When hiring a babysitter, it’s a parent’s right to ensure they trust the person watching their kids.

But when a routine babysitting job turns into an unwarranted invasion of privacy, this young babysitter discovers that some adults take this right way too far.

Read on for the full story!

AITA for refusing to hand over my phone to a stranger?

I (17F) was babysitting for a neighbour (Jane) tonight.

She had heard of me through a friend of hers (Kate) who is someone I babysit for regularly.

So when Kate asked me to babysit for Jane and gave glowing recommendations of how lovely Jane was to me (I’m quite shy) and how good I was to Jane, I thought, “Sure. I enjoy babysitting, love kids, etc – why not?”

The evening got off to a pleasant start.

My mother took me over to Jane’s house, introduced herself, gave Jane her number and left once she saw that there were actually kids there, that Jane and her husband Peter were getting ready to leave.

That it was legit basically.

Jane and Peter left and I babysit the kids who were cool kids.

Nothing usual happens while the parents are away, just routine stuff.

I watch a movie, clean up the mess we had made in the kitchen (spaghetti with toddlers is a nightmare!) and chill on my phone.

She gives an important disclaimer that will be important later in the story.

Nothing I do on my phone while I am at Jane’s is anything near “inappropriate'”.

I do have a lockable folder with some inappropriate things on there (AKA anime and manga that are definitely NOT G-rated), but I don’t touch that folder at all while I’m there.

When the parents get home, things start to get out of hand.

Jane comes home at 10pm, checks on the kids, checks out the house and as I’m waiting to be paid, she turns to me and says, “Before I pay you, I need to look at your phone. I want to make sure that you didn’t take photos of my house or my kids or look at anything rude.”

I ask her whether she means she wants to look at my iPhone’s camera roll and she shakes her head.

Jane had something far more invasive in mind.

“No, I want to quickly check your Facebook, your messages and whatever other apps you have to double check.”

I obviously say “No” and Jane tells me that she will not be paying me.

The babysitter phones her mother for help.

I call my mother and she quickly comes down.

She looks at my phone herself, tells Jane there is nothing on there concerning her and to pay me now please.

Jane pays me and informs me I will not be asked back and that she will be telling Kate that I was “not a good babysitter!”

My mother replies that she will be also talking to Kate about her choice of “good friends” and we leave.

Jane didn’t keep quiet about her distaste for the sitter.

My reason for the post is that Jane made a post on our neighbourhood community page on Facebook talking about bad babysitters who couldn’t accept the parents “rules” they had for babysitting and still demanded to be paid – and was offering to “PM” people more details.

Someone else screenshotted their conversation where, although she didn’t name me, she named the exact situation.

People online seemed to side with Jane.

Jane got over 100 comments talking about how that was her right as a parent/homeowner/what not to check that her children were not harmed while left with a babysitter.

The fact that I refused means I “obviously” did something wrong.

AITA?

If Jane is this suspicious, maybe she isn’t ready to leave her kids in another’s care.

What did Reddit think?

This user thinks Jane should have been upfront about her expectations.

Invading other people’s privacy on your own whims isn’t just wrong, it’s illegal some places.

This commenter agrees it’s not fair of Jane to expect this from the babysitter.

This redditor sees Jane’s behavior as part of a larger trend.

Jane may have gotten the last word online, but she burned a bridge with what could have been a reliable partner.

This babysitter left feeling more like a suspect than a caretaker.

If you thought that was an interesting story, check out what happened when a family gave their in-laws a free place to stay in exchange for babysitting, but things changed when they don’t hold up their end of the bargain.