Cleaning Rota in the office

[HopeS01]

I'm outraged a bit miffed (to say the least!), and I need some unbiased opinions as to whether or not IABU...

I work in a fashion retail head office. We have a communal kitchen. The Cleaner comes at the end of the day, every day. The receptionist has been sending constant reminders about the state of the kitchen; dirty dishes left in the sink, tea bags on the worktop, cereal in the plughole, out of date food in the fridge etc. etc. Disgusting. I feel sorry for the poor girl, but it is falling on deaf ears. No improvement.
Today, a Cleaning Rota was circulated. Every department (excluding senior management) is expected to take part and clean the kitchen at 2pm daily, when it is their turn.
I have refused, and have been notified that there will be consequences.

Is it reasonable to expect people (who are not employed as cleaners) to clean up after the scruffy b*stards who leave the kitchen in this state every day? Am I being unreasonable to refuse on the grounds that A) it is certainly not in my job role to be cleaning the communal areas (I tidy my own desk area and wash my own dishes!) B) I am too busy; I already work early every morning and late every night without a full lunch break to get my work done

NB: I don't know how to say this without sounding snotty, and I know this isn't exactly relevant because no one other than the cleaner should be responsible for this task, but I am not a junior member of the team. I feel a little over qualified to be unblocking the plug hole of someone else's breakfast (I do enough of that at home!)

It always boggles me how lazy people are when they're not at home. I run a toddler group and each session the children get a snack. My ds brings his plate and cup back to the tray but just about every other parent allows their child to get up and walk away. I wouldn't mind so much if the parents then tidied up but they don't! They just leave everything there and wander off leaving me to try to gather all the stuff with clingy dd on my hip while another organiser starts the washing up and the other tries to tidy the toys. One or two lovely parents usually pitch in but if every child/parent looked after their own cup and plate it would be so much easier. We don't even expect them to wash up, just put leftovers in the bin and put plates and cups on the tray. We volunteer so we're not paid at all. I don't mind that but a bit of basic courtesy would be nice.

I've experienced the same laziness in workplaces. Why people aren't embarrassed to behave in such a way is beyond me.

Cailin it was the same at the toddler group I was involved in running.

My lowest point was the day a mother came up and handed me a dirty nappy to throw away. I shit you not.

cripes, I know when I was teaching there would be some members of staff with several mouldy mugs festering away in their rooms, but I don't remember anyone leaving loads of minging stuff in communal areas and they would eventually come and wash their collection of mugs.

OP, I would be interested in the range of people you work with - are they lazy man whose womenfolk (wife/mummy) run around after them at home so they are unused to doing anything at all? or young people who live at home and are used to being pandered to by mum? or busy people who don't see the problem in leaving it all for a few days and then doing it all in one go?

whatever the facts, its pretty rank if there are lots of you cos it soon builds up.

I also do not understand who has decided on the rota, has the receptionist taken it on herself? or has it come from the bosses? either way YANBUIMO

I worked in a Council but my Department was small, only about 27 people. Everyone (bar the absolute Head, so all Managers) signed up to a rota. At the end of the day, we had to switch on the dishwasher (which everyone mostly put their stuff into), wipe the surfaces and the microwave. There was a cleaner who also wiped down, did the floor and did the bins. It generally worked, probably as we were so small, and only took a couple of minutes. I did get annoyed when someone would have a meeting and a tray and cups would just get dumped in there, but it was rare. We also had mice, but we were in the basement of a Victorian Council House, so I think it was rather inevitable, and they were not specific to the kitchen (and there was a war waged against them!!). I wasn't over-keen, but I just did it and, as my co-workers were clean and pleasant, it wasn't too onerous.

I worked in a retail head office where we had a department cleaning rota, it also included closing the office - setting the alarms and locking up. There was no office manager so it was down to everyone to muck in. We'd have regular meetings to discuss have a moan about the dirty fuckers leaving mess when there was a dishwasher! What always amazed me was that everyone would complain yet someone was doing it? One of the reasons I left.

In my current office we have daily cleaners yet people still leave the sinks full and empty plates on top of the dishwasher! CCTV is defo take way forward and then the culprits should be shamed.

Hmmm I worked in an office connected to fashion retail where we had a crazy office cleaning rota that saw consultants cleaning the toilets (I was given a last minute reprieve on doing it cause I was heavily pg).... Wonder if someone from there now works for you and thinks this normal?

YANBU to not want to do this - but YAVVVVVU to think the cleaner should have to clean up that level of mess - that is not what office cleaners are for. They are there to do general cleaning and tidying - hoovering/changing bins, that sort of thing - not to wash up peoples cups or put teabags in the bin (FGS cant people even do that!) or clear out of date food of the fridge. The problem needs to be sorted out from the source.

YANBU - If you wanted to work as a cleaner, you probably would have chosen a job with cleaning in the job description.

I think that dishwashers in office kitchens often contribute to the problem as people don't take the clean stuff out, and then leave dirty dishes out "to be put into the dishwasher when the dishwasher pixie arrives".

I remember washing up a sink full of other people's mugs on a client site when the cleaner collared me and explained very forcefully that it wasn't her job. She then did nothing but stand over me while I did it.

When I worked for a smallish company we had an e-mail round telling us that we would be expected to clean the office and I replied that that was fine, but they had to let me know which bit of my workload wouldn't get done if they wanted to re-direct my time. Never had a reply, or another request to clean, so perhaps it worked.

I am a cleaner, I do wards but sometimes do doctors residence and offices.

I am there to clean, not pick up after people who don't clean there own things.

It lucky we have infection control because I have seen them chuck out dirty microwaves, chuck out dirty cups ect.

I can not do my job in staff room if there is dirty dishes and cups. It is not in my job discription. I have in the past when the doctors and nurses have had to drop every thing for a cardiac arrest wash up there cups, dried a put them away.

Cleanliness is everyone responsibility.

Just to add I also do have 20 odd minutes spare to do this either.

If I wanted to wash dishes I would have worked in a kitchen :)

Don't have

I wouldn't have thought it that it makes financial sense for the company to be paying for expensive members of staff to spend their time cleaning. Surely it would make more business to offer to pay the cleaner an additional half hour or so to sort the mess?

Oh, yeah, on our rota day, we had to empty the dishwasher first thing, too, but mostly mugs so no biggy.

Same problem seems to exist in most offices.

Making everyone use their own crockery and cutlery then binning it if it's not washed up would be the only solution I think. It's always the same people making a mess and the same people cleaning it up normally.

Phantom, it's mostly women between the ages of 20 and 40, but we do have a few men.
I just don't think it's fair that it's come to this. I wouldn't dream of leaving mess like that for anyone to clean.
Forty, I completely agree, I'm sorry, I was so cross when I posted the OP I wasn't really thinking.

Seems like this is much more common than I'd realised ! Still, you've all given me the courage to keep putting my foot down!

It really pissed me off at my old work place. People dumping things and saying 'oh it's suchabodies day to clean'

And there were always a few men who said things like 'I don't clean at home why should I here'

Queue 18 year old gobby me 'well you're not at home and I'm not your wife so clean the sodding cup'.

At my place of work it's NOT the cleaner's job to do the dishes. She does the toilets, vacuuming, waste disposal and the general kitchen/sink area. But never dishes themselves. Unless it's in your office cleaner's remit, then why should she/he do it? I'm guessing it isn't, otherwise why would the rota idea and consequences be enforced?

I totally get where you are coming from though... it is a pain in the arse. My suggestion... no communal items... everyone brings their own and keeps them at their desk. That idea worked just fine at my previous office.

There was a great note on Passive Aggressive notes that read 'your mother doesn't work here - and she'd be ashamed of you if she did'. I wasn't allowed to put it up

It seems to happen in all offices ime, there's a couple of people who'll tidy up after everyone else every now and then but honestly it does nothing to fix the problem.

In my current office there was uproar when the few of us who washed up started binning anything welded on or moldy. We were accused of throwing away perfectly good crockery. I agreed and pointed out that if it was that important then fucking clean it yourself - I have no desire to be breathing in mold spores from the collection of rancid mugs on your desk and even less to get my hands dirty dealing with it.

Complicated systems of signing out stuff and locking the doors are ridiculous for an office full of adults imo never mind the amount of grief and hassle the poor bugger in charge will get (I'm presuming the receptionist).

Shaming is the only way to go - I don't know what your set-up is, but if there is a standard lunch / leaving time, management should do the teacher style "no-one's leaving till whoever's mug/fish heads/bolognase explosion/teabags these are owns up and cleans up" for a couple of weeks as well of end of day desk sweeps.

Also a die hard fridge policy of anything still in the fridge on Friday at 4pm will go in the bin - Tupperware and all.

Our office didn't have a dishwasher for exactly that reason

I like the idea of binning people's plates & food - that'll teach them