Woman drops kid off in middle of babysitting after relative lies to her about payment.

Getting lowballed for your work is not only a horrible feeling emotionally, but it's also financially unsustainable. Unfortunately, sometimes the worst lowballing offenders are friends and family looking for a discount.

While helping out a loved one can be great, we all have bills to pay, so being expected to perform your career skill for cheap or free simply because someone is family is only doable when the bank account is already padded. Sadly, a lot of loved ones don't understand that, and will manipulate their status as a close person to pressure you into providing work for free. Calling this out and drawing a boundary can create massive backlash.

In a popular post on the AITA subreddit, a woman asked if she's wrong for dropping off a relative's child after being misled about babysitting payment.

She wrote:

AITA for dropping a child off because I was lied to about my pay?

I (21 F) work as a babysitter\nanny while I finish my credits for my early child education. I’m very well known in my area and am professional, and have different ads for myself. I get multiple jobs a week. I don’t normally babysit for family, but I agreed to a few days ago. The child was 4, and with that age I usually charge $15 an hour, $200 a day. For this particular family member, I agreed to do it for $150 a day.

It was 2 hours in and my relative told me she could only pay me $50-80, and that she hoped I understood. I told her I didn’t understand because I told her upfront already, and that I even lowered my rate for her. This is what I live off of, I missed out on other opportunities that would pay way more, so I can’t have her lowball me.

She began ignoring me, so I told her if she continued I would drop her off at another relatives. She continued to ignore me so I dropped her off at this relatives sisters house, who agreed to watch her. Within a few minutes I got a text saying how unprofessional I was, and how dare I do that, that she’s family and I was being extremely selfish.

This is how I make money for a living, and I gave her multiple warnings and we agreed on a price before hand.

The internet weighed in with full force.

warp-and-woof wrote:

NTA. If the customer is unwilling to pay the price, they don't get the work. You obviously cannot just abandon a child, but you didn't do that--you took the child to a safe place and informed the parent immediately.

FearNokk wrote:

NTA. Submit an actual formal invoice for the time you actually babysat and then mileage reimbursement for transporting the child to another relative. Not sure if you have that kind of amount handy; my company reimburses 60¢ per mile driven and you include the whole trip there and back.

Keep screenshots of the conversation where she agreed to the original $150 then tried to short-change you. And don't babysit for family again...I'm sorry. That sucks.

IamIrene wrote:

NTA. Kudos to you for standing up to your a**holian relative. She's got a lot of nerve trying to pull that kind of BS. I hope you let your whole family know so she can't do it to anyone else - the whole 'because family!' excuse is such an obvious cloak for taking advantage...so gross.

Silansi wrote:

NTA, you handled this pretty maturely considering the sheer arrogance your relative was showing. Their attitude is astounding.

Pesec1 wrote:

NTA a million times over. Hired a worker - pay the agreed upon rate. Babysitters are workers just like any others. Don't have money? Get money. Sell stuff, borrow stuff - figure it out. But pay you must.

Luckily, the internet has OP's back. Unluckily, her aunt is a giant AH.