What is wrong with these people?

[Holidayz]

I work in office and have clients that think it's acceptable to go into our kitchen and help themselves to the staff biscuits. These biscuits are purchased with money from a kitty all staff add to monthly.

We've now started to hide the biscuits, but really we shouldn't have to should we? Any human should know this is unreasonable.

Most people provide refreshments for clients.

You're a pretty shitty company if your facilities manager isn't providing them for paying clients.

Add the cost of biscuit supply to their account.

The clients have no idea you have a staff kitty. If they thought you were so inhospitable as to want to refuse them a biscuit (!) they probably wouldn't want to do business with you. Whoever is in charge needs to start budgeting £10 a month for a client biscuit tin.

Hmm, interesting. If I substituted "office" for shop "client" for customers and kitchen for "staffroom" would this still get the same replies?

The kitchen isn't an area clients, customers or visitors should enter, let alone help themselves to food from. Is it because I said biscuits, what if they had helped themselves to a slice of cake? Would that be just as fine as a biscuit(!)

It's hard to say without knowing the set up of the business whether they are BU or not. For clients to be regularly raiding your kitchens they must have been there for some time and be hungry. Are they there for client meetings where refreshments would normally be provided? Your management should really be providing this for clients. In any case biscuits are about 30p a pack from home bargains or b&m so it's not something I'd be bothered about. If you get more expensive ones just stash them and leave out the 10p custard creams

Is there a 'no authorised entry' sign on the door?

I agree that helping yourself to anything that doesn't belong to you is uneasonable but you haven't really given enough detail to tell.

If customers in a shop were going into the staff rooms and taking biscuits that would be very odd but why are your clients in the staff areas if they aren't meant to be? I'm trying to imagine how this would happen?

Erm, 'no unauthorised entry', obvs

Really depends on the layout of the premises and how clear it is that the kitchen is only for use of employees and not visitors/clients

I'd be bloody bothered if I'd paid for the biscuits out of my own meagre salary and some random wandered in and poached 'em. It's not for them to decide that the management "should" have fed them so they're going to steal from the workers to make up for it. Yes, I said steal. Just because it's in the workplace doesn't mean it is up for grabs. It belongs to someone else. It's only biscuits... yeah, but it's only my biscuits

It's also not for staff to cover up the management's meanness out of their own pockets, unless the salary is either half decent (so not many roles in the public sector then) or includes an allowance for client snacks!

You can't assume they're necessarily hungry either. Some people are just cheeky feckers.

Why make it into some sort of cryptic puzzle? Surely you can see that there is a massive difference between someone wandering in off the street into a shop into a private area in the back and stealing biscuits to someone invited to an office conference who sees a seemingly communal area to make tea and have a biscuit? No one can offer a real opinion if they don't know the true situation

How would they know they're purchased by the staff themselves? I'd be offering clients the biscuits tbh.

Pretty shitty organisation that doesn’t provide biscuits for clients.

Are you sure a staff member/manager hasn’t told people to help themselves ? Odd to seek them out otherwise

Open plan, with a kitchen just off.

It's not an office I didn't want to out myself, without saying exactly what I do for a living. It's a care setting so clients drop off and pick up. They hang around at pick up times instead of collecting and going like they do when dropping off. This then leads them to spend time around the kitchen and look in. If they see biscuits they nip in and help themselves.

Could try an honesty box.

Bastards. They’ll be after your packed lunches soon. Tell them to fuck off. I hate people like this. Office bod on NMW brings food in to get them through the day and then clients in posh cars with big salaries start troughing.

Reminds me of a wanker I used to work with. I bought a shed load of biscuits with my Aldi shop and brought them in to work to help me and the others get through a really stressful workload. Then this wanker (big salary, big arse) starts making comments about being disappointed the biscuits are not “the proper brand I’m used to”. Fuck off, wanker. They are not for you anyway. Go to your fancy shop with your fancy salary and fill your boots with your own money.

Can you tell that I have never really got over this and that it’s a good job I left when I did?

I think it would be normal to provide refreshments for clients. Honesty box might be a good idea if appropriate to the client base, or a group kitty if activities are run as a group and it can be managed.

Just put in a Money box with a sign saying please contribute towards biscuits. And hide the naice biscuits.

I like the honesty box idea.

Yanbu, seeing as it’s a care setting. I think an office would be different. I always gave refreshments to visitors when I was a corporate receptionist. But I wouldn’t expect free biccies if I went to the doctors.

I think you have a bigger problem than biscuits here, if members of the public are able to get access to a private area where there may be confidential information sitting around and private discussions going on.

So they aren't even clients? They are people picking up clients?

It doesn't sound like they should be in staff areas at all, is there any way you can get them to wait somewhere else?

To answer your question nohfing seems wrong with them. They are just doing what a lot of people do, why not ask management to provide biscuits for them?

If this is a common problem in your office then clearly it seems ambiguous to clients. The issue is your office not them. I can't see more than one person getting confused about it all.

In that case then yes they are cheeky fuckers. Your manager needs to deal with this by either explaining that area is staff only and providing an appropriate waiting area or by providing them with a few biscuits. In the meantime I'd hide yours!