Wednesday, January 21, 2015

The end of childrens birthday parties....?

The week parents of a young child received a bill for £15.95 after their child failed to turn up for his friends birthday party, the invoice bearing the name of the party company was put in the child's school bag.

Well what can you say!  Yes I know it's annoying to have no-shows when you've booked a child's party, but sending an invoice, thats taking the piss.  I suspect her child will have bugger all guests coming to his or her next birthday.  It also raises an interesting legal issue.  You can't sue the child, he or she is under the age of responsibility and can't enter into a legal contract. To sue the parents you'd have to prove in court that they agreed to the child coming and that the person suing has suffered a loss as a result.
  And thats not as easy as you might think.  The company organising the event have already admitted they didn't have a problem (it was the parents who made the invoice, it was nothing to do with the event company) and the event company said it happened a lot and they would have been happy to offer other options to the parent so they didn't lose the money.  So the parent haven't suffered a lose anyway.  Besides which the small claims court costs £25 and the bill was for £15.95.

Most normal people would have had a word and told the missing childs parent about how dissappointed little Billy was at the party when their child didn't turn up and that it's cost them £16 for every child that didn't show up, that way the children remain friends and you stay friends with the other parents.  This way makes them look totally stupid and money grabbing. 
Theres a lesson here if you can't afford to party out somewhere and need to charge the parents on no-shows have the bloody party in your house next time.... not that any bugger will turn up....

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