My 4 year old damaged neighbours car

[Mummmybear03]

Hi all. My kids were playing on our street yesterday and one of them ran inside saying that my youngest who is 4 years old had thrown a stone and it has marked the neighbours visitors car. I immediately went round and before even seeing the damage I was very apologetic and said I would cover the repair damages. When I looked at the car there is the tiniest chip mark. A few kids were around us at the time and I asked who started throwing the stones, because my son wouldn’t just do that he copies people. It turns out it was said neighbours daughter who is 11. The parents were very off with me saying that it is irrelevant who started it. Clearly it isn’t because a 4 year old boy will copy what he has seen. I can away still saying that I would pay for the damage and apologising. I got my 4 year old who was very upset to apologise too. After coming away I checked cctv recording and it shows the neighbours daughter who’s car was damaged, was sat throwing stones at another boy on his bike and in the street. She has also taken my stones from my garden and thrown them out onto the road.
I am a reasonable person and if my child caused damage I would pay for it. But the fact he has copied their daughter makes me reluctant. And they’re were pretty arsy with me even though all I did was apologise and offer to pay. They said they will get a quote and get back to me. Just to note that it’s such a minor mark on a 9 year old car.
Any advice? Thanks.

I'm pretty laid back and lax but ffs a 4yr old should not be out playing on the street without parental supervision. You're lucky he's not under a car.

Everything after 'but' is irrelevant. Your 4 year old is not old enough to know not to copy naughty behaviour, that's why he shouldn't be out unsupervised. This is all on you OP.

I think I'd agree with the above advise. Pay up and take it as a learning experience I guess.

Sorry to add the same message but a 4 year old is not old enough to play out without adult supervision. I'm not going to say any more but please be thankful a chipped car is all you have to worry about

That’s why adults supervise 4 year olds and don’t expect 11 year olds to act as unpaid babysitters.

YABU

Yeah check out that convincing photo of a wet car (when it's been dry for ages) with zero visible damage

It isn't dry everywhere. It poured here last night and rained again this morning. It's dry now but we're expecting rain later again.

We had torrential rain yesterday!

Dry for ages? I guess yesterday's biblical storms didn't get to wherever you live then! Nothing was dry around here for a good few hours yesterday.

Your child damaged they care while unsupervised, if they are likely to just copy other children, supervise them!

The only part of this story that matters is you allowing your 4 years old child to play in the street without an adult present. That's just pure negligence. You're lucky a small mark on a car is all that happened.

I think it’s important to teach kids from a young age that ‘someone else was doing it’ isn’t a get out for their own bad behaviour. If someone else is doing it - let them do it and suffer the consequence. You are responsible for your own behaviour.
If they aren’t able to understand that then you need to be watching them. If the older kids had been doing something unsafe would they have copied that too?
I hope you haven’t given your child any indication that you think someone else behaving badly mitigates their own behaviour. Copying other peoples bad behaviour at school for eg is still going to lead to them getting into trouble.

It is totally irrelevant that the daughter was throwing stones. You are using it as some cheap get out of jail card. Accept the responsibility for your childs actions.

The good news is if you google smart paint repair you should be able to get that repaired properly for about £25-50. You can try to get away with cheapskating it and get a touch up stick but if you have already pissed the owners off by accusing their daughter i get the impression they wont be in the mood and may escalate to a respray of the panel which will be a few hundred.

Make the call to smart repair, get it fixed and move on.

Yabu too young to be unsupervised. A young kid got reversed over in cul de sac by amazon van who couldnt see them behind.

I agree the neighbours girl shouldnt throw stones abpnd was likely the cause but she didnt cause the damage.
I would show footage to the parents as they need to supervise more too. And maybe they might naturally see the point its follwed from their dc and could have been them by chance.

Did you def see the damage was caused by your dc? It could have already been there.

A friends kid was throwing stones towards my neighbours car and cat! I tried to grwb the stone -- his mum was right there and ignoring.

There was also those kids who drowned on the ice. Kids could just as well follow someone away (bulger) or copy even worse behaviour.
I wouldnt want them playing with 11yo either.

If anyone was watching the intervention would have been to stop neighbours kid throwing stones at bike whick frankly is more serious than damage to their car.

If your 4 year old isn't able to act appropriately unsupervised (and frankly none are) then he's too young to be playing out without your supervision. The fact that the daughter of the owners of the car that your son damaged was also misbehaving (but didn't cause any damage to anything your knowledge) is irrelevant to the damage that your son caused.

You absolutely need to apologise profusely to the owners of the car that your son damaged and pay in full for any repairs. And in future, fully supervise your extremely young child and make sure he doesn't damage anyone's property.

Oh wow. YABVVVVVVVVVVVU to blame an 11 year old, for your unsupervised 4 year old's behaviour FFS.

I’m more just shocked you felt it appropriate for your four year old to be playing in the street unsupervised!

This.

It rained really hard all evening where I live on the south and I know it started earlier in neighbouring counties. Just because it’s dry where you are doesn’t mean it’s dry everywhere. Though this still might be bullshit.

If this really happened, I agree with PP that you should be supervising a four year old and if you don’t and they damage something, you need to pay up regardless of who they were imitating.

A four year old is way way way too young to he unsupervised in the street. If someone I knew and cared did that with their child I would hand on heart suggest they attended parenting classes!

with regards to the car, that damage is minimal. Thank heavens your four year old wasn’t injured by a moving car while unsupervised in the street ( and no it doesn’t matter however slow cars may go there).

How do we know the 4 year old was unsupervised and not just being neglected by whoever was supposed to be supervising?

By your own admission, your four year old isn't mature enough to make their own decisions.....so what adult was outside supervising?

You are going to be one of those Mum's aren't you, "my child would never do that" "He got in with a wrong crowd" "He is an angel"

You do realise that people from around the globe post on Mumsnet, don’t you, or did you think everyone lived within 20 miles of your town, somewhere in the UK? 😳😂

It’s rained a lot and we’ve had flooding here over the weekend. So I’m pretty certain I don’t live near you. And I don’t live in the UK. either. 😆

Agree with both points here.

YABU. Your DC is 4 and not old enough to make non-impulsive decisions. Thats why he need to be supervised and as his parent it boils down to being your responsibility for doing just that. Either supervise him outside or don't let him out.