Colleague charging electric scooter at work

[Whatt]

One of my colleagues has recently started commuting to work on an electric scooter, which is great for the environment and saves them money on travel expenses. However, the issue is that they've been using the work place plugs to charge their scooter during the day.

Now, I'm all for being environmentally friendly and reducing waste, which is something that our management team has been pushing for lately. They've switched to cheaper hand wash and toilet roll, and they no longer provide bottled water or tea, coffee, and biscuits in the staff room. I understand that these changes are necessary due to the high cost of living and the need to reduce expenses.

However, I can't help but feel like it's a bit unfair that my colleague is essentially getting free electricity to charge their personal vehicle while the rest of us are being asked to make these small sacrifices.

I'm also worried that if our electricity bill goes up, management may take away other benefits and incentives that we currently enjoy, without realizing that the charging of the electric scooter is the cause.

I'm not sure if my colleague is aware of the impact this is having on our electricity bill, but I feel like it's something that management should know about. I don't want to be seen as a snitch or cause any unnecessary conflict in the workplace, but I do think it's important to be transparent and fair.

Yabu = mind your own
Yanbu = they're taking the piss

I'm not sure "most" workplaces don't supply tea/coffee/water. My experience:

Supermarket - Free tea/coffee/water

Very large Insurance Company HO - Free water/hot tap. No tea/coffee. Vending machine with coffee like pish at 20p

Small Admin office - Free tea/coffee/filter plus biscuits

Larger Admin office - Free tea/coffee/filter/water/ Pish but free coffee vending

Small Office - Free tea/coffee/water plus occasional free lunch/ treats

Large Office - Free fruit, tea/coffee/green teas etc. free fruit and all you can drink booze on Thursdays beyond 5pm.

Never has anyone begrudged charging a device.

You totally want to snitch!

Or this is a reverse and you're actually asking if you should be annoyed with your colleague who snitched on you for charging your scooter.

I work 3 jobs.

Carehome: free tea / instant coffee and biscuits plus they do a really nice lunch for all staff. Choice of soup and a sandwich/ salad or a hot meal.

Corporate hospitality: free water/ tea/ fancy pod coffee/ endless lentil soup for lunch. Cold drinks coke/ Coke Zero but an unspoken rule of no more than a can per staff member per day. Often get free cake.

Local council, nothing. Access to a kettle / microwave. No one cares if you plug stuff in though. My phone charger / laptop cable have electrical safety stickers as they are sticklers for health and safety.

Wow I can't believe some people don't get free tea and coffee at work. If these companies can't pay for a few tea bags and pint of milk or two they shouldn't be still operating!

I guess it depends on the sector but still....

And no don't go and snitch on your colleague!

I once used an office pen to sign a birthday card before putting it in the out tray (with a stamp on, natch). Feel guilty to this day.

Public sector is entirely different though.

Loooking after employees is not what taxpayers want their money spending on. And when it comes to schools and such, we're basically seen as stealing from children/service users if a single penny is spent on staff. Even before budgets were so incredibly tight in the public sector, it just wasn't done to provide any perks or comfort items. And of course no Christmas parties unless we organise them and pay for them ourselves.

I mean, it's not the end of the world or anything. But this thread does demonstrate what other employees can take for granted, and what is perceived as making a 'good' employer.

Wow, I think I might be guilty of BU . I never realized how affordable it is to charge an electric scooter!

However, I still have concerns. If everyone starts charging their scooters, won't the cost go up? And where will we find the space to charge them all? Those things are pretty bulky, and our staff room is already on the small side.
I don't think management has caught wind of this yet, since they never venture into our humble abode.

But with the way they're cutting back, I'd rather have a well-stocked refreshment corner than a scooter garage. After all, it's tough times out here, and we all need a little pick-me-up.

Catastrophising much??

It’s ONE scooter. No evidence to say this is going to spiral out of control.

Go have a spa weekend or something

If everyone starts riding electric scooters then the world will adapt, who would have thought when the car was invented that we'd end up with all our roads lined with them bumper to bumper

I can only imagine the outrage from students if universities started offering free refreshments to staff. That's not how they want their tuition fees spent.

I wouldn’t care about someone charging something. However electric scooters are only legal on private land so he shouldn’t be using it to be commute. Also adults on scooters look like absolute bellends

Cross that bridge if and when you come to it.

The perks are already gone. Snitching on the scooter owner won’t bring them back. It will just blacken your name, because it is so petty

@Whatt how many of your colleagues are likely to buy electric scooters?

Back in the day all staff used to put a small amount in and buy coffee,tea,milk.
Can't you do this ?

My concern would be the legality of it being used for a journey on public land.

I used to do this. But people were using the money to buy breakfast supplies - bread, butter, cereals - which I never used - and often the milk would run out because it was being used for cereal as well as hot drinks.

This reminds me. A couple of decades ago, at my school we offered the children toast on arrival, as some of them left home at 7:30am for a long minibus journey to school. To that end, the school provided loaves of value sliced bread.

One day I forgot my lunch, and as I work through my lunch hour and there were no shops nearby, I made myself two slices of toast. As I was doing so i heard my classroom door open, and then shut.

Later that day I was hauled in by my head teacher to explain why I'd 'stolen' two slices of value bread. Whoever had looked in, had reported me to her.

Don't be that person, OP.

It's mental that her first thought was to accuse you rather than ask if you're ok, especially in that kind of setting.

It's not if you've worked in schools.

In one school I worked at, if the food bought specifically for deprived and vulnerable children wasn't kept under lock and key in a cupboard that only two people had keys to, rather than just in a staff only area or locked in a cupboard that staff used for other purposes, most of the 'nicer' stuff would disappear between the kids leaving for registration and set up the following morning.

Even emergency hypo kits in staff fridges (snack, lucozade, glucogen) across site - because if somebody's having a hypo, they aren't walking from one end of the premises to the other to the medical room where the children's hypo kits were stored - were regularly taken, frequently leaving the glucogen out so it was unsafe and had to be replaced.

'Well, I was hungry' doesn't cut much ice when it ends up being treated as a staff perk rather than an essential part of helping vulnerable children or literally somebody's lifesaving stuff being taken.

Lyntegid, that's your first priority? Whether it's legal? How does that affect you?

@NeverDropYourMooncup no but @saraclara is a teacher.

If one of my colleagues had nabbed two slices of value bread for their lunch my first response would be concern.

😂

Oh sorry, I see you mean your colleagues would have eaten it. But still!

Yeah, the phantom snack snatchers were also the better paid people in the school as well. It wasn't the TAs or cleaners that were taking the food out of other people's mouths.

I charge my phone and get tea bags, coffee (instant) and biscuits ... shame about the pay . If management aren't happy they will say