Am I wrong for expecting my sister to plan my wedding for free and demoting her to guest when she refused, and for telling anyone who took her side that I wouldn’t help them anymore either?
My fiancé and I run a small accounting office. We do pretty well because we’re both bilingual, English and Spanish for me, and English and Ukrainian for him. About 10% of our business comes from family and friends of the family. Over the years, I’ve accepted barter for work more times than I can count. Everything has always been done properly and documented. One year, my aunt paid me in empanadas. An “uncle” had his mom make us a huge batch of tamales.
My dad helps my fiancé work on his truck, and I’ve had to pick him up more than once because my mom fed him too much and my dad got him drinking aguardiente. Everyone we’ve traded with has always given something fair in return. I’ve also been doing my sister’s accounting ever since she started her wedding planning business. She didn’t really have anything to trade, so I did it for free at first to help her get started.
Over time, it just became the norm, and I kept doing it without charging her. Now I’m getting married. At a family dinner at my parents’ house, I announced the engagement and asked my sister if she would plan my wedding and be my maid of honor. She agreed to be my maid of honor, but said she wouldn’t plan the wedding unless I paid her. I asked her why, and she said she couldn’t keep doing free work for family because she needed to make money at her job.
She said it in a way that felt like she thought I didn’t understand what having a job meant. I talked it over with my fiancé and then with my parents. After that, I told my sister she would still be invited to the wedding, but she was no longer part of the wedding party. I also gave her all her financial files for the year on a USB drive and told her she needed to find another accountant. My parents backed me up and told her they were disappointed that she wanted to charge me after everything I had done to help her.
She went on social media to complain, and some people took her side. I understand that not everyone will agree with me. But then a few people started messaging me directly about it. I listened, and then I asked them if they thought I should keep doing her accounting for free. Most said no. A few said that “family helps family.”
For anyone whose taxes I handled who said that, I told them I wouldn’t be doing their taxes this year or in the future.
They tried to take it back, but I didn’t change my mind. My sister now says she isn’t coming to the wedding. I told her to just RSVP no. Later she said she hadn’t been thinking when she said that, but I told her that wasn’t my problem. She has two months to find a new accountant. AITA?
