building manager at work ruining my work life

[Vivbevorcath]

I work in an office of around 250 people in central London. I am in a senior position in finance, being a woman it has not been easy to get here over the last decade and i am performing well for the company and I am a good boss to my reports. So a valued employee and generally believed to have good behaviours (according to my 360 references and good end of year “behaviour” scoring .)

The office is open 24/7 because it is a busy industry, so working in lots of different time zones. It’s also quite an intense job where you burn out quickly. It’s hard to juggle with family life and most people can do it solidly for around 10 years and then need to take a break. I work 90 hour weeks, often work weekends, and have 3DC under 5. I often don’t sleep at night and I try to do my share of school drops and pick ups, so I feel like a headless chicken most of the time. The management team at my company acknowledge that I always go above and beyond, I win them plenty of business and I am a strong part of the revenue line which pays everyone’s salaries in our London office.

There is a man who is the site manager at the office who seems to have decided to make my office life a living hell. The reason is that I have lost several of my office passes to get into the building and have required new ones over the years. OR due to the fact I am always dashing about, I have unexpectedly had to go into the office and collect something and needed a temporary pass.

Over the last two years he has done and said the following which I find disrespectful to me and unkind:

• confronted me in the canteen, raising his voice and standing over me in front of 50 staff about me losing office passes and threatening to “lock me out of the building” if I do not return them
• sending constant emails to the whole office (250 people) telling them that I have lost passes.
• sent me bills to pay for new passes to be made
• followed me into the lift and said things like “I caught you. You were trying to get away from me but I caught up.”
• coming into my office and demanding I empty my bag and show him how many passes I have and which ones they are, while I am in a meeting
• my colleagues tell me he is constantly in and out of my office when I am not there moving things around and looking for things (I understand the office is not my property but if he goes in every day when I am not there, surely that is needless?) he then often sends me an email cc’d into the management saying that I have left a mess or I did not fill my bin properly or my plant is dying end needs watering or I am using an old version of windows that is not compatible with the system!!
• he has implied that he has access to all the security cameras and that he has seen me “up to no good” (I presume he means with the passes again!) he seems to think I have a visitor’s pass from long ago that I secretly use but honestly I have no idea - there is just a pass that I use (it is a plain white card… I don’t know if it’s a visitor’s or not)
• the final straw is I came in today to do someone a favour (some extra work for the CEO) and he has remotely blocked my pass! So I could not get in. The work was time sensitive, I was banging on the door, and had to beg the security at reception to let me in. I will now have to go to him and ask for another pass and be subjected again to all of this.

Anyway. I think I am done with this and might just explode at him. I know workplace safety is important but I think he has gone too far. AIBU?

This just doesn't add up. Most/every finance company in the city can just deactivate a lost visitor pass.

Irrespective of how often you lose your passes, this man is intimidating and harassing you. If there is evidence of his other behaviour aside from the emails, it is gross misconduct. You are not setting out to wind him up; you can certainly improve your pass chaos, but that's irrelevant. You are not creating the monster; he already is one. Send your complaint to HR, exactly as you have written it in your post and have your phone set to record, the next time you encounter him.

Misogynist Minion. The End.
💐💐💐OP I’m sure it is the most irritating behaviour ever but save your headspace for real life. This guy lives on another planet!

Losing security passes repeatedly at my place if work would be a disciplinary issue.

However this guy sounds like a prick.

Sorry posted too soon. Nail his arse to the wall, he is so wrong on so many levels.

@FeliciaMcAspieGreer

I'm suspicious that this is real. How could someone with 3 children under 5 work 90 hour weeks and still fit in school pick ups?

And have time to post on Mumsnet 🤔

You lose one pass a year, Op? That really isn't the message that you give in your opening post 🤔

Op you keep losing passes and he needs to keep replacing them. Have you looked at it from his point of view because if I was him I would view you as a security risk. You are making his job more difficult because he had to cancel cards issue new cards no idea what card you are using because you are using visitors cards. Having said that he should speak to you first if you continue to lose cards he should go to HR instead of sneaking into your office or addressing this in front of others

I'm intrigued to know what you paid for this senior role in finance working 90 hour weeks at various sites and all hours.

Surely if you're up the tree, then Rob will be told to pipe down.

@stuntbubbles - brilliant.

@Vivbevorcath why haven’t you formally complained yet?!

I wonder if he’d be so keen to behave like this if you were a 6ft4 bloke built like a brick shit house? Sometimes I doubt he’d be following you into lifts crowing how he caught you or demanding you empty your briefcase

He’s a bully & he’s doing it because he’s getting away it

Report it

Surely with 3 children under 5 you've been on maternity leave for much of the last few years and/or home working due to the pandemic? Have you had much time in the office to lose all these passes?

To the posters defending this man - do you think he would be behaving in the same way if OP was male?

Doubt it.

I'm also wondering how someone so important, highflying and busy can lose so many passes and cannot see why it is an important security measure to keep hold of your pass. I'm also struggling with how, if you're so important, you have got that far in the job if you can't sort out an issue with a building manager about a pass. No wonder you're working a 90 hour week as you're spending most of it hiding from Rob.

Report him to HR. His methods are not professional, however you need to stop losing passes. The whole first paragraph of your OP, is basically teeing up a justification of why you lose them.

His behaviour is way out of line, would he act like that towards a man? Unlikely. It's intimidation and bullying - he seems to have become fixated on you and a power trip. Formal complaint to HR and the CEO. You're trying to do work for the CEO to further businesses interests and are being prevented in doing so by this man who seems to hell bent on a personal power trip.

I work 90 hour weeks, often work weekends, and have 3DC under 5. I often don’t sleep at night and I try to do my share of school drops and pick ups, so I feel like a headless chicken most of the time.

What has this got to do with losing security passes?

Does he work for your company or is it an outsourced building management setup? I would write everything you've put into this post into an email and send it to the most senior person you can access in HR / Facilities (probably both) and let them deal with it.

One a year is a lot. I've been at my work for over ten years and still have the pass I got given in my first day. You need to take more care over your things but equally there are better ways to handle this from his perspective and he should have raised it as a security issue with your manager long before now. He shouldn't be harassing you.

It's very possible that if you are using a visitor pass inadvertently, that it has simply been cancelled. Our office routinely cancel visitor passes because people don't return them when they leave our office and it's a security risk.

Complain to the company he works for. They usually work for some facilities management company rather than the building itself. Tell them he's bullying you. Because that's what he's doing. I know exactly the type... On a power trip, trying to assert his 'authority' over you.

@Cam2020

Report him to HR. His methods are not professional, however you need to stop losing passes. The whole first paragraph of your OP, is basically teeing up a justification of why you lose them.

I agree with this. If you can manage all that you ostensibly are then you can find it in yourself to not lose security passes with reckless abandon. In certain industries this would really become a disciplinary issue due to the nature of the work.

@NoLongerTroels

Stick a ring doorbell in your office you can see what he gets up to in there when you aren't in. He's a plain old bully who seems to think a stupid woman couldn't possibly be as important at work as you seem to be. Fight fire with fire. Keep a diary of his bullying and invasion of your privacy.

Or maybe he’s just a bloke who’s job it is to ensure security is maintained and he’s passed off that someone who claims to be so busy, so important to the company, works all hours of the day and night AND has 3 children under r can’t even keep hold of their security passes! You’re advocating setting up a spy camera - maybe that’s what the OP needs so she doesn’t forget where she’s put her security passes so often.

OP, your kids won’t thank you for working 90+ hours a week. I would say the same if you were male BTW.

@Athena51

Surely with 3 children under 5 you've been on maternity leave for much of the last few years and/or home working due to the pandemic? Have you had much time in the office to lose all these passes?

Didn’t you see - she works 90 hours a week!