For the fourth year in a row we will visit my BIL and his family for 3 full days before Christmas, 20-24th. It's an 800 mile round trip for us. The reason for doing it is my MIL is down that way too and has been in a home for the last 4 years with increasingly debilitating Alzheimer's. It's pretty much the only time my kids can visit now due to school, uni and work.
Anyway, how much does the stw massive think is reasonable for us to contribute financially towards our stay? It goes without saying that we all muck in and help with cooking, washing up etc.
PS there's four of us.
Should have said there's four of us.
Err, zero? I'd likely offer to take them out for a good meal and maybe turn up with wine and biscuits. I've never paid to stay with family or friends or been paid in return. I guess that depends on what sort of relationship you have with them though.
My initial reaction was nowt, but then I concluded that I was missing something. Assuming that they never visit you for longer periods? and as you say., this is a regular thing then I'd be tempted to suggest you buy the weekly shop
Err, zero? I'd likely offer to take them out for a good meal and maybe turn up with wine and biscuits. I've never paid to stay with family or friends or been paid in return. I guess that depends on what sort of relationship you have with them though.
This would be my thoughts.
Errr what? Take some flowers/booze/cheese, that kinda thing. Offer to take them out for a pub lunch, or get a takeaway in. Handing over cash would be odd, to put it mildly.
This is a bit ****ing weird, tbh.
Take gifts, wine, whatever. Pay them? Have they asked for this?
Offer to make a contribution - either money towards it all or by bringing plenty supplies.
If you are all pitching in when there then that won't be like you are leeching off them.
Enjoy the trip and family time.
I hate this stuff. We always have it when we go to our in-laws. Mrs B is so sensitive to it she over compensates - we turn up with food, she try to pay for all the shopping while we're there and take them all out for a meal.
Its far easier if you formalise it - my uncle had a house big enough that we could fit both families and grandparents at Christmas (kids packed onto camp beds on floor of parents etc) so we went there every year until we were over 18. All the food, booze, crackers the lot got shopped for by our Aunt and the bill for everything was split between the families. No drama, no bad feeling that someone has paid too much/not enough. Was never an issue.
Cars were smaller then too - 3 kids and 2 adults with luggage and presents in a normal car wasn't really any question of us bringing food as well.
I can't honestly what's right in your circumstance as I feel like there's something missing here.
But for anyone I'd personally go and see at Christmas the answer is never money. Food and/or drink depending on who it is, and always getting stuck in with helping out with prep and cleaning. Is suspect if we told someone we wanted money contributing it'd be bigger news than if we told everyone we was expecting a child, and I'm fairly sure that's not an exaggeration.
But whatever, it just what happens to work for whoever I guess.
The missing piece of the puzzle would be that my other jalf gave them £200 last year, which I felt was a bit steep. We took venison and a few other food items, paid about £100 in petrol and spent two days driving. I've also discovered my other half pays them £15 a night when she stays when down to see her mum, I think that's pretty tight. Because of the Alzheimer's my partner has control of her mum's finances and that money comes out that, which I also think may not be a bit iffy. He's keen to claim for everything, when he used to take his mum out for coffee he'd ask to be reimbursed for it. I appreciate the cost of living is tough but he always has money for booze and weed. Like Mrs B I feel like my partner over compensates so as not to cause any trouble. I've said my bit and won't fall out with her about it but it feels like it might resurface in the future. And there will be no venison this year.
It goes without saying that we all muck in and help with cooking, washing up etc.
It doesn't! Every family dynamic is different but certainly some would turn up and treat the place like a boutique hotel!
My mother would always try to give her father money, and vice versa when they stayed with each other (and she still does the same when staying with anyone else). I think it depends if you were actively invited, invited yourself, or its just expected. Also if you are an stereotypical STW IT consultant married to a doctor wondering how to maximise your SIPP returns and they are juggling two minimum wage jobs.
I think my in-laws offer to pay for the food for Christmas dinner every year - but my motivation for hosting is I get to choose the food, and have christmas in my own house which is way more important than the cost!
Ooh I hadn't thought about charging relatives to come visit at christmas. Will text them now to tell them it's gonna cost £50 a head to compensate for the heating bills and general ball-ache of having them round. Great idea!
He's keen to claim for everything, when he used to take his mum out for coffee he'd ask to be reimbursed for it.
Have you thought about telling him to f-off?
The missing piece of the puzzle would be that my other jalf gave them £200 last year, which I felt was a bit steep. We took venison and a few other food items,Well its probably at the generous end of things - but feeding an extra 4 mouths at christmas when nobody is skimping is not cheap. If the 4 of you are drinking booze it could cost that.
paid about £100 in petrol and spent two days driving.
You've mentioned the 800 mile round trip + this again - so I suspect this is actually part of the real issue! Realistically they aren't going to come to you, given MIL is not going to travel that and they presumably wouldn't leave her on her own. Now if you don't go down who would be more upset? your partner or the in-laws? Travelling to visit family is a ball-ache but we do it either out of a sense of duty or because we actually enjoy spending time with them.
its tight only giving them £15, or its tight expecting £15?I've also discovered my other half pays them £15 a night when she stays when down to see her mum, I think that's pretty tight.
That gets a raised eyebrow from me. I don't know if anyone has looked at the OPG rules/guidance, but whilst I can see how you might make a case to justify it, I doubt this is "normal".Because of the Alzheimer's my partner has control of her mum's finances and that money comes out that, which I also think may not be a bit iffy.
interesting - I suppose its legit to ask for her coffee to be paid, not sure about his. Of course any normal parent/child relationship you might alternate or "mum" might insist they pay.He's keen to claim for everything, when he used to take his mum out for coffee he'd ask to be reimbursed for it.
a bit of amateur psychology - she's compensating for not being there the rest of the time to help with mum. If the alternative to "overcompensating to avoid trouble" is being fair (whatever that means) and having a hostile trip it sounds like a great investment: 2 days in the car and 4 days with people grudging your presence sounds grim. You could always book a hotel or air bnb which would cost you far more!Like Mrs B I feel like my partner over compensates so as not to cause any trouble. I've said my bit and won't fall out with her about it but it feels like it might resurface in the future. And there will be no venison this year.
We are another lot who have to travel to see family. A mix of Premier inns and staying with family, but as kids have got older we more and more stay in hotels. While a 7 year old does not mind being asked to sleep on mum and dads floor for a night so that cousins can sleep in her room, for some reason as a 17 year old she now objects 😉
We have always taken food and drink, but regularly get told that our journey and accommodation costs far outstripped feeding us all.
It doesn't! Every family dynamic is different but certainly some would turn up and treat the place like a boutique hotel!
Yeah, one of my BiL and I were discussing this a few months ago while washing up....that we have a couple of branches of the family who have not a clue how to repay the effort of hosting or cooking a meal, and if anything at age 32 with kids in tow take washing home to mum....!
Why would you charge or pay family? That really does not compute... by all means offers & contribute is asked, but it not a hotel, is it?
We stay in hotels now when visiting in-laws - keeps things nice and simple and you can retreat to the hotel when you've had enough of them!! 🙂
When we've done Christmas meals for MIL/FIL, we've usually all bought the food and cooked/prepped it, and just turned up at theirs with everything (they were getting on, so we'd make an effort). We have an invite from SIL this year and she's said she doesn't want any money, so we're all doing 'something', be that cheeses, starter, deserts. We'll take a load of wine round as well. Got invite to friends on Boxing Day - again, we'll turn up with wine and beer as we 'both' do when hosting the other.
I suspect I'll be driving both days anyway.
I think as it's custom and practice that your wife has set, then I'd just carry on. Xmas day isn't a cheap meal.
We always split stuff at Christmas as my sister was ending up hosting quite often, due to family members illnesses and stuff meaning we were travelling down to theirs. We'll just ask what we need to bring and its usually "get a joint of meat and you're incharge of starters". Inevitably we'll take a shit load of booze and soft drinks as well and leave any left overs, but as its my 2 nieces birthdays about a fortnight after christmas we end up back down there drinking the rest of it anyway!!
I now go to Costco and get one of the massive packs of bog roll as well and take that. You go through a lot of bog roll when theres about 15 people round for a few days...
As per most of the other replies - we have never done more than turn up with bottles of wine and bunches of flowers and assume things will be reciprocated at some point in the future. The only time we have done more than that was when we stayed with my brother-in-law in Australia for a full month and we regularly did big shops and made meals for everyone. We'll be doing the same this Christmas when we stay with my other brother-in-law in America (not staying for as long, but he did pay for our flights out so it is the least we can do).
We'll just ask what we need to bring and its usually "get a joint of meat and you're in charge of starters".
Good point – when my brother comes to ours for Christmas, he always asks if he needs to bring anything and I usually just ask him to bring cheese (he always brings wine when he comes for meals so I don't need to mention that). He lives alone and wouldn't ever host us, so I am happy for him to give that token contribution.
Are teenage boys involved? Remember, they eat for the UK and will be hungry an hour later!
I'm just trying to imagine the reaction if I had proposed to pay my (Greek) in-laws for staying with them. One of us would have died, one way or another.
I'm not sure why people think its weird to contribute to Christmas....we host my parents and my bachelor uncle most years and they always contribute financially. Having guests for 3 or 4 days means we probably spend at least double our normal festive spend, have to organise every meal on time and in enough quantity - buy certain things we wouldn't normally get (we are mainly veggie but guests are very much not etc etc). I did refuse the first time stating that for many years I'd been supported by them! but it didn't work and they left a bunch of notes under the pillow anyway so now we just say sure chuck it in the bank account and we'll get some very nice food/drink. My parents are not strapped for cash and know with two kids at uni, we very much are so it really does help. There is no embarrassment as I do plenty of things for my elderly parents which if they paid a tradesman to do it would cost a fortune! However, if they didn't contribute it wouldn't bother me in the slightest and certainly if I thought they were short of cash I'd properly refuse.
I'd say there is a big difference between being a one off or a rotation between families hosting and it being the same people doing it every year. Especially if the hosts are not doing it because they just love hosting and because it makes sense practically. And when everyone's younger and it's going to a parent's seems different.
Hosting a family of 4 for 3 or 4 days across Christmas isn't cheap. Then again, neither is driving an 800 mile round trip.
If it's money or you buy x,y & z doesn't really matter - but something feels appropriate rather than a few bottles of something random and a lump of cheese, which was probably not needed.
An honest and open conversation is probably what's needed most of all.
Why would you charge or pay family? That really does not compute... by all means offers & contribute is asked, but it not a hotel, is it?
Because some people don't have a lot of spare money, and feeding and boozing a family of 4 people for a number of days of expensive meals is, well, expensive?
When we've had Christmas or New Year with friends we've taken some nice wine or contributed part of the meal but those are always things that are reciprocated. We know they're going to come to us at some point.
But if the relationship, for whatever reason (who lives where, spare bedrooms), always ends up being one way I think it's safer to work something out (almost more important with family) than let resentment build up. And it's not necessarily about ability to pay - being the poor relation and visiting the rich one who pays for everything can be just as harmful (whether it's 'they never pay for anything and just treat the place like a hotel' or 'we can afford to pay for ourselves, we're not a charity case).
We had a relative who'd sneak off and pay the bill at a restaurant as well. Yes, we could pick it up the next time but for some people cashflow is an issue - let us pay our share.
Well, just goes to show that there are some very odd people out there.
Well, just goes to show that there are some very odd people out there.
Got to agree with Doris really... But go on then, since I've bitten.
Assuming the full family doesn't come around to the OP's house since it's bloody miles away and that the OP's family of 4 have been going there for four days for the last four years....
Clarify exactly what is odd.
If they've asked you to go stay then no contribution
If you are using it as a hotel to see your missus mum then pay for the food and drink you 4 have - dead simple
The 800 miles and to 2 days driving is off no consequence - you choose to live where you live
Well, just goes to show that there are some very odd people out there.
An excellent passive aggressive flail there, insulting potentially everyone in the thread, but with plausible deniability. Cunning
Isn't that 50% of all posts on any political thread....
I acknowledge the irony in what I just posted 😃
An honest and open conversation is probably what's needed most of all.
The OP is visiting the In Laws, there's no room for that sort of madness.....
The correct choice is....bottle it all up, getting ever more tense, then, on day 3 when you can barely stand up for mince pies and are still drunk by 10am, say something particularly stupid and offensive and leave under a cloud of bitter regret.
A true Xmas experience.
Well, just goes to show that there are some very odd people out there.
The ones who appear to have completely harmonious and well adjusted relationships with all parts of their family?
Or the rest of us where there are various underlying tensions, jealousies and resentments between partners/siblings/parents and their children that have to be carefully managed and have a habit of emerging when everyone spends a lot more time together than they are accustomed to?
If your wife is happy with the arrangement then that's the correct answer.
Personally, I'd rather stay at a local hotel/BnB than with relatives or "friends" that demanded payment.
The correct choice is....bottle it all up, getting ever more tense, then, on day 3 when you can barely stand up for mince pies and are still drunk by 10am, say something particularly stupid and offensive and leave under a cloud of bitter regret.
A true Xmas experience.
Or bottling it all up until you're in the car on the way home and taking it out on each other so that you can spend the trip in silence quietly seething with someone you'd actually got no issues with at all.
If they've asked you to go stay then no contribution
If you are using it as a hotel to see your missus mum then pay for the food and drink you 4 have - dead simple
The 800 miles and to 2 days driving is off no consequence - you choose to live where you live
I think this is a bit snappy but fair!
We don't charge our inlaws to stay with us or vice versa BUT:
1) if I were staying with them, I'd expect to do the big Xmas shopping trip and pay for it. Them putting 4 of us up has its own cost.
2) we do rotate who visits who, so it's not us paying for them every single time
In OP's case it sounds to be all on one side (because the relative can't travel). That's life but OP imvho should be offering to pitch in with just money or agreeing to buy a bunch of the stuff the whole household and guests will go through over Xmas.
OP's petrol bill is irrelevant to the in laws.
You lot showing up with a family of four expecting to be fed, watered and sheltered for nowt every year are a bunch of tightfisted scrooges!
We visited some friends in the Alps (1500mile round trip), who built a 25bed chalet. They don't have kids and use it a weekend or two a month. I don't know why it's so big. They insisted that we do a full scrub down of the kitchen and bathrooms before leaving; they were spotless before we started work on them. We've not been back.
To see our extended families is about a 2000-2500 mile round trip. If they charged us, I wouldn't be motivated to do the drive. We can go on holiday elsewhere for the same cost.
If they charged us, I wouldn't be motivated to do the drive.
Is that because you're seeing it as a duty, something that you have to do, not something you want to do?
Or bottling it all up until you're in the car on the way home and taking it out on each other so that you can spend the trip in silence quietly seething with someone you'd actually got no issues with at all.
Are we married? MrsJ- is that you ?
LOL...
OP's petrol bill is irrelevant to the in laws.
It's totally relevant.
You make a collective decision you want to be together. You make a decision that the best place for this is family A's house as it's close the care home so family B drive to family A. As part of the collective cost of having Christmas all together the fuel costs of travelling is totally in the mix. Granted, it's nothing like as expensive as hosting Christmas for 2 families, but it's a factor.
As a rough guess I think our Tesco shop is about twice as expensive on Christmas week as opposed to a normal week and we don't do a stupid OTT Christmas. I reckon some folk must triple their normal shop cost for Christmas week easy. So for two families that's 4-6 times the usual one family shopping bill.
The correct choice is....bottle it all up, getting ever more tense, then, on day 3 when you can barely stand up for mince pies and are still drunk by 10am, say something particularly stupid and offensive and leave under a cloud of bitter regret.
A true Xmas experience.
Or bottling it all up until you're in the car on the way home and taking it out on each other so that you can spend the trip in silence quietly seething with someone you'd actually got no issues with at all
Or bottling it up for years and having a go on the way.
Another excellent choice 😭
Nowt
Get the buggers to travel up to you for a change . I couldn’t be arsed travelling that far each Christmas
Not an option because of mil condition. My relationship with my bill is a wee bit strained, "you don't want your sleeping mattress, you want my ex army camping bed!" This conversation happens every year, he likes to tell people what to do. I don't really drink but I'm tempted to take some whisky and see what happens.
Steven - this is clearly a you problem. Either accept that the only reason you are there is because your wife wants to be there and you are doing it for her, on her terms, because she is the one who’s mother is 400 miles away and unwell, of book into a hotel/air BnB and cough up more for a little less intense family time.
Keep in mind that often the only reason a wife is 400 miles away from a sick mother is because the other 360 days a year she has chosen to be with her husband.
Not an option because of mil condition. My relationship with my bill is a wee bit strained, "you don't want your sleeping mattress, you want my ex army camping bed!" This conversation happens every year, he likes to tell people what to do. I don't really drink but I'm tempted to take some whisky and see what happens.
Steven take some of your excellent bramble whisky I sampled a long long time ago.
If it's stressful I'd be tempted to travel inn or some such establishment at least you'd have peace and meet for a meal or two.
My FiL looks as though he'll not make it through the weekend but we're still having folks for Xmas. One year my BiL made it extremely stressful, opening the good wine at 11am, using all the hot water in his 10am bath, scoring the table by turning the bubble bottle on the wood, taking a facetime call during the main course. To add insult to injury his present for staying was 4 bottles of desperado for me, even the knows I no longer drink. I'm not inviting people I don't want. Hence he's not on the welcome list and neither is my egocentric money grabbing sister.
Haven't made bramble whisky for a long time! It's not that stressful, he has three lovely kids an adorable border terrier and I get on fine with his wife. When he's being a pain he's swiftly told so.
the only reason a wife is 400 miles away from a sick mother is because the other 360 days a year she has chosen to be with her husband.
Except it's really not that simple or black white, there are many reasons my partner is in Scotland, she lived here for a long time before meeting me and did go back to Dorset for a year but then came back to Edinburgh.
I've also discovered my other half pays them £15 a night when she stays when down to see her mum, I think that's pretty tight
I had to read that more than once to make sure I fully understood it.
There is a massive difference between offering to help out with shopping/chores/money versus a family member charging a fixed rate.
That is not normal, at all.
I agree with Drac. Soz. All very very odd.
Personally I'd be keeping a safe distance in a premier inn!
When we're invited to stay, whether for a night or a week, I just make sure when we leave they think we're the best guests.
So, depending on the season and venue (i.e. a Spanish Villa in summer is going to be different from a suburban house in November during a working week) I might take stuff to make fancy breakfasts, interesting lunches, sundowner cocktails, a few nice steaks for dinner, and more wine and beer than we're going to drink ourselves.
Yes we do get invited back. The seafront house at Kite Beach in Dominican Republic was a welcome treat. And an added bonus is when the hosts keep telling you what a bunch of cheapskates your other mutual acquaintances were.
Never considered it but I can see it making sense for some people.
It obviously depends hugely on the families and dynamics involved, I wouldn't presume to say someone else's arrangements were odd or wrong just because they are different to ours.
Takes some drink, good cheese, cold meats and maybe a joint or two...
A joint or two? Lamb, beef? Or couples of grams of purple haze?