Father asking for money for a favour done

warby68

When you let things drag on, the picture gets clouded and 18m is a very long time to leave something unresolved. You look like you have been allowing the relationship to deteriorate to avoid paying.

Your sentence ' I can't say why we didn't pay him - we just want the house finished' is actually very telling to your mindset.

Has his bill changed from 18m ago or was he trusting you to be 'decent' and pay a reasonable amount back then but got well and truly fed up when you paid nothing?

I agree you have a problem with shoddy work but you've let it slide so long, complaining now will look like a 'tit for tat' response to his bill and so the situation will escalate.

Surely to goodness its been mentioned at some point since then?

In a nutshell, you've allowed yourselves to lose the moral high ground you possibly had at the beginning - my take on what you've said. However I have very little patience with people who avoid paying their debts but carry on spending on other things.

silvercar

I may have missed the point you are all trying to make, i'm doing a rubbish job trying to explain where we are coming from, but in the end we have to pay for unsatisfactory, unfinished work. We do just have to suck it up and pay more than we intended. Yes, its definitely a lesson learned and we we will do all painting work ourselves in the future and never get favours done again!

It's mixing business with family.

Maybe he is billing you because he is short of money?

You need a very honest conversation. Can you send the bill back saying it was a shock but you will pay him for the work done. Ask for a revised bill based on hours actually worked.

chesky

It's been going on so long now that it's left a bad taste in everybody's mouths. You should have sorted it out immediately when you had a fair case (as I said in my original post).

You should not have undertaken the new work without having reached some kind of conclusion with your father.

Now, whatever you do, the family will probably never fully recover.

What a mess. What a pity.

borkid

Mojisola wrote: »

But you must have had the money to pay him ages ago if you have also saved enough to pay for the utility room.

Why didn't you give it to him as soon as you had it?

Not necesarily, some savings can't be touched for x years. Back in the 90s we had a savings account which I think was 5 years. Just before it was due to mature we went around pricing work/ holidays but we couldn't touch the money until the the maturity date. Similar with another much longer term one of my OHs which matured last year, paid so much per year into it. Infact there was a slight delay in getting the money even after the maturity date.

Of course this might not be the case here but things aren't always as straight forward as they seem..

borkid

Kaye1 wrote: »

My Dad is a plumber. He was properly offended when I offered him money for some jobs he had done for us.

We hadn't asked, he had offered and we accepted. He was mortified at the though of taking money from us- and yes, he is self employed.

I've even had similar things with old friends. They wouldn't take money so when they need help I give it.

AylesburyDuck

Ryiah wrote: »

Woah hold on a minute you seem to be reading quotes that are incorrect due to my error. Let me repeat, I misphrased! he had no idea we planned to give him money!

He asked us for money the first time, we said we hadn't intended on paying as he never mentioned it when he started, but my husband and I said to each other that we would give him something as it did take a long time..we had it in our heads when he was doing the work (and before he asked for payment) that we'd give him something.

*I can't answer why we didn't hand it over as soon as we got the money together. We just wanted the house finished!

We know and appreciate that my dad has done a lot of work which he wants payment for. We have decided we will negotiate something but not the full whack. As people said previously - you wouldnt pay a tradesmen the full whack for unfinished, unsatisfactory work!
We can and would've decorated ourselves if we known he'd be charging us!

In my eyes this is a similar scenario (except payment is agreed beforehand!) - you get an extension built, the joiner hasn't finished the work - he's stopped coming then turns up months later demanding money even though the job isn't finished and work done is substandard. You always intended to pay him while he was working, but now he's demanding money for unfinished work would you actually pay him what he's asking?

Obviously the money would be kept aside for him just incase he comes back to finish, but im sure you'd carry on with the other jobs that need doing in the house and not put everything on hold?

**I may have missed the point you are all trying to make, ***i'm doing a rubbish job trying to explain where we are coming from, **** but in the end we have to pay for unsatisfactory, unfinished work. We do just have to suck it up and pay more than we intended. Yes, its definitely a lesson learned and we we will do all painting work ourselves in the future and never get favours done again!

In order
* You answered your own question, you just wanted the house finished. Your Dad came a poor second.
**I dont think you missed anything. I just think it doesnt fit what you want to hear.
***It's tiring back peddleing isnt it.
**** I'm not inclined to actually believe a word you say now, due to the above back peddleing. Maybe unfairly, maybe not, you created the doubt yourself.

Sorry OP i think you've brought it all on yourself.

Mojisola

Ryiah wrote: »

When he finished, he asked us if we were paying him or not, we said we hadn't intended to but we'll give something.

Our relationship took a downslide after he asked for payment last year.

Ryiah wrote: »

he doesn't actually know we intended giving him some money.

We never mentioned it to him, we just always had it our heads that we would give him something when we can - which we can now and we also have enough saved for installing the utility room - which is why we went to get quotes.

borkid wrote: »

Not necesarily, some savings can't be touched for x years.

Of course this might not be the case here but things aren't always as straight forward as they seem..

Well, the OP does say "we have saved enough", not "we have had a bond mature" or "the money's only just become available".

Ryiah - if you told him last year that he would be paid something, why do you say that he doesn't know that you are going to pay him?

He's been stewing over the non-appearance of the money you promised him all those months ago and has lost patience with you both.

LKRDN_Morgan

Ryiah wrote: »

In my eyes this is a similar scenario (except payment is agreed beforehand!) - you get an extension built, the joiner hasn't finished the work - he's stopped coming then turns up months later demanding money even though the job isn't finished and work done is substandard. You always intended to pay him while he was working, but now he's demanding money for unfinished work would you actually pay him what he's asking?

But you're comparing your dad to some random tradesman you've employed :huh:

enthusiasticsaver

My OH has done loads of electrical work for our daughters. Would never dream of charging for his time but we have got used to keeping track of materials and asking for that to be reimbursed. When we employed our nieces husband to help OH work on our daughters house we paid his going rate as he is self employed although he did charge us friends and family mainly because he was learning about electrics from my OH at the same time. OH is an electrical engineer.

Obviously this situation will never occur again as you have learnt not to accept your dad's offer of (help!) as he does shoddy work and still expects payment for it. Whenever we get decorators in we always ask for a quote to get the job done not an hourly rate so there can be no confusion if it is a large room. How many rooms were decorated and how many to your standard. Get someone in to quote and then halve it if you were not happy. Are we talking about you paying him a couple of hundred or a thousand? I would not accept that he charged you half rate and then did a rubbish job. That is not acceptable. The rooms which were not done satisfactorily get a quote to get them redone and deduct from his bill. Whichever way you look at this your relationship will suffer. Depends on how you feel about that.

maman

Ryiah wrote: »

I may have missed the point you are all trying to make, i'm doing a rubbish job trying to explain where we are coming from, but in the end we have to pay for unsatisfactory, unfinished work. We do just have to suck it up and pay more than we intended. Yes, its definitely a lesson learned and we we will do all painting work ourselves in the future and never get favours done again!

I realised that the discussion about paying must have been privately between you and OH although I can see how others may have read it differently.


I think it's sad that your dad wanted payment for helping you in his spare time. I'd do anything to help my children. It would be slightly different if he'd had to take time off work and he needed the money making up but I'm sure lots of people take time off to help their children too.


Personally I wouldn't negotiate, I'd just pay him the money he's asked for and say nothing about shoddy work or time wasting anything else other than that you were surprised as he hasn't charged you before for helping. If that's the way he wants it then you know where you are for the future and it helps keep your relationship (on the surface at least) civilised. I know that means you might have to wait longer to do the utility room but to me it's worth it to be on the moral high ground.


ETA: my DH fixed a couple of new fence panels for DD1 earlier in the week. She was round the next day, unasked, with the money for the panels but no mention of paying for DH's time and expertise. Then she had the cheek to ask to borrow our power washer and no hire charge was even mentioned!:eek::rotfl:


On reflection, I did borrow her sewing machine for free last month.:o