Warning to oap,s hiding money at home.

natnhay

Hi we recently had an 80+ elderly relative in hospital.When we bought her home we decided to clear out food cupboard and fridge.A lot of outdated tin stuff was thrown away and placed in the bin and left out for collection the next day.We visited her today to be told that she had a money tub disguised as a tin of soup which contained her pension money,yes you,ve guessed it we threw it away.So please if you oaps have something hidden PLEASE,PLEASE let someone know.We had been told about some hidden cash for use when her time comes.Also please check for the old £20 notes as we had to exchange alot of the hidden cash we knew about.Ive never felt so bad as i did today,so hope this helps someone avoid a story like this.

welshmoneylover

natnhay wrote: »

Hi we recently had an 80+ elderly relative in hospital.When we bought her home we decided to clear out food cupboard and fridge.A lot of outdated tin stuff was thrown away and placed in the bin and left out for collection the next day.We visited her today to be told that she had a money tub disguised as a tin of soup which contained her pension money,yes you,ve guessed it we threw it away.So please if you oaps have something hidden PLEASE,PLEASE let someone know.We had been told about some hidden cash for use when her time comes.Also please check for the old £20 notes as we had to exchange alot of the hidden cash we knew about.Ive never felt so bad as i did today,so hope this helps someone avoid a story like this.

Did you ask her if it was OK for you to turf her stuff out before hand?

Personally, I'd be berluddy mortified if I found out a family member did that to me.

It's a shame that abuse of the elderly is on the increase.

Are you having a whip round to replace the money? I think it's the very least that can be done for her.

Newly_retired

Tinned stuff keeps for years and years.

PasturesNew

Poor thing
No privacy in her own home any more.

She'd have been mortified if you'd found her black and white Naked Mr Universe postcard collection.

Biggles

How could you pick up and examine a 'soup' tin, closely enough to see that it was apparently out of date, without noticing a) it wasn't really a soup tin and b) weighed nothing like as much as the other soup tins?

The whip round mentioned above is definitely called for.

larmy16

Maybe the moral is to ask for someone's permission before you go throwing their things away?

Poor old lady.

foreign_correspondent

Those money tin things are incredibly light - I always thought this was the big flaw in them, the illusion it is a real tin is gone as soon as you pick them up - your story sounds rather fishy to me!!

natnhay

Hi morning all, as if i didnt feel bad enough,at what has happened i feel even worse now.I now feel like a criminal,(why does my story sound fishy)as for asking permission perhaps we should have but we thought we were helping.If things had been left up to the relative she wouldnt have gone into hospital and bascially would no longer be here.Lots of the tins were as old as 2002, dont date stuff for no reason.Some of the comments make me sound like a monster,but i am not just a caring relative trying to help.

larmy16

It is incredibly hard to get some elderly to get rid of stuff. I know an old guy who has tins back from the 90's. He will never use them but I would rather leave them for his family to deal with.

Once we helped him get rid of an old freezer in his garage filled with blackberries which were about 20 years old!!!!!!!!

Don't feel bad. You were trying to help and we all make mistakes despite our best intentions.

You hear stories of people donating stuff to the charity shop which has their life savings in. At least it was not that bad!!!

ceridwen

Okay - i believe you were trying to help.

BUT - why did you decide to throw out someone else's possessions?

Personally - I would be absolutely furious if I found anyone had gone through my possessions - never mind thrown them out (even if it was stuff I was planning on throwing out myself...).

Well - all you can do now is apologise profusely to the person and offer them the money it would cost to replace all the possessions (including that money stashed in the tin concerned) and absolutely insist that they TAKE that money.

It will also be necessary to buy them a decent present - as an apology for the inconvenience and worry caused.

I think there are basically two ways of thinking about whether it would be "helpful" to have someone "tidy up" one's possessions. I guess the problem lies with the fact that you are in the group of people that regards doing this as helpful - whereas a large number of people (including myself) are in the "My possessions are MY possessions and the thought wouldnt even cross my mind that anyone would even touch them without my say-so". Hence the need to pay up/apologise to the person concerned.

foreign_correspondent

foreign_correspondent wrote: »

Those money tin things are incredibly light - I always thought this was the big flaw in them, the illusion it is a real tin is gone as soon as you pick them up - your story sounds rather fishy to me!!

natnhay wrote: »

Hi morning all, as if i didnt feel bad enough,at what has happened i feel even worse now.I now feel like a criminal,(why does my story sound fishy)

see above - I just dont know how you could mistake one for a real tin once you had picked it up - they weigh nothing.

I can completely understand the need to clean out cupboards, re-stock etc, and I did the same for my gran when she was in hospital, but cannot understand how you could mistake the tin for a real one - especially if you were looking at them closely for sell-by dates!

Have you reimbursed her?