To think this is madness at a company Christmas do?

[designateddriver16]

We have a Christmas do which is pretty much compulsory. You get hounded for explanations if you don't go. They are generally Saturday nights and never in convenient locations. This year's is out in the sticks. Transport is not provided. Nearest town is 10 miles away. Accommodation available for £90 per room. (Not covered)

Senior management have announced us they are only providing free wine with the meal. No soft drinks for drivers or anyone else. I queried this and was told that tap water in a jug was the only non alcoholic option. Drinks are available at the bar at extra cost (last time a coke was £3)

I have to drive. Need to get home for the dcs. I'm not a massive drinker so even if I weren't driving tbh I'd like the option of alternating wine with a soft drink.

AIBU to think this is not only weirdly stingy but irresponsible madness?

Want2be - now there's a plan..

Not legal, but similar. There's a legal element. We're just poorer.

I think I'll go, show my face, scarf the food and vanish before the "entertainment" gets going. Again, another thread.

Next year I'll decline straight away without all of this angst.

I would need the wine to get through a fancy dress staff Christmas party.... The horror!!

If going to this turd of an event is a yardstick for promotion, I'd be out the door in a flash.

I remember joining a company just in time for its xmas party and made it clear I don't do this type of thing. Never been asked again since.

I also lied and told them I was a Muslim.

Fancy dress is my idea of hell.

This ^ with jingle bells on!

Why do you need an excuse? 'This doesn't work for me' 'I don't want to come' ' its too far and costs too much' job done. Anyone that wants to quiz you can fuck off.

What a wonderful example of British Management especially the non alcoholic drink provision;!

Do they run the firm in the same way?, its a wonder their solvent and in business!

I did wonder if it was a police force. But I can't believe that - or a law firm. They wouldn't be so discriminatory surely. Leave themselves wide open etcetera. OP, i know you can't say. I am just musing ....

It sounds pretty standard to me tbh. I don't drink, and I've never had non alcoholic drinks provided. Its usually water or I buy my own. If you don't drink then you can drive, so it doesn't matter that its in the sticks. If you do drink then, just share a cab to the town and train it from there. I use public transport and make it back from Christmas meals in some pretty distant places without trouble, it shouldn't be too difficult.

From what you've said, it sounds like my worlds Christmas do. I'm glad to have avoided it by working this year. I'm actually almost convinced we work at the same place. When is it?

I'm glad I'm old. And stroppy. Would have no problems whatsoever in simply declining the invitation. And would happily state that it sounded like my idea of hell if queried. I don't feel obliged to go to things I don't want to.

Can you not simply say you can't make it? If asked why not, raise a surprised eyebrow at the rudeness of the question and say 'I have other plans that evening'.

You're getting a free meal?

Ours is almost compulsory too but we have to pay for food drinks and transport to from isolated venue!

If they're that fussy about the OP attending, I can't see them being happy about her leaving early enough to get public transport home - in a lot of places this would be 8/9 pm at the latest.

Maybe they're only providing water and wine because soft drinks don't really go with food and it would be a bit odd to have coke with a formal dinner. I wouldn't drink anything except water with a meal if I wasn't drinking alcohol.

Do the people who actually care whether or not people attend work functions not really have much going on in their lives outside work - I find that this is usually the case.

I discounted Police or other emergency services/Prison Service or courts due to provision of food and alcohol, which is practically unheard of in the public sector, unless you are an MP .

Don't go.
Reasons:
1 It's miles away.
2 Accommodation expensive
3 drinks expensive
4 have to drive home
5 I have kids
6 I DONT FUCKING WANT TO GO.

Subsiding wine but not soft drinks is just plain discriminatory to those who don't drink. For that reason alone I would not go, but I personally wouldn't make up an excuse I'd tell them straight that was the reason.

Some companies make out that attending the Xmas do is near enough compulsory, but has anyone really ever been turned down for promotion because of it? Unlikely.

If you're worried about telling the truth, a last minute illness or car break down is in order. If you go down this route, make sure you make a big play in advance of how much you're looking forward to it. (Play them at their own game!)

Does anyone else need to know the fancy dress theme, and what OP will be wearing?

you could always attend do the networking and then either arrange a pick up or scarper before the booze begins to flow.

Could you be on a really tight budget (you say you aren't well paid, so are unable to afford fancy dress, hotel, extra fuel to drive to distant location, babysitter, expensive soft drinks etc, as there just isn't the money in your budget.

I used that excuse a few years ago when we were heavily in debt - we just didn't have spare money for that sort of thing, even if it could be saved a couple of quid a month all year, if we could have done that, we had a whole list of better uses that the money could be put to.

I wouldn't be lying to them, or letting anyone down at the last minute.

If I didn't want to go, then I'd have made that clear from the beginning.
If they pressed me for reasons, then you've got a list of them in your OP.

That said, I've been at work for 35 years now and have never worked anywhere where the meal and/or wine is paid for, so I might go along for the meal, drink water (which I like and would have asked for with any meal anyway) and then come home.

No public transport. When I say it's in the sticks, I'm being pretty literal. Taxis are not cheap in our area due to us having no bloody choice.

The fancy dress is based on an era. As is the music. It's an era which is not to my taste either sartorially or musically. (It just gets better.) I have cobbled together an outfit but will undoubtedly look like a giant twat.

Oh, and did I mention the seating plan? god forbid we get to sit next to the people we'd choose to.

The evening has few redeeming features other than most of the people who work there. We can share the horror together.

Get in your car at the correct commute time, drive to the nearest busy roadway. Roll your window half way down so the traffic noise can be heard and call someone, preferably management, and say that you are broken down by the side of the road, but you have it handled, a tow-truck has been called and your DH/mother/Santa Claus is coming to pick you up. So sorry to disappoint but you won't make it to the party.

On Monday you say your DH/cousin/sister tinkered with the car on Sunday and voila, it was a loose cable.

I've never done this to cadge a day off to go to the beach. I read it somewhere in a book. Yeah, that's the ticket!

Oh no you have d&v, how awful you can't make it.
And yes, it is very irresponsible of them not to at least offer simple orange juice in a jug.

What's with the drama? Don't go but SAY you're not going. I'll bet there are many who are thinking what you are and will also bail if you come out with it.
EVERYTHING about this party doesn't exactly ring the bells on the thrill-o-meter.

Oh and venues that charge soft drinks as much as beer really boil my pics.

lie that you cant go as you have a funeral? I would