My dad and I (22F) run a small business together. My brother (27M) used to help out when he was in college so he understands how things work. Sometimes when we’re buying exclusive product sellers only let you buy one per address. In those cases my siblings help us out by ordering from their address, and we reimburse them. No one has ever made a big deal about it, it’s not a lot of effort, and they don’t pay anything out of pocket.About 8 months ago, my brother agreed to do this again for us. We sent him the money ( $2,000) he placed the order and that was that. But the product never showed up. My dad spent almost a month dealing with customer service and eventually had to pretend to be my brother to get the refun, because my brother refused to help. After more back and forth, my brother finally sent the refund to my dad. A few months later, out of nowhere, the product shows up at my brother’s house. He called to tell me not to tell our dad because he wanted to do it himself. The next day my brother comes over to my dad’s asking questions about the product like how much is it worth? How much money do you make on that? He hangs out for a little then leaves without mentioning that the product arrived. He then calls me the next day saying he plans to try to sell it to our dad I say I think he’s wrong for this because the product was never his. He argued that because it came to his house and the refund had already been issued, it was his now. I disagreed, told him I thought that was super shady & that it still belonged to my dad in principle. later that week he comes by dad’s house again & says Christmas came early ! then proceeds to offer to sell it to our dad. My dad offers $1,000 just to avoid conflict. My brother turns it down, saying “It’s worth more,” “I can sell it myself,” and then throws in, “I’m doing you a favor even offering it,” & “I’m nice, but I’m not $2,000 nice.” At that point, I stepped back. I work with my dad every day, and my brother is my best friend, so I didn’t want to escalate anything. There has been lots of tension between them since. 6 months later my brother is moving out of his apartment & I offer to come bring some boxes over, When I show up, he’s super behind. I end up staying all day packing, cleaning, loading stuff and the whole time he’s nitpicking everything, being short with me, complaining about how I do things, just his usual ungrateful attitude. as I’m unloading the last of the stuff I see the product untouched. After everything, after how he treated my dad and how he treats me all the time I decided I was done. I took it and put it in my car. Then next day he called me & demanded I bring it back I told him “you cant steal what was already stolen” he told me “I ruined his relationship with our dad” & “I’ll regret it.” I told him “no you did that.” now hes telling everyone im a theif & sending me rat memes.
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My dad and I (22F) run a small business together. My brother (27M) used to help out when he was in college so he understands how things work. Sometimes when we’re buying exclusive product sellers only let you buy one per address. In those cases my siblings help us out by ordering from their address, and we reimburse them. No one has ever made a big deal about it, it’s not a lot of effort, and they don’t pay anything out of pocket.About 8 months ago, my brother agreed to do this again for us. We sent him the money ( $2,000) he placed the order and that was that. But the product never showed up. My dad spent almost a month dealing with customer service and eventually had to pretend to be my brother to get the refun, because my brother refused to help. After more back and forth, my brother finally sent the refund to my dad. A few months later, out of nowhere, the product shows up at my brother’s house. He called to tell me not to tell our dad because he wanted to do it himself. The next day my brother comes over to my dad’s asking questions about the product like how much is it worth? How much money do you make on that? He hangs out for a little then leaves without mentioning that the product arrived. He then calls me the next day saying he plans to try to sell it to our dad I say I think he’s wrong for this because the product was never his. He argued that because it came to his house and the refund had already been issued, it was his now. I disagreed, told him I thought that was super shady & that it still belonged to my dad in principle. later that week he comes by dad’s house again & says Christmas came early ! then proceeds to offer to sell it to our dad. My dad offers $1,000 just to avoid conflict. My brother turns it down, saying “It’s worth more,” “I can sell it myself,” and then throws in, “I’m doing you a favor even offering it,” & “I’m nice, but I’m not $2,000 nice.” At that point, I stepped back. I work with my dad every day, and my brother is my best friend, so I didn’t want to escalate anything. There has been lots of tension between them since. 6 months later my brother is moving out of his apartment & I offer to come bring some boxes over, When I show up, he’s super behind. I end up staying all day packing, cleaning, loading stuff and the whole time he’s nitpicking everything, being short with me, complaining about how I do things, just his usual ungrateful attitude. as I’m unloading the last of the stuff I see the product untouched. After everything, after how he treated my dad and how he treats me all the time I decided I was done. I took it and put it in my car. Then next day he called me & demanded I bring it back I told him “you cant steal what was already stolen” he told me “I ruined his relationship with our dad” & “I’ll regret it.” I told him “no you did that.” now hes telling everyone im a theif & sending me rat memes.
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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> 1) I took something from my brothers house i think didn’t belong to him 2) i did take it without him knowing
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Contest mode is 1.5 hours long on this post.
You still haven’t told your dad what happened, you just sunk closer to your brothers level and became a thief yourself.
ESH
>I disagreed, told him I thought that was super shady & that it still belonged to my dad in principle.
ESH – quite clearly it belongs to the vendor who’s already issued the refund. Someone in your family need to contact them and send it back because absolutely none of you have paid for this.
YTA
Your brother, for all his faults, has stolen nothing from your father. From the vendor, perhaps, but not from your father. You, however, definitely stole from your brother AND the vendor.
Your father got his money back. Therefore this is neither his problem, nor yours. The product that you say was never his (your brother’s) also was never your father’s, as your father was refunded.
Your brother is quite dodgy, but answering your direct issue:
> 1) I took something from my brothers house i think didn’t belong to him 2) i did take it without him knowing
Yes, YTA on both accounts. it’s not an everyone sucks because your dad seems to be a bystander here.
YTA paragraphs
line breaks
ESH.
The fact that the item showed up right after your father got the company to refund the money makes me suspect your brother may be lying about not receiving it. But if it was legit, then the company has written the item off as a CODB and your brother has received an unexpected windfall.
Your father worked hard at getting a refund, but his experience is not unique. I’ve spent a lot of time chasing after refunds of products damaged or not delivered. Your reward for your effort is the refund, and your time spent is CODB. Your father was willing to buy the item from the company for $2000. That’s what it’s worth. Why is he not willing to pay your brother what the item was worth? That’s what was supposed to happen; he pays $2000 and gets the item.
Your brother received a free item due to your father’s efforts. It would be fair of him to reduce the price due to your father’s efforts, but he is not required to do so. That’s one of the problem with doing slightly shady things like trying to get around the rules in order to get benefits you aren’t entitled to. The company is probably selling at a discount and that’s why they only want you to get one. Those deals are meant to be promotional.
What you did was stealing. Legally, if anyone owns the item it is your brother (one might argue that the company owns it because they returned the money). Ethically, the issue is getting into grey areas. Your father paid $2000 in advance but he was going through a middleman (your brother) and when you are going through a middleman the item doesn’t become yours until you take possession. That’s why if a product is damaged in transit you aren’t responsible for the cost of the damages.
“Fair” would be for your brother to give your father a discount proportional to the amount of time he spent getting the refund. Is that $1000? I doubt it. But either way, you can’t steal from someone to force them to do what you believe is “fair”. Your brother should be paid for the item or you should return it.
There seems to be a sack of misguided moral compass swirling around the family. Maybe starting with the sketchy thing with having family members buy product to circumvent vendor restrictions.
So now everyone is caught pointing fingers.
You don’t have any moral high ground either. You didn’t tell your Dad what your brother was doing.
NTA. This is clear cut.
ESH
If your dad got the refund for the initial order, then the proper thing to do would be to tell the company it showed up
Something got missed in the paperwork
Your entire family was just going to essentially scam this $2000 product and all you care about is your brother being immature?
All of you need to grow up
YTA.
It does not belong to your dad.
It belongs to the supplier.
Doesn’t belong to your dad, no, he got the refund money for it. Item was delivered to your brother’s address under his name.
You are using your siblings as a loophole to fraudulently order something, and then you are calling your brother shady for offering to sell the item to your dad for a lower than market value price? You sound like a sour hypocritical moron.
YTA for stealing from your brother. He didn’t steal from your dad.
ESH. You’re all thieves.
Nta
Taking back something that belonged to you or someone you are returning the item to isn’t stealing. At least, not in my book.
Considering the fact that someone received a refund, this product technically belongs to the seller. Whoever is in possession of the un-returned product at this point is technically a thief.
YTA
You and your dad were already gaming the company by ordering through your brother’s account, and your dad already got his refund for the product.
Technically, it’s your brother’s as he was the person on the sales receipt. Dude shouldn’t trust or help either of you again.
NTA. You pulled kind of an asshole move but it was justified. Nothing brings put someone’s nasty side like seeing a loved one be taken advantage of.