Offering workmen teas/coffees (aibu)

[Bu22]

I just don’t know if I am being completely unreasonable here.

We have builders in at the moment (not in our flat but in the flat opposite which is owned by us).

Seeing as it belongs to us, I immediately started offering them teas/coffees the day the works commenced.

It’s not a problem when there is just 1, 2 or 3 workmen in at a time. But.. sometimes there’s 5-6 of them and because i’ve started it, they now just knock (twice a day usually) and ask for their teas & coffees.

Like I say, if there’s just a couple or a few of them I don’t mind at all. When i’m standing around making 5+ cups of different teas and coffees though, whilst looking after two young children, it gets a bit annoying. I’m also sick of seeing all the mugs left outside my door at the end of the day needing to be washed - although I suppose it’s good that they always give them back instead of leaving them laying about.

Part of me feels it is reasonable, part of me thinks it isn’t.

Although I can’t exactly turn around and say no even if I wanted to so I suppose I will just have to deal with it!

Bare in mind they’ve been in for nearly 3 months…. I’m done with the sight of the kettle atm! I even contemplated getting a cheap kettle for them but then that would probably look rude and where would they keep the milk…

No. I’m an architect and employing builders.
Im working too.
No one washes my stuff up or makes me drinks.

It also means they can make their drinks just the way they like them when they want them.

But I knew I’d get disagreements.

We've had a lot of work done on our house and garden over the years.

I bought a cheap kettle which I left in the garage, and I left a pack of those "instant coffee in a cup" (sorry, I don't know why I can't link, but if you Google that you'll see - each pack contains 6 plastic cups containing coffee and whitener, costs £1), and the same of "hot chocolate in a cup" and some sugar cubes. That and a box containing individually wrapped biscuits/chocolate bars for them to help themselves. I just replenished anything when required of course.

Our guys were always really happy with that and we had great work from them all.

Or the 3 in 1 sachet things if there isn’t a fridge available.

It's not about disagreement, it's about being kind. My DH is a QS and owns a construction company. I'm a stakeholder in a multimillion pound company. When something needs doing in our house that DH isn't qualified to do, we have workpeople in to do it. I/we will always offer tea and coffee. They just don't get cow's milk. They are more than welcome to bring their own, but we don't provide it. We are always happy to wash up their cups too.

I'm not even sure why this is a thing at all.

These people bring their own flasks, food, and have lunch breaks.

Do you do this for women workers in your home?

See to me this isn't an issue. I always look after workmen and often make bacon sandwiches with plenty of tea/coffee biscuits etc. everyone's different I suppose

I have 2-3 female cleaners visit fortnightly and it’s the first thing I do when they arrive. I wouldn’t make it myself if they were there daily for an extended period, but I’d certainly provide it.

I always find it hard to know what is the etiquette, it’s a very grey area.

for us, we had builders in for 6 months for loft extension . They had their own ladder to get to the roof without going through our house for most of the project so we didn’t see them much at the beginning, they put their own kettle in the roof and brought their own coffee and tea. I felt a bit bad I never offered but what they did worked well.

someone came for an afternoon to fix our washing machine recently and for that I did make tea/coffee. I think if it’s short term then you should offer

I think this is a job you take on when you do building work. I know it's exhausting - my house was torn apart with building work while I was living in it for 9 months. But the tea breaks are actually an important window for them to ask you things, which generally happens about 10 times a day anyway on a big build!!

Definitely agree about leaving a kettle etc. I got a (free) second-hand kettle from our street FB page. It was great because it didn't matter if it got dirty etc. At the end of the job, I said they could take it if they wanted and they did - to use on other jobs. Also, some old mugs, teaspoons etc. I regularly bought tea/coffee/milk/sugar/biscuits so didn't have to do anything. It wasn't expected but I think folk appreciate it - particularly if it's a long job.

I haven't tried the 3-in-1 sachets, but you don't need a fridge with the ones I described, the coffee ones contain whitener already inside the plastic cup.

Bonus points for no washing up after them except a few teaspoons! (Could probably just buy a pack of disposable/recyclable stirrers too, but I didn't.)

This reminds me of that thing about consent where they explained the concept using tea. It's not OK to make someone tea if they haven't asked for it.

Yes, they’re awful. The drinks taste horrible from them. I can’t believe people actually use them.

Leave them a kettle - one jar of coffee /box of teabags, cup of sugar and some milk in a flask. Done.

Electrician here
We had this discussion on site just the other day, it turns out me, the plumber and the chippy working on a ladies extension (who has provided kettle, tea bags and mugs) are all being chased to book in a big project for next year.
The plumber asked me "did he not give us a tea last time we were there?", I checked my records that night, and indeed his customer card is marked NT, no tea. Now NT isn't a complete blackballing, but if theres other work available we will swerve the NT's, so we did and he's still trying to get builders, because everyone is well booked up and the discussion moved from the site to the trade counter at the builders merchants (where they provide tea, and bacon buns).
Offering a nice brew is a kind of ritual ice breaker that forms a rapport, if its not forthcoming i tend to spend the rest of the day muttering under my breath "not even so much as a **ing cuppa" and won't work for them again out of choice.
Toilets are another bone of contention, if you have only one WC and its a long job, fair enough get a portaloo, otherwise set aside a loo in the house. Although portaloos are good value if the likes of an architecht or surveyor turn up, because if they nip in for a pee you can accidently back the van up so they can't open the door and be unable to hear them over the hammer drill for 20 minutes, always good for a giggle!
Moral is, tea, better relationship, better workmanship, we will come back if needed!

Universal rule... Leave out kettle and teabags/coffee and they make their own

I always offer tea and coffee and cold drinks in the summer but I also encourage them to make their own if we're not in. I quite regularly came home throughout our building works to find hubby making huge rounds of bacon sandwiches for everyone!
I went out and bought cheap 'builders mugs' after coming home and seeing the builders standing around with my best Emma Bridgewater mugs!

Well-catered tradespeople do a good job IMO, and they do appreciate it. I keep a selection of scabby basic mugs for that very purpose.

I always make hot drinks for tradesmen, but that's just because I work from home and constantly drink tea myself 😁

My window cleaner knocks every time he visits and asks me to make him a coffee, which I think is a bit weird though.

When we had the landscapers in doing the garden and paving I was WFH and at times would be on calls/teams meeting so needed to alert them to this fact so we set up a green/red card that was placed on the patio doors. Green card meant they were OK to knock for water, drinks, loo visits but of the red card was up they had to wait. It worked really well and I know they appreciated the drinks and home made cakes that I supplied as well as the weekly treat of a cooked lunch on Friday as when their boss came to sign off the job he commented that they said it was one of the best jobs they had worked on.

This. Some of the comments on here sound a bit elitist!

They don´t know what your kitchen looks like.

A colleague used to work for a moving company. And the things he´s seen... Never accepted a cup again.

When our last house was being renovated I had up to fourteen men on site and hardly any kitchen facilities. Twice daily tea and coffee, plus biscuits. On the last day we had a cream tea and toasted teacakes. They did a wonderful job.

Oh, and when my curtain woman turned up she had tea and toast!