Dearest MN'ers! Can you please help me respond to a text I received from a former 'employer'? I'm sorry if this is long. Her message may seem friendly but in context, not so much, so I don't want to dripfeed.
Until a few months ago, for about a year I did some self-employed work to the value of about £3-500/25-30 hours a month for a local charity run by one person. Note that it being a charity is a bit of red herring - it was the most efficient way to get grants and pay herself plenty.
She was very frustrating to work with for about 30% of the time. She tried to haggle about invoices for previously agreed hours a few times; seemed to have a chip on her shoulder about quite a lot of things and people [including acquaintances ignoring her in the street, relevant later]; insinuated I had mental health problems; and would occasionally mention conflict with people she'd previously worked with (yeah, red flag!). Her knowledge of how to legally run a charity was minimal (I had to say 'no, you can't do that, this is required' a lot). Her partner and one of the trustees commented a couple of times that they were surprised that I'd lasted this long compared to previous people in the role.
In the end, I had a few weeks' break during which she tried to haggle about invoices for the third or fourth time, and considering I didn't need the money, I quit. Telling her (in person) was very tense. The reason for quitting I gave was that I'd been offered a fulltime job elsewhere (didn't want to give the real reasons). There was no contract and no planned work, so I left immediately.
In the weeks after, she sent about 2-5 emails and texts asking me to do more work for free as part of a handover (I'd already written a handover document, she just couldn't comprehend parts of it - she's very dyslexic), and falsely accused me of not giving her access to and deliberately deleting documents (she emailed later saying she figured out the access). I decided not to reply to any of it (was busy with other work and couldn't be arsed).
She has now sent this, slightly edited to anonymise. Tempting as it is to ignore again, I'd like to come across as the adult in the room. How would you reply?
"Hey Agapornis, hope you are well, do you want to talk at any point? Nothing to do with work, just that I saw you in [town] last week, and it would have been nice to say hello. If you don't want to, that’s fine, but let me know if you do. Hope all is going well for you, take care."
To me it reads quite passive aggressive ('it would have been nice'), a tone she's used before. I very much don't want to talk, but I want to keep it superficial and shut down any further texts. No doubt she'll spot me in town again some time. I'm thinking something like:
"Hi [Twat], I'm well thanks, very busy. I didn't see you, my mind was probably elsewhere, with headphones in! Hope you have a nice Christmas."
She's told me she's not on Mumsnet, but if any of the trustees read this, now you know why I quit 😅