goodwill vs exploitation ?

I never asked my elderly neighbour for money when I bought him a carrier of groceries, he had covid at the time. I look upon it as him being confused and tbh me spending £30 on him, as a gift. Much better than it winding me up

She sounds horrid. A grifter.

I can imagine what a bad taste it's left in your mouths - even at this distance I feel a twit for assuming that a poor old soul who was ill at the time had forgotten.
I would send her the bill as you suggest but then let it go. She has history of not paying up, it doesn't seem to bother her, and there's no point letting it eat away at you. Definitely set to "ignore" now though.

She is being very short sighted. Apart from anything else.

Personally I wouldnt bother chasing up the money. But that is me.

Sounds like she is doing the same sort of thing to others.
She is conning people.

If it was just the matter of £20, I wouldnt tell others. But your neighbour has lost £400.
I would say word will soon get round, but you were not aware, so others wont be too, I assume.

Difficult situation.

Fraud can be reported.
Not sure this is all fraud.

I would write off what happened to yourself. But your neighbour has been a victim of something. Assuming your neighbour is telling the truth.

This lady, [and in real life I know of someone who may be ripping off the elderly[he has been reported in a safeguarding capacity]], may well be doing the same sort of thing to the people she socialises with, and family.

People keep talking about the money in question being £20. Please read the original post ! It amounted to £32. If it was £10 I would write it off and put it down to experience but this woman, elderly or not, is a con artist and no way would I let her get away with it.

If it was £70 I still wouldnt carry on asking, personally. But that is just me.
So I didnt bother to look back and reremind myself whether it was £20 or £32. Made no difference to me.

She sounds like a thoroughly nasty person. I am afraid you are not going to get your money back but avoid her in future. It will be her loss in the long run when she has nobody to help her.
I help my elderly neighbour frequently by fixing thing, changing light bulbs etc and she always thanks me profusely often buying me flowers ( which I wish she wouldn’t) and I get an email from her absent son.

This is shocking behaviour! Even if I only owed someone £2.00, and forgot to pay it, I'd be genuinely mortified when I eventually realised I hadn't given it back to them. How someone could knowingly do this is beyond me!

The fact that you asked her if there was anything your OH could get for her from the store, by no means makes it a gift, you were simply offering to pick up some goods for her if she needed anything! And the fact that she went on to give you a list of shopping she wanted, how could she possibly see that as anything but a favour of going to the store for her ... not a gift at all!

Thank your lucky stars that it was 'only' £32.00, and you now know never to help this awful woman out again.

dragonfly46 how lovely to be appreciated and thanked by your neighbour and her son 😊

I would just ask for the money!

This is shocking behaviour! Even if I only owed someone £2.00, and forgot to pay it

My mil is like that with 1p!
If she owes me 1p change, I have learnt to accept it from her. She cant rest thinking she owes something to someone.

Yes, I do remember your post biglouis, and the conversation that developed, and you will see that I supported you too. I know there are some people around who manipulate and take advantage, but most don’t.

Unfortunately it looks as though MissQuoted’s neighbour is one of those who has taken advantage of her and her husband’s good nature and now refuses to do the right thing.

I got involved with a CF neighbour like this in a previous address.

It began with my helping with her DLA form but she began to ask more and more favours and in the end I felt like I was her PA. That was back in the days when I worked full time at a very responsible and demanding job at the uni. She would often ask me to get bits of shopping for her and I would have to ask two or three times for the money. Cards were not so much used then as they are now so I began making the excuse that I only had enough cash for my own shopping or I was not going to be near the shops. There can be advantages to not being a car owner.

There was a whole saga (which I wont repeat) and she had an adult manchild (aka son) living with her who could have performed some of the services. Fortunately she eventually moved away. I blocked her number when she tried to guilt me into travelling across the city to help with her DLA renewal. Again, no car can be an advantage.

Anyway thats why I am so strict now at not getting "involved" with neighbours and keeping my distance as to how much they know about me.