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Original poster

Help- cleaner drank my gin!

614 replies

kayde12 · 19/01/2020 10:48

Hi all,
I’m new to mumsnet, but would really love some advice!

I’ve just signed up to a cleaning company and had my first clean, which I was thrilled about.
Then I noticed that half of my bottle of pink drink has gone!
I only got the bottle given to me as a gift last week from my sister in law.
My Dh doesn’t drink and I have my two ds in the house.
It was the cleaner definitely!
The company have been awful at getting back to me and sent me a poor email saying she said she didn’t drink it Hmm and was too early in the morning.

I feel really gutted and not sure how to move forward or get some sort of justice!!

OP posts:
maras2 · 19/01/2020 14:10

Here's my 2 pennorth.
55 years ago when I was 11,I frequently decanted my mum's Dry Fly sherry into an old aspirin bottle which was easily secreted in my blazer pocket.
Other kids nicked various types of booze and we pooled it together to make 'cocktails'
No one had fizzy pop in those days so one bright spark nicked a slug of his baby sister's National Health orange juice concentrate to sweeten the concoction Envy (not envy)
After a while and one by one we started to agree that it was so rank we'd knock it on the head.
We did this, then one bright spark suggested we graduate to nicking fags.
This went well till fucking brain of Britain, who shall remain nameless as he's now a prominent politician, decide it was a good idea to use his dad's pipe tobacco to make roll ups.
Stunk the 'drying room' that we all met in to high heaven, the Rizla papers burst into flame and we were all so sick I think that the author of 'The Exorcist' must have done that experiment too.
Any way,sorry, got lost down memory lane but my money's on the kid. Wink

T0tallyFuckedUpFamily · 19/01/2020 14:10

if you're spying or monitoring employees you have to tell them otherwise it's covert monitoring and usually illegal or dodgy.

Nope. You’re only breaking the law if you put them in an area where they should expect privacy, such as the bathroom/toilet or nanny’s bedroom/private living quarters.

SchadenfreudePersonified · 19/01/2020 14:12

If I could find a decent, reliable cleaner I’d give her the gin. I’d pour it and offer a selection of artisanal mixers. A few olives on the side. Possibly some salted almonds.

Grin

I prefer pork scratchings, but if you are within a bus ride of me, I'll do it!

T0tallyFuckedUpFamily · 19/01/2020 14:12

My cleaner regularly drinks our alcohol but we don’t mind as she’s a great cleaner and a lovely person. I’m usually happier when I’m cleaning with a drink in my hand too. 😁

messolini9 · 19/01/2020 14:14

That fact is- you dont know its the kid any more than you know it wasnt the cleaner.

That is an abosolute & undisputed fact @MimiLaRue.

As is the fact that OP has responded by making a vicious accusation of theft to the cleaner's company, while simultaneously letting her son off the hook entirely.

roisinagusniamh · 19/01/2020 14:17

By explaining how it would have been impossible for your son to have drank the gin, had he stolen it, you have exposed yourself as a very controlling parent ....you drop him to school and pick him up for activities every day??
Poor lad , dies he get any freedom at all ?

Oakeyy · 19/01/2020 14:20

Yep, we used to steal alcohol from my mum's stash, fill up empty water bottles so we could drink it for an occasion etc. Used to refill the alcohol bottle with water though.

C8H10N4O2 · 19/01/2020 14:20

In the UK? Illegal, you have to at least inform them and there should be a notice up to remind people they are being snooped on.

Utter nonsense. You have the total right to put cameras up in your own home and inform no on

Its the cleaner's place of employment. You can put up all the cameras you like in a workplace (other than eg lavatories/medical rooms) but you have to inform them.

messolini9 · 19/01/2020 14:22

Poor lad , dies he get any freedom at all ?

Only at midnight, when he sneaks out to the garden shed for some much needed me-time, & a crafty sip or 2 of mother's ruin ...

X2Kevintheteenagers · 19/01/2020 14:23

My brother use to top up my dads spirits with water from the age of 13 .

Don't drink and no cleaner not to have these problems

MitziK · 19/01/2020 14:31

I always wondered how MC 13-14 years got hold of the alcohol I was sure they'd been drinking when hoiked out of the toilets during the school day. And why when they have been drinking, as long as they continued to deny it, their parents would say 'You didn't find an alcohol bottle, did you? So they haven't been drinking. They're just tired/being silly'.

Now I know. The parents are destroying low income women's livelihoods because it's easier to accept than thinking their PFBs are having a go at the incredibly sugary booze in the house. And the entitled little gits are letting it happen by not admitting it.

SauvignonBlanche · 19/01/2020 14:31

Not sure why people think that the cleaner decanting it drinking is impossible. Quite strange really.

Not as strange as thinking that it couldn’t be a teenager Hmm

Inappropriatefemale · 19/01/2020 14:32

Can’t believe how many of us filled our parents’ alcohol bottles with water after we stole it!Grin

MsMarvel · 19/01/2020 14:38

I cant believe the amount of people who seem adamant that its not the cleaner!!

Yes theres no way of knowing 100% but it does seem like the obvious deduction.

And i know plenty of people that would tipple and drink half a bottle of gin, maintaining an alcoholic with relatively little signs. Used to work in a pub where the cleaner was fired for drinking while cleaning. She was an alcoholic and was topping up while working. And was getting through a lot of alcohol to maintain the buzz.

Also, not sure if its been mentioned, but topping up with water wouldnt work on pink gin... It wouldnt be pink any more!

KatherineJaneway · 19/01/2020 14:39

Oh get over yourself, it was your teen.

Drum2018 · 19/01/2020 14:44

Can’t believe how many of us filled our parents’ alcohol bottles with water after we stole it!

My parents didn't drink when I was a teenager. It would have been the odd visitor or alcoholic friends of my father who got the watered down alcohol Grin Visitors would no doubt have been too polite to say anything and alcoholics would have been too pissed to notice Grin

Inappropriatefemale · 19/01/2020 14:46

Well nor did my mum but she always had a bottle of Vodka for her MIL coming over and she would take one swig and say ‘yuck, it’s water and coke’ and as my brother was just young then it could only have been me!Grin

Bluntness100 · 19/01/2020 14:48

Very very few people are adamant it's not the cleaner, what's being said is she doesn't know it's the cleaner and it could have been others in the house. Hmm

That's the whole point. She doesn't know who it was any more than we do.

Drabarni · 19/01/2020 14:49

Who'd be a cleaner with accusations of theft all the time, it must be awful.
There should be some justice for the cleaners, could they prosecute for wrongful dismissal or slander? I doubt they even get an apology.

OP As for justice, find out who is was and then seek justice.
My money is on the 13 year old.

RedskyAtnight · 19/01/2020 14:49

Surely we are all overlooking a suspect here?

If it was pink gin, why couldn't the 7 year old thought it was a nice fruity juice drink, poured himself a glass, found he didn't like the taste and poured the rest down the sink?

definitely has not thought of this because I drank a bottle of orange cake flavouring aged 8

RachelEllenR · 19/01/2020 14:54

OP - my cleaner did something similar with open bottles of wine. First time I'd just drink more of it than I remembered - second time I know I'd only had one glass and there was a lot more gone when I went to pour another. So the next time I left it at a specific height and it was gone. I'm afraid I didn't give the real reason for letting her go to the agency but she didn't come back after that and no more wine went missing.

starfishmummy · 19/01/2020 14:55

Changing the subject slightly...
If this was the cleaner's first time wouldn't most people stay at home while they were there? I know I would.
(And in that case wouldn't the cleaner quaffing half a bottle of gin be obvious?)

MimiLaRue · 19/01/2020 14:55

As is the fact that OP has responded by making a vicious accusation of theft to the cleaner's company, while simultaneously letting her son off the hook entirely

Well obviously- she's known her son for 13 years. She's known the cleaner for 5 minutes. Of course there is no proof yet its the cleaner but if you know someone well and you know hoe they typically respond in certain situations, its not unreasonable to make a judgement (yet to be proven). She doesnt know the cleaner from Adam does she? she has literally no idea what the cleaner does in her private life

MimiLaRue · 19/01/2020 14:57

Also, having worked with alcoholics I can testify that many of them could easily drink a half bottle of gin and clean a house. If you are a functioning alcoholic with high tolerance it would barely touch the sides.

Presumably the OP knows if and when her son goes out with friends and there would be evidence of him drinking.

Inappropriatefemale · 19/01/2020 15:00

Yes but lots of mothers don’t always see their kids as getting up to naughty things.

My brother used to come in drunk every night for about 6 months (when he was 15) and my stepdad and I knew that when he would run straight up the stairs every weekend night, without popping into the living room, then he must’ve been drunk but my mum said ‘nonsense’ and my brother was drunk!

Some mums are quite naive to their kids.

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