Neighbour wants no drilling this afternoon

[Daisydrum]

We are having work done on our house. The workers are only here M-F within normal hours. Our neighbour has asked for no drilling this afternoon because of important calls. Not sure if they are being unreasonable?
We did warn them months ago work was coming and when work was starting.
They have had about 2 years worth of work on and off, often during my important calls (and they’ve had it on evenings and weekends).
I’m not sure if the builders will need to use the drill or not but there will certainly be some banging as we can’t expect them to do no work for the whole afternoon.
Not sure what to say back.

It depends. Apart from the building work, are your neighbours generally ok people? I'd at least chat through with them to see if you can narrow the time scale and talk to the builders about what is possible without slowing the job. You may be able to come up with a solution or you may not but at least you will have tried. I don't think you can hold their builder's noise against them if you never asked for silent periods or spoke to them about it

@Chumleymouse

I’d say ok, I’ll have to give the builders the afternoon off if you need no banging/drilling, here’s the bill for their wages 🙂

If people who work from home need a quiet space to work then they should buy a house in the middle nowhere without neighbours, or get a job with an office !!!

Sorry but this is quite possibly the most ridiculous statement I have ever heard. No one expected work places to change the way that they have and some have changed permanently.

I don't think as a one off that it is a totally unreasonable request. I would see if they could be more specific with timings that they need it to be a bit quieter and ask them if they have an alternative working set up that they could use to work around the noise in future.

It sounds like you have a good open line of communication and I would try to work together for a best case outcome for you all.

It seems the wfh lot, need to adjust, and it’s a pain for others, can’t come soon enough back to the office for lots concerned.
No more upset neighbours and general domestic noise, never happened before wfh did it

Are they work calls? Can they be done over zoom with headphones? Offer to lend them your headphones if it would help.

Take no notice- it's more important to you that the work gets done as quickly as possible.

I thought the suggestion that saying to them that only essential work will be done was a good one.

@waltzingparrot

Are they work calls? Can they be done over zoom with headphones? Offer to lend them your headphones if it would help.

yuck! I would not put anything in/around my ears that had been used by someone else, especially not in such sweaty weather

I think as a one off it’s not unreasonable to ask they may not want to say exactly why - job interview, medical appointment, work disciplinary etc. The fact they’ve asked just once means it’s important. A bit of consideration goes a long way.

@Dixiechickonhols

I think as a one off it’s not unreasonable to ask they may not want to say exactly why - job interview, medical appointment, work disciplinary etc. The fact they’ve asked just once means it’s important. A bit of consideration goes a long way.

It’s never a one off. Give in once and you’ve set the precedent and the requests keep on coming.

@HeddaGarbled

I think it's a reasonable request actually, as a one off

I agree. How ungenerous not to try and comply with a specific request for one afternoon.

So the neighbour’s work is more important than the builders’ work? They’re expected to down tools for the afternoon and no doubt lose pay whilst the neighbour does their far more important calls for their nice middle class job? Tell the neighbour that you’re not stopping them and they need to do their call elsewhere. I’ve done calls from the car, it’s not that difficult.

I think your neighbour is being really unreasonable actually. I'd never ask my neighbours to do this when they've paid for the workers to come out. Especially if it's a Monday to Friday thing because then it could drag into the next week and possibly cost them more money. I'd make do and take the important calls in the least noisy room of the house.

Too many people should really be looking for detached homes in the countryside. Reading mumsnet makes me really thankful of my own neighbours. There's dogs, children playing, bbqs, building work and nobody would ever complain. It's part of living around other people. Luckily nobody is a bit off a piss taker with loud music late at night and barking dogs are told to be quiet/brought inside.

Just because you think they were a dick, doesn't mean you have to behave like one too.

YANBU. It needs doing and they've had notice.
I speak as someone who works at home, not on calls but on work that needs a lot of concentration and focus. From about April–Oct there is almost always some building/DIY noise or other coming from one of my neighbours. It's just life and we all have to just deal with it. Employers and clients need to understand too; we're all in the same boat at the moment.

As for what to tell them, maybe 'I can't schedule the work like that, it just needs done. They'll do it as quickly as possible, obviously, in everyone's interests.'

All these people saying they can work elsewhere make me laugh. Rent an office space? Really, WTF?! I live in a rural area, I can’t just rent office space on a whim. I’m not allowed back in the office to work just yet as there’s not enough office space with the covid safe measures work have put in place. You literally have to get senior manager approval just to be on site if you are a home worker. I have a desktop PC not a laptop as I’ve historically been an office worker that didn’t need the portability of a laptop. So how would someone like me just work elsewhere?

The neighbours have asked, not demanded, and if it was possible to accommodate them I would. They may have had building work going on, but if you asked for them to not do XYZ for an hour at a set time do you think they would have accommodated you?

If they gave you an indication of what their "important" calls were for e.g. exams like a PP then it would be unreasonable to make noise. However if it is general work "important" calls then tell your builders to crack on.

I had building work ages ago and one of my neighbours complained directly to the builders. I told the builders to ignore her and contact me if she complained again as I would have politely explained to her where she could go. She has since backed down due to issues in her own home that caused alarming noise which trades were refusing to come out to fix for ages.

@Ohdeariedear

I’d agree for today. You have no idea what the calls are, for example, Dh has been having having cancer treatment and a lot of the discussions around options and treatment took place over the phone. Perhaps it’s something like that.

However, I’d probably say no to further requests. The fact that they’ve come and asked for your help today, for a specific window of time means I’d be more inclined to help this time.

∆∆∆This

Sorry but this is quite possibly the most ridiculous statement I have ever heard. No one expected work places to change the way that they have and some have changed permanently

Why though? For the builders this is their job. Should they cost and schedule every job to assume some outages whilst neighbours WFH take calls?

Nobody chose this situation at the beginning but there are many, many threads on here where WFH causes issues because most homes are not set up to be workspaces.

If employers want their staff to provide free office space ongoing then they also need to provide the supporting equipment and accept that they don't control the environment as they can in the office. At the moment they are still riding the wave of WFH being seen as a "perk" when for many people it simply isn't.

So the neighbour’s work is more important than the builders’ work?

Do we even know that the calls are work related?

I'd imagine this kind of thing is becoming increasingly common now more people are working from home. Perhaps for those whose jobs involve taking important calls the office is the best working environment after all?

Blossom It sounds like building work been going on a while and a first request though. I’d speak to them and see if you can compromise eg agree times and make clear it’s a one off. I’d hate to think I was making a difficult situation worse for neighbour and would hope they would show same consideration in return. For me if they’ve asked this once it means it’s important. It’s not always appropriate to wear headset or go elsewhere eg coffee shop for call due to confidentiality.

Tell them they need to pay your workmen for half a day's work if they can't work as normal. The neighbours should do their calls this morning or during the evening.

@C8H10N4O2

Sorry but this is quite possibly the most ridiculous statement I have ever heard. No one expected work places to change the way that they have and some have changed permanently

Why though? For the builders this is their job. Should they cost and schedule every job to assume some outages whilst neighbours WFH take calls?

Nobody chose this situation at the beginning but there are many, many threads on here where WFH causes issues because most homes are not set up to be workspaces.

If employers want their staff to provide free office space ongoing then they also need to provide the supporting equipment and accept that they don't control the environment as they can in the office. At the moment they are still riding the wave of WFH being seen as a "perk" when for many people it simply isn't.

This is a good point. Do we have a class issue here? Office work being seen as more important than building works? It would be relatively easy for someone to take their calls somewhere quiet. It may well be impossible for the builders to do their jobs quietly. The easiest to accommodate (the neighbour going somewhere quiet for the afternoon) would be the most reasonable solution surely?

You can't change your life for wfh neighbours.
Did they ask you if they could make noise? Tell him he'll have to find an office if he needs quiet.

If it's a once-off it's not totally unreasonable to see if your builders can find something else to do for 1 or 2 hours, surely. If they can't, they can't but does it hurt to ask?

@Porcupineintherough

I think it's a reasonable request actually, as a one off.

I agree. We had to ask our neighbours to do the same when DD had a really important interview. Although we did give exact timings.