poll: enforcing small personal debts

[gusl]

Suppose a friend owes you some money X, but forgets about it.

How big does X have to be before you send them a reminder email / make a phone call / mention in conversation / mention when you receive a restaurant bill?

What factors affect this number? e.g. closeness of friendship, whether it related to a purchase, how long ago it was, the kind of person that they are, your financial situation, their financial situation, age difference, history of reciprocity, gender, your mood.


What I call "debt" here does not include paying for your food/drinks/tickets, as this tends to be framed differently.

Comments

[hykue.livejournal.com]

small amounts (say $5-10) tend to go back and forth a lot, so I don't usually say anything. Or, I'll say "you owe me money, buy me lunch" when I remember it. I would probably remind (or, more likely, need to be reminded) for $20 or more.

[puellavulnerata.livejournal.com]

Depends on the closeness of the friendship, specific circumstances under which I lent the money (might have just been that someone wasn't comfortable letting me outright pay for things, I might really have expected it back, anywhere in between), and what I know of the person's financial situation, I suppose. In general, I suppose the cutoff might vary anywhere from $50 to $300 depending on circumstances.

[pbrane.livejournal.com]

Lending money informally... You really have to assume it will never come back. And if it really needs to, then you need to write it down and have them sign it when it goes out. If you don't care enough about repayment to do that, then you shouldn't care enough to hassle them about getting it back.

Personally, when I needed to borrow a large sum from my younger brother, I specifically arranged with him to pay it back *with a prespecified accruing interest* to give me the proper incentive to get it back to him.

The amount was large enough that at this point in the year, I am currently his best returning investment for 2008 (as I'm paying better than his ING savings, and everything in the markets is in the red ink).

But seriously, just don't lend money if you anticipate getting into a situation where you're wondering whether you need to nag them or not. Either don't be the kind of person to care (either because you only lend amounts small enough for you to not care about whether they *ever* come back, or because it's just not in your nature to care [not your case, apparently]), or else only lend to people you *know with good certainty* will pay you back promptly.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_wirehead_/]

yeah, whenever i loan money to friends, even larger amounts (covering a roommate's rent for the month, etc.) i think of it as a gift. i find that expecting to get it back just has too much potential for ruining the friendship. debts between friends suck. thinking of it as a gift means i also won't lend any amount i can't afford to lose (e.g. "if you don't pay me back by the end of the month i can't make *my* share of rent"), so it also eliminates that source of tension. and then when they are able to, and remember to, pay me back, it is a pleasant surprise. otherwise i just got myself some good karma and helped out a friend in need, so what the heck. :)

[gustavolacerda.livejournal.com]

well, in the current situation, my housemate owed me ~ $79.50 for a gas bill, which he couldn't easily pay 2 months ago. Yesterday, he finally paid it through PayPal... but he rounded down and only paid $70. My inclination is to have him pay the rest now, but that would seem petty. I'm a much better bookkeeper than most people.

[noequal.livejournal.com]

He should have rounded up to $10.

You're a grad student ... maybe you shouldn't be loaning money?

[gustavolacerda.livejournal.com]

So, your housemate tells you he can't pay you for gas until his next paycheck.
Does this count as loaning money?

[noequal.livejournal.com]

semantic point: gasoline for a car, or the gas bill for the apartment?

[gustavolacerda.livejournal.com]

the latter.

[noequal.livejournal.com]

Then it isn't a loan, but it would make me wonder if he's a good house mate.

[bhudson.livejournal.com]

On the crazy end, a friend of mine got invited to a friend of his for dinner. Nice dinner, wine, good time.

A couple days later, the friend-of-his sent him a bill for $50 for the food and wine.

My friend paid him double, with a note never to call him back again.


Getting a cheque for $9.95 less than promised is petty on his side, but there's no point in your getting petty back at him: that would cause heartburn, and you'd need to go out and spend $9.95 on Tums. Just ignore it and go on, and don't loan him money again.

[leigh-a.livejournal.com]

I prefer to just avoid lending money. If it's under say, $50 for someone I know well and like it probably just turns into "Happy Birthday!" If it's over $50 I probably don't have that much to lend. It also depends on how the person would act if I owed them money, even though I very rarely borrow money from people, and when I do I always pay it back within a day or two.

One unusual case is when I lent my sister ~$600 for a damage deposit that I never got back and I don't remind her about it because I don't think I'll ever get it back, but now I just refuse to lend her money at all ("No can do. Remember the damage deposit?").