Woman won’t pay to replace mother-in-law’s phone after baby breaks it

A woman faces a holiday dilemma after she and her mother-in-law argue over who should pay the bill for a broken phone.

The woman explained this in a post on the popular resource Reddit. Forum “I ——“ that her mother-in-law was babysitting her and her husband’s 18-month-old baby when she gave the child her phone to watch YouTube. However, this turned out to be not the best idea.

“Our (baby) decided she was done and threw the phone off the high chair, severely cracking the screen,” the woman wrote.

After the incident, her mother-in-law demanded that she and her husband “pay to have her phone screen repaired because our daughter broke it.” However, the woman refused for three reasons, including because her mother-in-law was much wealthier than them.

“The cost of repairs is a significant amount of money for us, but not for her. Our combined income is less than half of her individual income,” she added.

She also noted that they were “not supervising” the child at the time and “should not be held responsible.” She also said it was her mother-in-law’s decision to give the child a phone and “was not suggested by us” and “not something we would ever do ourselves.”

The woman said her partner “offered” his mother to pay for the phone and they would “pay” her “in installments.” However, she said her mother-in-law “refused because she thinks it’s our problem that we have to solve.”

“I also don’t agree with us giving her money back, the phone was broken due to her own negligence,” she said, before asking Reddit if she was wrong.

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Several people on Reddit sided with the woman, noting that the mother-in-law should not have given the phone to the child.

One person noted that the phone is “a fragile object, not a child’s toy.” The Redditor added: “I don’t hand 18 month olds things I don’t want them to throw around… that could break or damage them.”

One person wrote: “The person supervising the child and/or the person giving away valuable electronic equipment (that was never intended for use by a small child) is 100% responsible for the damage.”

Another said the woman’s mother-in-law “deliberately created the situation with her poor choices. She handed the phone to your child. She will have to deal with the natural expected consequences.”