Whatsapp

[Comefromaway]

Is there any way I can either stop people from whatsapping me or put something on so they know I don’t read it.

I use WhatsApp for just two things. To send photos/videos to my husband & kids as my work phone contract charges for sending photos. I am also in one group chat which is muted and I read it at my leisure.

During lockdown work colleagues have taken to whats-apping me instead of emailing or texting. I don’t want it. My notifications are set to mute on whatsapp but they all use it lots. I like to have set work hours and separate work and home as far as possible. Yesterday it appears people had forgotten I’d booked the afternoon off to take my son to enrol at college.

Also if they email me I have a written trail all in one place of things I’ve been asked to action & my response.

Why can't work pay for a phone for you?

Why should they? They are already kind enough to pay a monthly contract due to having a spare number available. My phone was a Christmas present just after the iPhone 6 came out. They bought me a laptop for lockdown because I needed one to run payroll at home.

I’ll be back in the office in a couple of weeks anyway as long as we don’t go into local lockdown.

So they’re kind enough to pay a monthly contract for you, but you expect to dictate exactly how you use it (again, the handset being yours is irrelevant when work are paying for you to have the number and therefore access to WhatsApp) and to prioritise personal use over business use?

I think you are confusing the people who pay my contract (my bosses in my department) & the people who are whatsapping me (the engineers and site workers).

My boss has said not to use WhatsApp in that way unless you need to send someone a photo of something and can’t access a scanner/email

I’m not sure why people are so confused!

OP needs a work paper trail. Hence the need for emails and more recently text messages.

Nobody needs to use the WhatsApp group as they are encrypted and the company can’t retrieve these if necessary.

It’s nothing to do with who owns the handset or pays for the sim.

We have a group WhatsApp which is only used for nights out.

No work has every been sent or needed to be sent, work uses emails.

I feel it’s a bit illogical that you want to ensure that your colleagues only contact you over iMessage or email and not WhatsApp - what’s the difference, it’s all 24/7 availability?

You can disable “seen” and “online” notifications on WhatsApp as previous poster (terrible sorry forgot your name, am on app) mentioned, it seems like this might help?

I see emails every time I log onto the computer and texts ping my phone between the hours of 7am & 10pm.

WhatsApp messages I only see if I decide to catch up on a social group I’m on or if I decide to send a photo to a family member.

Just block the contacts you don't wish to contact you on whatsapp. Simple. No need for drama.

I have a similar situation and I just block work people who send me whatsapp nonsense. I tell them first, but if they continue I just block them. Bollocks to them.

You can hardly blame work for messaging you on the work phone. And if you've booked the afternoon off just don't read the messages until work hours the next day. And turn the volume off, leave phone at home if it's really that intrusive.

It’s quite difficult to leave phones at home when you’ve got kids who need to be able to contact you.

ITS NOT A WORK PHONE!

It is if it’s their number and they pay for it...

Or maybe I should just stick my work SIM in my own handset then tell IT I can set whatever parameters I like because it’s not a work phone. Should be good for a laugh.

I don’t know why you don’t just sack off WhatsApp and use a service for family messages that’s not tied to the phone number if that’s just the core issue, though. Facebook Messenger or whatever, seeing as reasonable personal use is ok.

Why don’t you just leave the work WhatsApp group? You don’t have to be part of a group if you don’t want to. If you’re not part of the group they can’t message you - sorted!

@Bessica1970

Why don’t you just leave the work WhatsApp group? You don’t have to be part of a group if you don’t want to. If you’re not part of the group they can’t message you - sorted!

I’m not in any work WhatsApp group, I never have been. There is an engineers group I’m not part of. The only group chat I’m part of is a group of mumsnet mums with kids who all took GCSE’s in a particular year.

Colleagues WhatsApp me by entering my mobile phone number.

@ItsTimeToPlayTheMusic

It is if it’s their number and they pay for it...

Sigh, as I said earlier, its a perk, at one point they paid for a number for my daughter because she was going on a school trip abroad and they had a spare number that wouldn’t cost extra. That went on my P11D My phone contract is between me and the MD, same as my salary and bonuses etc. Nothing to do with any other colleagues.

The person who pays for my number is NOT the people who are whatsapping me.

The person who pays for my number has issued a directive that WhatsApp should not be used for work communications.

Download Telegram and use that for your family pictures. And delete Whatsapp.

I’m not deleting WhatsApp. I use it for a particular social/support group I’m very fond of.

I didn’t start this thread to argue about my work contract and perks. I asked for technical advice as to how to do something on the app.

So then block the contacts as a pp suggested. Or get a another cheap phone and put the work sim in that. And go back to using your own sim that you used before you got the work one.

People are not just going to stop sending Whatsapps. It has become one of those normal things in life now.

Previous to getting the work sim I had a payg Nokia!

I altered some settings after the first couple of posts

@Comefromaway

Why should they? They are already kind enough to pay a monthly contract due to having a spare number available. My phone was a Christmas present just after the iPhone 6 came out. They bought me a laptop for lockdown because I needed one to run payroll at home.

I’ll be back in the office in a couple of weeks anyway as long as we don’t go into local lockdown.

Because you need a phone to carry out your work?

Being kind by paying your contract? As in they pay it personally not through the business? That's just weird. They need to provide you with a phone and SIM card on contract.

Same with the laptop - that's not kind it's equipping you to do your job.

I actually agree with this. It's a total pain in the arse. We use Teams for work chat but a few of my colleagues contact me on WhatsApp. I would rather use Teams solely for work messaging and WhatsApp for my private life but I can't. I have no private contacts on Teams as that's a purely work messaging tool so can't see why some people can't just stick to it.

I have actually asked people and some people say they prefer WhatsApp. Also Teams messages can be searched by work so some feel whatsapp is more private.

What I tend to do is ignore the work WhatsApp ones - politely tell them to contact me on Teams if they want a quicker response. I also get WhatsApp messages from other people connected with work (like customers/suppliers) now too fgs!

I don't need a phone to carry out my work though (apart from receiving one verification text per month from HMRC). Even working from home I don't actually NEED a phone though it is useful to be able to phone into the office every now and then.

The conversation 6/7 years ago went something like this.

Boss: "X has left the company but we are contracted to carry on paying for his phone number for the next 18 months, we've also got another spare number we aren't using, do you want it, it doesn't cost us any extra you just might have to pay a bit of tax on it as a benefit in kind?"

Me: "Yes, go on then, I might as well"

if you can, I would quite strongly email the people who message you to say that you don't regularly check your whatsapp (whether you do or not) and could people please text or email you as you're concerned you will miss important work messages if they use whatsapp which you only use for personal reasons

I don't know if you're in a position to do that but I would do that in your shoes