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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To be hurt and humiliated that I did not receive a farewell gift from colleagues

193 replies

flippyfloppyflower · 02/09/2018 16:06

Just that really. Left my old post on Friday for a new post starting on Monday and I received nothing from my old colleagues. I wasn't expecting a party but a card and a small token would have been appreciated.
I know this is a first world problem and I shouldn't let it get to me but it has. I also realise that they don't have to so anything but I always thought it was nice to be nice (which they weren't obviously )

OP posts:

YolandiFuckinVisser · 02/09/2018 22:00

We had a leaver last week, the norm is for somebody in their team to arrange a collection and buy a small gift and card from all of us. Not this time, nothing happened except for a few of us (outside her team) realising she wasn't getting anything so got her some flowers & chocolates.

It's nasty and unkind, she had only worked with us for 1 year but didn't happen to be one of her manager's favourites so didn't get the send off she'd seen for others with a similar tenure.

SerenDippitty · 02/09/2018 22:07

Not treating everyone the same when they leave is just nasty and spiteful.

Dilemmacentral · 03/09/2018 08:20

Not treating everyone the same when they leave is just nasty and spiteful.

They’re not in nursery.

If someone has been a total pain in the ass; a gossip; work shy.... why on earth should they be treated the same as someone who has got stuck in; been a support; kind; thoughtful?

eggstoast · 03/09/2018 10:50

dilemma
Who are you to be the judge of that. Fair enough if you don't want to put in on an individual basis, but to collectively decide that you won't bother because a worker is deigned a gossip, lazy etc.. through group think is equally reprehensible and smacks of bullying.
The kind of behaviour you're advocating is usually a sign of toxic workplace and the only people benefitting from it. i.e. getting a 'leaving gift' are the gossips, queen bees and arse holes.
All employees should be treated the same, anything less makes for an unpleasant working environment.

Havaina · 03/09/2018 10:57

I agree, eggs toast, I've seen collections range from £30 to £300.

The value is unimportant, the leaver should get a token if the culture of the workplace is to do leaving goats.

SerenDippitty · 03/09/2018 11:01

*They’re not in nursery.

If someone has been a total pain in the ass; a gossip; work shy.... why on earth should they be treated the same as someone who has got stuck in; been a support; kind; thoughtful?*

Precisely because they are not in nursery and should be able to behave like adults. Why indulge a grudge against someone you are not goi g to see again?

Nat6999 · 03/09/2018 11:23

I worked for 27 years in the Civil Service, I was in a team that had people I'd known nearly all the time I'd worked there, had a year of being in & out of hospital with 4 operations before work decided to finish me, didn't get a card or a gift, didn't get any cards when I was ill. I'd always put in collections for other members of staff, but when it was my turn I got nothing, just had to go in to return my security pass & collect my personal stuff.

MiniCooperLover · 03/09/2018 11:50

OP, were you the person who usually organised collections and so no-one took over? Or will they have all gone to work today and though 'oh shit was Friday her last day' in horror? Were they def aware it was your last day?

SerenDippitty · 03/09/2018 12:08

These things sometimes do fall between stools, everyone assumes that someone else has got it covered and so nothing gets done - but somehow that doesn’t make it hurt less because you think they should have made sure. It feels like you just don’t matter enough

OliveBranchManager · 03/09/2018 12:12

@ilovesooty that is the rudest thing ive ever heard! Did they ask you for it?
Did they offer up any explanation as to why they felt they could ask for it back??

Bond0O7 · 03/09/2018 13:12

Yes it is a shit feeling I was with my company for 5 years before going on maternity leave and got nothing a card would have been nice. my manager even forgot i was leaving a few of the fellow ladies I was close to gave little gifts for baby so that was lovely.
Caught up with a few of them a couple of weeks ago and one of them told me they had a farewell party for a girl that has been with them 3 months before I left! There is a clique group at work so I obviously wasnt in it good riddance to them coz I'm not going back when my maternity leave ends!
Hope your new job goes well!

MulticolourMophead · 03/09/2018 14:23

I used to work in the civil service, and I think it depends on the team you're with.

My last team, well, boss was a bully but did get his wife to organise a small gift and card gift had all the hallmarks of being a re-gift but on the team before that, I'd have been given something nice and thanked, etc.

DarlingNikita · 03/09/2018 17:24

That IS weird if a) you've totally left the company and b) the usual culture is presents and a fuss. I'm not surprised you felt hurt and humiliated.

Is it possible they all didn't know, or forgot/got mixed up about, the date of your last day?

continuallychargingmyphone · 03/09/2018 17:29

I wouldn’t have worded it like Dilemma but honestly if I was so disliked somewhere that people were given ‘refunds’ for contributing to my retirement I wouldn’t be boasting about it on here

BlueYazoo · 03/09/2018 17:30

Tbh i’m the kind of person who could quite happily escape quietly out of a back door without a goodbye on my last day so maybe not the best person to debate this with however I think unfortunately most people are just too caught up in their own lives these days, I really wouldn’t take it personally at all

DarlingNikita · 03/09/2018 17:32

Dilemma, the OP says while she worked there she was regularly invited to colleagues' for dinner etc. How do you square that with your suggestion that they didn't like her?

continuallychargingmyphone · 03/09/2018 17:35

I think dilemma was giving an alternative viewpoint. I am sure op is lovely.

I had a friend who gave a horrible leaving speech and to be honest it made things very unpleasant. Sometimes it’s best just to smile and go.

User12879923378 · 03/09/2018 17:36

OP, I completely get why you're upset - I would be too. I'm sure you'd know if you were so disliked that no one would want to give you a leaving gift. I think it's more likely that someone volunteered to do your collection and then got distracted - it's been known. I'm so sorry though.

CasanovaFrankenstein · 03/09/2018 17:38

Totally missing point but “leaving goats” is a fantastic typo. I want to work somewhere that has those!

Sorry about your rubbish ex-colleagues OP.

SherbrookeFosterer · 03/09/2018 17:39

I once left a company and my gift was a £5 bottle of cava from a department of 15 people.

Do the math!

I figured I was lucky to have been able to jump before I was pushed.

Gettingbackonmyfeet · 03/09/2018 17:40

I think it is shoddy of the manager to be honest

I am sorry OP but to be honest I have seen this happen when the person leaving wasn't particularly liked (not always fairly like a pp said where the person just didn't gel for whatever reason and whilst I always ensured fair behaviour you can't actually make people like each other) but if it was my team I would never let someone go with out a card and something small..a few times I've gone out and got it and not bothered asking the team because I knew the response

We had a nightmare employee in one place , a truly horrible human being and even she I went out and got a card and some chocolate because it's just mean but that should be on the manager to do it otherwise it's condoning workplace bullying in my mind

I will confess it stuck in my craw a little with the above example but still.

Winenot78 · 03/09/2018 17:41

This happened to me and I was quite put out!

TBF I hadn't been there for a really long time but I’d contributed to gifts for other leavers while there. I got a card in the post a few days after I left because they “forgot” to give it to me while I was there. They also forgot to give me a birthday card even though they gave them to everyone else.

cheapskatemum · 03/09/2018 17:43

I feel for you, maybe everyone thought someone else would organise it, so it didn’t get done? Are you friends with any of your former colleagues outside work? I know I’d want to know what went wrong & would ask.

In my 1st proper job the manager was so nasty that everyone left one by one. I was the last to leave - typical me, I kept thinking she’d wake up nice one day - so everyone else there was new by the time I left & I didn’t get a leaving gift. I wasn’t expecting one though.

margesimpson40 · 03/09/2018 17:44

Dilemma has a point. We don't know these people ffs.

Dilovescake21 · 03/09/2018 17:44

YANBU!

I left my teaching job after deciding not to return after maternity leave. I got nothing, not even a card! That was over 10 years ago and it still annoys me! It makes me extra careful now to make sure people are always given a proper “send off”.

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