'm that age and have driven to hundreds of hospital appointments. There's also patient transport. It was an absolute liberty to ask.

Because OP said she can get a taxi. I think OP comes across as the type of person who would help if someone was genuinely in need.

I wouldn’t have volunteered for them all in one go but if I could have helped at all I would have. Maybe something like the below would have landed a little better than just ‘No’

‘I can do next week but will have to see about the others as they come’

‘I can’t do next week but might be able to the next, I’ll let you know as soon as I can’

I'd question why her grown children couldn't work it out between them TBH.

Since you did ask, yes I would help but I dont think its wrong not to want to or that you are under any obligation to. You said no and that's fine.

people wanging on about 'community' need to understand it should work both ways. If the neighbours had spent several years building a relationship with OP, babysitting their kids, giving them presents at christmas, looking after the house on holiday, offering to mow their lawn when doing theirs (just some examples!) and then asked for this favour in return that's one thing.

If they are 'just' neighbours and not friends but suddenly start expecting quite large favours from OP (4 2hr trips is a whole working day, and it doesn't even sound as if they'd offered to pay petrol!) that's not 'neighbourliness' that's CFery.

Of course, the neighbour needing an emergency lift to hospital is completely different and I doubt OP would refuse that and tell her to call her own kids while standing there trying to stem a bleed! But this woman has other options, it's incredibly rude to expect OP to take time off work rather than her own children.

The people on here saying she should use hospital transport, taxis, volunteer drivers and public transport seem to have no ideas of the realities of using them.

I didn’t have a car and needed to attend chemo. I wasn’t eligible for hospital transport ( which leaves people there for hours/ all day when really ill) , there wasn’t any volunteer service, couldn’t afford the taxis as not working due to ill health and the extreme cost and the bus took 2.5 hours to do a 30 min car journey.

Also imagine doing all that when you are having treatment that can leave you really sick or in pain etc.

This is like people who think there is respite for disabled children and lots of services for support. You don’t know until you need to access these things that they don’t exist.

I also think the @ophas invented the hour journey time as the replies have not gone in her favour.