Things you no longer see/do in the workplace

[TheGrumpiest]

I always really like those threads about food/shops that no longer exist, so I thought I'd start one about the work place. I joined the workforce in the early 90s working for quite large companies.

Luncheon Vouchers - loved these! Like Monopoly money.
Tea trolley lady that came round twice a day. Tea and coffee was free. Small packet of biscuits 5p.
Strippers 😲 A milestone birthday? Getting married? = stripper in the office at lunch time .
Rolls of fax paper on the floor every morning. You had to seperate and tear out each fax with a ruler.
Endless Memorandums with huge circulation lists typed out. You had to cross your name off and pass on to the next name once you had read it!
Friday lunch time = pub. People got quite tipsy.
Lack of HR type processes/concept of people management/development etc. People were just asked to not come back the next day if deemed unsuitable... One lady saw her own (unique) job advertised in the local paper and realised her time was up 😲

BTW these aren't necessarily things I miss about the workplace. Just things that don't exist anymore or not acceptable! Tell us yours!

@BestIsWest I can't see the image in detail. Was the headline referring to Richard Grainger's CfH?

DH had a social club at work and told me recently he played snooker there every single lunchtime through the 80s.

Once interviewed at a newspaper. From waist height up the room was a cloud of cigarette smoke. I did not take the job because I feared for my health. Rolodexes..

I remember secretaries taking shorthand for the bosses. Old typewriters.

Alto I'm not that old. I may remember it from going to work with my Nan.

Fax machines.

Internal envelopes

Heels

Suits everyday

Smoking in offices. I was a trainee and the bosses were smoking in an office with a pregnant woman. I asked them if they thought that was acceptable. They told me to mind my own business but she did get moved

Bit later than yours OP but I remember when I started my payroll training the first thing I was taught was how to make up a cash pay packet with a grid on the back for how many of each note and coin was included.

We still have bins at each desk (although hardly used as pretty well everything gets recycled or shredded).

Also we still have a petty cash system.

My grandmother used to be a "clippie" on the buses, so a Routemaster was her workplace. She had one of these machines on her front that you'd put a paper reel in to print out tickets. I would love it when she allowed me and my brother to travel on the bus occasionally and have a go at printing the tickets. We'd also hide in the luggage area, where the bus conductor stood on the platform.

Preparing tax computations by hand (on A3 analysis paper), taking them to the comptometer operator to have the arithmetic checked and then getting your secretary to type them up.

Night typing pool to clear the backlog - letters came back with a carbon copy for the file. That file copy then had to be sent to the partner and the manager before going to your secretary to file.

Not being allowed to wear trousers at work (and being told off for walking in to work on Tube strike day in trainers - had shoes to change in to)

Being taken out on Friday lunchtime to drink with one of the partners because he wanted company. No one being in a fit state to work thereafter.

Manually completing your timesheet and handing it to your secretary by 10am on Monday morning to be input. (And having to find 7 hours of chargeable work every day to go on said timesheet as you were only allowed 15 minutes of non-chargeable time which was intended for completion of your timesheet...)

The annual arrival of several hundred copies of the updated tax legislation - bright yellow for the major taxes and a separate orange volume for the "weird ones" like VAT, IHT and Stamp Duty.

Standing by the fax machine at 11pm on 5th April feeding pages of the final copy of a trust deed through to the BVI office and praying that it didn't chew the paper up as it needed to be signed before midnight.

SO glad its all behind me now..............

We still have bins and desk drawers. Most people use desk drawers to store food these days as far as I can see.

We still use these for sending documents in the internal mail….or we did in 2019 before covid. Love the orange internal mail envelopes hahaha

We still have phones, bins, ring binders, cakes & big card for leaving, circulation envelopes and it is obligatory to bring back edible goodies from holidays. I started work in 2003 and I've used a fax twice.

I work in a lab and things I don't see anymore: smoking in fume hoods during work parties, alcohol/lunches in the lab fridge, people not coming back after boozy Friday lunch out, very few lunches out at all now and all the older people telling us what they got up to in the good old days (they're all retired now).

@Zilla1 This the link I got the image from pressgazette.co.uk/three-leave-in-computer-weekly-restructure/
Dont know if that is any clearer for you.

I remember when my workplace banned smoking - what an uproar! They had counsellors and all sorts. It just resulted in the smokers taking utter liberties with their smoke breaks and spending most of their time at the smokers shelter.

Also remember sending telexes in my first job - nothing like having your boss standing at your shoulder dictating while you typed to turn you to jelly!

Oh, I had a smoker colleague who was upset when they banned it inside - I started here in 2004 - his office was dreadful. After he retired and his office was painted it still smelled!

There were clubs at a couple of places I worked in the 1990s. And I was interviewed at one place (80s) that had an outdoor swimming pool.

Are heels that unusual these days? I've never worn them myself but a couple of the women in my office do.

@Taytocrisps Staff sending postcards from their holiday. They would generally be back at the workplace by the time the postcard arrived several weeks later, so you'd thank them in person. "Your postcard arrived Dave - looks like a nice place"
Ahh!!!! I'd forgotten about that! Imagine doing that now grin]
We do still bring sweets back from hol for the office though.

Smoking
Telexes
Beer and wine in the fridge for anyone working after 6

Yes, Duty Free sweets for the office are an essential detail of any foreign travel. Or at least, they were before Covid.

I remember those! I think they were called 'Roneo Rondstadt' but nothing comes up on Google apart from Linda Ronstadt. I seem to remember they stunk of metholated spirit.

Fax machines.

I'm not even sure I really know what a fax is...

Being expected to be away from your desk at lunchtime for an hour.

Queuing to use the only photocopier on the floor.
Pub on Friday lunchtime
Pub at lunchtime if it was someone’s birthday/retirement/getting married/leaving/special birthday.

On the last working day before Christmas/Easter, going to the pub at lunchtime and not returning to the office.

Tippex/Snopake correction fluid
Rulers
Carbon paper

Smoking, internal mail, acknowledging letters with a postcard by hand, drafting a response, printing it on plain paper for clearance, once cleared printing it on headed paper, then waiting for a signature before posting it.

Fax machines, only landlines, later a service that would send emails on your behalf, having an assistant to file emails and hard copies for me.

A fax is the devil's machine. Never worked!