Woman Who Broke Wine Glass Sent £156 Bill by Her In-Laws

Spending time with the parents of your SO is destined to be a total shit show. You could be the nicest human in the world, but somehow, the way you folded a tea towel can see you four emails deep into an argument with the subject line, “Your visit this weekend…” Or banned for life because you asked where the “toilet” was rather than the “loo.”

One woman has become embroiled in particularly costly in-law drama after being asked by her partner’s father to pay for a broken wine glass.

According to a post the woman wrote on parenting website Mumsnet, reported on by the Independent, she was visiting her parents-in-law when she accidentally dropped one of their wine glasses. At the time, parents of her partner-of-four-years apparently “shrugged it off."

“I get on well with both [my father-in-law] and [mother-in-law],” she wrote in her post on Mumsnet’s “AIBU (Am I Being Unreasonable)” forum. “Have been with my [husband] for four years now and we are having our first child in four months.”

However, two weeks later, the woman received an email from her father-in-law asking her to transfer him the cost of the glass, which turned out to be £156.

“At first, I thought it was a joke only to realise that these people have no sense of humour, so they obviously must be expecting me to pay them ASAP,” she continued in the post. “Haven't told DH [darling husband] yet. Really shocked at this as they are not known for being stingy.”

Other Mumsnet members were equally perplexed. “WTAF. Did they get to be so wealthy by being so cheap?!,” read one reply on the forum. “Personally I’d buy them a set of plastic picnic wine glasses and send it with a note apologising for the breakage and saying you recommend plastic glasses so they don’t have to worry about any future accidents.”

However, some Mumsnet members felt that the woman should replace the glass, even if it was an accident. “If I broke something at someone else’s house,” one user wrote, “I would offer to replace it and expect to do so. Your FIL is rude to ask, but it’s even poorer form that the OP [original poster] didn’t offer in the first place.”

Although the Mumsnet poster explains that her husband’s parents are “VERY well off,” can we just take a moment to discuss who the hell would spend that much money on a wine glass, a.k.a. the most commonly broken drinking utensil as it is literally always in the hands of drunk people? And why would you hand it out to guests like some billionaire madman and not lock it away with all the cheques you’ve never cashed and that limited edition Millennium Beanie Baby?

Rich people, man.