It's just a fiver

Very much so.

As a mid 20s person, I turned up to a workplace in 1984 where "the Boss" was a "right wing" religious nutter and two of the three line managers were screw-ups of people.

With 33 on the permanent staff plus 18 part-timers and casual workers, "a couple of dollars" almost every week added up to a lot.

I was plied into three or four donations but then I noticed birthdays of people who were on site fewer than two years were not honoured with a cake or a gift (including me), I said the time after, "no, sorry Beth, but I am not contributing to a pool that's not fully inclusive of ALL the staff ... respectfullty, I am OUT of the merry-go-round of it ..."

Very soon, about six or seven others also withdrew.

Yes, apparently my child and I should starve for a couple of days to give £5 towards a birthday present. 🙄

Some of us can't even afford that.

You should never have been put in this position. Collections if at all, should be voluntary and the amount not stipulated. Stick to your guns. You may find others will now be brave enough to do the same.

I hate these forced collections. Gift giving should be voluntary not forced. Else it's not really a gift. I belong to a religious faith which encourages generosity but not giving under compulsion/giving when we don't have the means. I think it's time these forced donations at work were cancelled.

So people who are unable to afford £5 are not team players? Go give your head a wobble 🙄

That’s nuts that they asked you to contribute 😳

YANBU in the face of such obtuseness. "Only £5 Genevieve? Did you know a 3lb bag of pasta costs £3.80 at Sainsbury's and that'll keep me and my children in evening meals all this week?" (It does too because I checked online.) Sadly, I don't know the cost of educating Genevieve on the economics of small sums.

Yanbu.

When I was a single mum I was earning quite decent salary but their dad paid nothing so I was paying nursery X2 and a big mortgage on my own and every penny was accounted for for a while. I had to skip meals but if you looked at my headline salary that wouldn't have been obvious (I wasn't bad with money, ex H drained our joint savings and refused to contribute a penny until I took legal action. I also had to pay for lawyers to get a court order to keep us safe from ex)

People can't know someone else's financial situation and it's not ok to expect people to spend money like this. Collections are ok but should be anonymous and not compulsory. People shouldnt have to explain their finances at work.

She's your manager so presumably gets paid more than you. She's in no position to say 'it's just a fiver' to you.

I opted out of my work one when a girl going on mat leave was given a few hundred pounds just ridiculous

I work for the civil service we only do collections for when people leave, I’m happy to put in but then I earn a decent full time salary. When I was part time in a low paid job I was far more reluctant. When I was a manager given my wage was higher than others I would always put in extra/additional to make up for those who couldn’t afford it, I would never make people bad for not putting in!

That is an unfair comment. You cannot comment on someone’s personal finances, and deem it stingy.

For a lot of people, a fiver could be the difference between paying a bill on time or not.

Office collections should really be stopped. They put unnecessary pressure on people to ‘show up’ when the reality is, these people are colleagues not family or close friends (obvs some become close friendships), and no one should feel pressured or obligated to cough up their hard earned and perhaps stretched money.

Stick to your guns, it might be ‘only a fiver’ but it’s also your choice. I only give collections of select people

I really don't like workplace collections.

In theory, they seem quite nice and well-intentioned. In practice, I think they often create more problems and I think, in all honesty, most should just be stopped.

I think a lot of people put into them because they feel some unspoken pressure to do so. Even if it's made out that it's completely voluntary and no one is being forced-most people do feel a level of pressure to put in lest they appear "tight" or "mean-spirited," or "not a team player."

There's also the issue of workplace politics. Collections very rarely can be done completely equally. You can't mandate that everyone puts in the same amount for every collection and that the same amount of people contribute per collection.

So, you could have one employee who is supremely popular and people contribute a ton to their collection and they get very obviously expensive gifts/gift vouchers.

Then, you might have another who is maybe not as popular or quieter and people don't contribute as much or less people put in. Thus, meaning they don't get as much spent on them.

As much as it "shouldn't" matter-it does. What was once a nice gesture can turn very quickly into something that leaves someone feeling negative about something that was meant to be positive.

I see this a lot actually, a very uneven way of deciding who is receiving the presents.

You get flowers because you had a baby but she doesn’t.

She got wine because she moved house but he doesn’t.

She got something for her 30th, her engagement, her wedding, her house move and her baby, all within a year. But you (who has worked there for 15 years) get nothing for your 40th.

And people notice all this inequality. They might not say it, but they see it.

What is it to do with you how someone else spends their money?

Not everyone wants to put in for work collections and that should absolutely be ok. So long as they're not also expecting a collection when their day rolls around, I don't see the problem.

It's unfair to expect people to put in any amount of money that isn't given completely willingly because the person wanted to do so. Not because they worried that @CurlyhairedAssassin would judge them for daring to spend their own money on nights out, expensive makeup or living at home.

I assume if you can't afford to give at any point-you would expect to have to complete an itemised list of all expenditure to make sure you haven't overspent on makeup or nights out?

No thread like this is complete without someone spouting team player bollocks. 🙄

Sometimes I wish I could press the 'thanks' icon more than once.

Contributing to a collection has nothing to do with being a team player. Team players support each other with the workload at work. Some may become friends. Neither things mean that you should be bullied or shamed into giving to a collection.

Even with my closest friends and particularly now in a cost of living crisis I don't expect gifts. So I certainly don't expect to give to a collection or get one. I'd be furious if people were bullied into contributing to anything for me.

I mean that 2 employees have purchased a house. So now there are two separate collections to buy them a gift each.

Funnily enough no collection was put out for me when I got mine a year ago!

Have a quiet private word with her, and explain how you feel. Ask her to not approach you again on the matter. And say that your request to opt out needs to be respected in the same way as her decision to opt in.

Oh at my workplace you don't even get vouchers, you just get cash in an envelope. It really does defeat the object! 🤣

Team player or team PAYER?

The sheer entitlement to others money from some is astounding

Why have they started this protection-racket stuff at a time when a lot of people would prefer to be wfh anyway? How to alienate your workforce.