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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Builders and tea bags

102 replies

londonchick · 14/06/2012 08:17

DH thinks IABU. I, on the other hand am pretty annoyed!!

Builders in our home for the last 2 months. The first month we weren't living here. Now we are back and living our normal lives - going to work, etc.

Got up yesterday afternoon for night shift to find no tea bags left in caddy. Builders have been helping themselves so I asked if they could get some more for DH in the evening and me this morning. Head honcho states yes he'll go out for them.

I get home this morning to find a few tea bags in the caddy - but from a box I had stored on the top shelf in our food cupboard. DH didn't open box so it appears builders have rifled through our food supplies and found them. They would have had to search well as I had them tucked out of sight for emergencies!

I am really quite annoyed that they have gone through our belongings and that they haven't actually put their hand in their pocket for once and stocked up. DH thinks IABU as 'you have to keep builders supplied with their tea'. Invasion of privacy (albeit v minor) obviously isn't an issue for him!

Sorry such a long story but AIBU really? Really? They managed to supply themselves with tea and milk when we weren't living here!!

Milk is another story. Don't get me started on that!!

OP posts:

BettySwollocksandaCrustyRack · 14/06/2012 13:32

But like someone pointed out its not the providing tea thats the problem, its the fact that they rifled through her cupboards to find them.

If I had anyone working on my house I would gladly provide tea but leave it out on the worktop so they could help themselves. I would not want them going through my cupboards.

Scholes34 · 14/06/2012 13:33

YABU - shouldn't have run out of teabags, so they wouldn't have needed to go through your cupboards.

only4tonight · 14/06/2012 13:46

I don't suppose dh could have found the stash (or found the time to get some in himself rather than ask the builders to go shopping when you are working silly hours?)

Inertia · 14/06/2012 13:50

YANBU to be pissed off about them rooting through your cupboards - that's not on. Part of the deal with builders is that you are actually placing a lot of trust in them to do the job without going through your stuff. Some people keep personal documents or medication in kitchen cupboards - is it ok for the builders to root through that in order to find teabags that they couldn't be arsed to get (or even just do without for a couple of hours) ?

And I am someone who supplies tea, biscuits, bacon barms, teacakes to the point where our builders said it was like a cafe. And left a kettle, teabags, milk, biscuits etc while I was at work . Maybe you could buy a cheap kettle and job lot of cheap teabags and leave it in their work area, and just be breezy about telling them that you've provided extra supplies for them to save them the bother of rooting through cupboards.

Original poster

londonchick · 14/06/2012 14:00

DH would have normally got them but was at work function till late last night and was back out early this morning.

Thanks hamncheese for pointing out it is more the cupboard rummaging that has annoyed me. Although I didn't realise that builders were such royalty that asking to just tide us over until I shop today is so unreasonable! I would never use up all of something and just expect more to magically appear if I was nursing in someone's home foe example.

For everyone who is saying I'm tight, please read the post. I have provided everything, we just very unfortunately ran out one day early. I was running out to work and forgot about stashed box. If I had remembered I would have got it out for them!!! They have had tea, coffee, biscuits, and bacon sandwiches when circumstances have allowed! They most certainly haven't been treated badly!!! Oh and all their cups have always been washed up for them!

And yes I might have left cash for them if I'd thought of it but really. Is it really such a crime??!! Builders really are special people obviously, and the plumbers and the electricians and the plasterers! It can be up to 10 people a day! That's a lot of tea!!

I think I need to re-train and become tea-drinking royalty too

OP posts:

Laquitar · 14/06/2012 14:13

Ah this is what i hate here. When people get bitter about other people's jobs and perks and start comparing it with their own job.

You sound very resentful now.

Original poster

londonchick · 14/06/2012 14:38

I'm not resentful really and am grateful for their work. Certainly if I had tried to pull a wall down in our house it wouldn't be looking how it does now! The house wouldn't even still be standing!!!

It's just blooming well frustrating!

And remember I am venting on here so I can get it all out and carry on with my life. That's what AIBU is for isn't it?? :) I'm certainly not skulking around the house consumed with rage, even if it appears like that on here.

I'm having a lovely day!

OP posts:

doggiemumma · 14/06/2012 14:45

Maybe you should have given them a shopping list to get you things you don' have time to get yourself

They are there to do building work, they are builders, not gophers

doggiemumma · 14/06/2012 14:47

rude and entitled??? > FFS!

OP, bacon sarnies?? that changes everything, of course they should have got your fecking tea bags

Cuddler · 14/06/2012 14:50

Ive never had builders in but really?an unwritten rule about as much tea as they can drink?They do get paid dont they?I mean out of politeness i imagine i would offer them the odd drink but endless rounds of tea and biscuits?Do they really expect that?I have a lot to learn!

HandMadeTail · 14/06/2012 15:00

Frankly, I think it's not unreasonable to have asked them to get a few tea bags. I realise that it's usual to supply tea and coffee to builders, but after you have done so for a few months, its not beyond the pale for them to buy a few if you run out. i.e. a bit of give and take.

They wouldn't have to make a special trip - they could pick them up when they go for their 2 hour breakfast break.

I think it's very rude of them to go rifling through your cupboards.

I am amazed that people think otherwise.

Noqontrol · 14/06/2012 15:02

It seems you build in the cost of the tea bags, sugar and extra milk into the building budget! After 3 months of building work it was really noticeable how much less I needed to buy. If they are here for a long time they almost become like lodgers, I almost missed them when they went.

HandMadeTail · 14/06/2012 15:09

You missed them after 3 months, Noqontrol?

I have to say that after our 4 month job was finshed after 8, I was so glad to see the back of them!

(Lovely people and all that, but so wonderful to have my house back.)

Noqontrol · 14/06/2012 15:16

Well, I kind of missed them because they were really nice people. But it was also very nice to get the house back to ourselves

Latara · 14/06/2012 15:25

Oh dear...
My cousin's a plumber & it's a major catastrophe if he forgets his flask!

YANBU because your builders should be organised enough buy their own teabags & milk...

When they manage that then YANBU to log on & tell MN that pigs are flying past.....

YADBU to think a man craving his cuppa Builders' will think of anything rational like 'i must not look through this private kitchen for teabags'....

chipmunksex · 14/06/2012 15:37

I would freak!, but then I just can't stand strange people in my house at all!

Let alone looking in my cupboards and drinking my tea!

valiumredhead · 14/06/2012 15:43

Think I am used to it, we had a houseful of workmen for just over a year - it was VERY quiet once they had left...

saturdaygirl · 14/06/2012 15:49

I had a builder, gave him endless tea, biscuits and bacon rolls, he thanked me by ruining my carpet, doing a substandard job and generally taking the micky (I ended up having to move out for a week), should have been a one day job.

Never again

Builders get paid a decent wage, nobody provides me endless tea at work, why should they when I get paid.

I think unusual to ask a builder to get some more tea but not totally unreasonable, however, totally unreasonable to drink the last of a families tea.

Definately out of order to go through somebodies cupboards and clearly these builders are not doing a great job because the op is giving them tea since they are already five weeks late

saturdaygirl · 14/06/2012 15:50

Also think it is very patronising towards builders to insinuate they will not do a good job unless they get cups of tea, and in fact, they are incapable of working without said tea

ParsleyTheLioness · 14/06/2012 15:52

Providing tea is the norm. They should NOT be rifling through your cupboards, and I'm surprised that many posters do not see this as a boundary issue. IME sometimes when people work in your house, they 'forget' its yours, and see it as an extension of their workplace, as I have had similar 'boundary' issues. This does not in any way excuse it.

Pendeen · 14/06/2012 16:56

When I saw the title I groaned as it brought back memories of when I had a series of projects for the local council - alterations and refurbishment of schools.

As the architect I not only did the design and tender but had to manage the jobs on site and whilst it was a "nice little earner" as regards fees there were times (come to think of it many, many times) when I wished I had never accepted the commissons and they were nearly always related to "builders and tea bags"

Almost every Head teacher / school secretary / caretaker whinged on and on about contractors pinching tea bags, milk, squash, biscuits, etc from the staff room cupboards / fridges.

The law states that employers must ensure reasonable facilities are provided and rather than hiring site huts, portaloos etc. for most of the schemes the schools agreed to let the contractors use the staffroom and staff loos but regarded any use of tea bags etc. as a capital crime.

I remember one stroppy, snotty Headteacher attempt to bawl me out in front of the governors because the contractors had " used too much loo roll " !

It seemed at times that the work was the least of schools' worries. It got to the stage that I was including in specifications for the contractor to "provide tea bags etc" in their price and one of them took this to extremes bringing packets of luxury biscuits, cookies, bottles of Evian and even pastries to the site meetings.

Needless to say those were very well attended!

landofmakebelieve · 14/06/2012 17:26

Blimey I'm the biggest tight arse going but even I think you're being tight by expecting builders to get their own teabags!
YABU.

NormanTheForeman · 14/06/2012 17:29

YABU

Us builders love our !

Inertia · 14/06/2012 17:37

Pendeen - the issue about school staff rooms is probably that it's not actually the school paying for tea, milk etc - it's the staff themselves paying for tea club out of their own pockets. If you are a school cleaner or TA getting paid at (or close to ) minimum wage, it would be pretty galling for a horde of builders to take the stuff you've paid for on a daily basis. The school will already be paying for the work - surely it's the responsibility of the site manager to ensure that their staff have access to refreshments?

Latara · 14/06/2012 18:00

@ NormanTheForeman - As a nurse i love my tea. But i always put the milk in first.
Until i presented the Pakistani ward Dr with a cup of tea.
'THAT is not tea. I show you how WE make tea. I will make you a cup of tea as it should be made.'
5 mins later Dr marched in with my cup of tea - i hadn't actually thought he would bother... but it was the best cup of tea ever!
I hated to admit it but it definitely tasted better with the milk added last.

Plus it was quite sweet that he'd taken time and effort to make ME a cup of tea :)

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