To think this is a strange way to do Secret Santa?

[Fancylike]

My office has announced a Secret Santa but has set a minimum price of £40. There’s no maximum but you have to spend over £40 on a single gift. I’m new to the company but every SS I’ve done previously had a maximum spend, not a minimum and it’s always been £5-10.

This just seems like a lot of money to spend on coworkers you may not know well (I work in a different department to the name I pulled so have to research them) and also having a minimum doesn’t sit well with me given the disparity in salaries across the office. I’m new so I don’t want to rock the boat by asking if the organiser got mixed up but it’s also been made clear we all need to participate.

I’d give the name you drew back to the organiser and say “I don’t want to participate, thank you”.

I don’t do our workplace one (never have) and they only spend £10. They ask every year and every year I say “no thanks I don’t want to. I hate buying presents, even for people I know, I’m not adding to my list.” I don’t want what will probably be a crappy/novelty gift back either. Bah humbug maybe, but I couldn’t care less.

So everyone participates willingly? Really?
Unless you are all hedge fund managers, I find it hard to believe everyone is in board with the budget. There is no way I would pay that much on a colleague I hardly know. I would also be mightily annoyed getting an expensive gift that is potentially absolute rubbish. Do they all gift the receipts as well? Sorry, but if this is true I would push back.

compulsory Secret Santa...

JFC, could there be a more effective way to make people hate their workplace? ;)

Ban Christmas at work. It's gone well beyond its sell by date WRT gifts and presents for ADULTS. Bah.

Even my close friends Christmas lunch gathering in only £20

Fuck that.

You should push back, you won't be the only one thinking wtf.

Also, it's voluntary. I always bow out of SS.

Every secret Santa I have done I have been handed the item BY the person so hardly 'secret'.

That's not how you do secret Santa. All the gifts are put in a box or a sack so no-one knows who donated what.

Madness. Limit is usually £5-10. I don’t spend £40 on relatives!

There are 8 of us in my workplace, we stopped doing secret santa when one year every single one of us bought Thorntons chocolates (we had a £5 limit and they did BOGOF that year). Seemed pointless.

How do they know how much something cost?

Buy some vintage tat for a tenner and say it cost you £50

DP has a family secret Santa as their only presents to each other, where the max budget is £15 so that's literally all he spends on his parents and siblings.

£40 budget for a random colleague!

Someone’s PA is having a laugh 😂

I took part in our (remote) office one twice - first time it never arrived and second time I got this cake in a can kit which would make a cake that was about two bites (and I looked it up and it cost £10 with postage)! Have never taken part again...

Again I'll ask how the recipient would know how much you paid for the gift, unless you leave the price tags on!

Or is there a "list" you have to choose from - OMG 🙄

Secret Santa is only fun if you know and like most of the people involved.

I do one each year with a group of internet friends, we've known one another around 20 years at this point, some better than others of course. We have a £10 limit, you're meant to send something nice but also its meant to be a clue as to who the giver is.. and then we all guess on Christmas day (ish) and post our guesses.

It is fun and no one is forced to take part - some people are VERY good at achieving both nice gifts and clever clues, and because no one is forced to take part, no one gets a shitty 'can't be arsed' gift!

I really can't see the point if its forced, you don't know the people you may get as recipient, and theres no fun guessing who your sender is!

I think a minimum means you actually get something of quality rather than five things from the pound shop that will go in the bin. However, a £20 minimum would maybe have been reasonable but £40? Compulsory? Very unreasonable of the company

As you are already well and truly in it and names have been selected, you can't really back out.

Personally i'd get a 10-15 pound gift from somewhere like a craft market stall, where no one will have the foggiest what its actual value is as isn't anything mainstream.
If anyone thinks you've been cheap and brings it up with you, look horrified you might have been ripped off by the random market trader you bought it from.

Or as others have said, check out the charity shops. Often items in there no one would have a clue were not brand new or lower price.

We've always had voluntary secret santa-the past few years people haven't wanted to do it so we haven't. No drama or sulking involved. It should be a choice participation, you can't mandate someone spending £40 (!!!) out of their own pocket.
If you feel you have to as a new staff member, do what others have said and shop around in sales for bargains which were originally £40. Even regift if you have anything. Opt out early next year when you are settled in.

I would spend what I could afford its secret anyway. And also shout out in the office if anyone has got you please don't spend that much as you know times are tough you won't be offended if they need to cut back etc so you don't feel bad karma wise.

You need the German tradition of Schrottwichteln. Everyone wraps up something they have at home and don't want - the tackier or crappier, the better (Schrott = rubbish) and then at the Christmas do, you swap them, Pass the Parcel-style or by putting them all in the middle of the table and each person draws one out. It's a good laugh, nobody spends anything and, very occasionally, one person's rubbish turns out to be just what someone else wanted.

Do you have to show a receipt for what you bought??

Yes, I definitely don't consider them "chic"....in fact, I don't consider anything American chic.

The Yankee Candles do seem a bit twee and overly cute-sy with their names. Like "Mommy's Fluffy Marshmallow Pie" and "Holiday Fireside with pebbles and Soda" kind of thing.

But the Americans love all of that stuff....log cabins, baking, fall, Thanksgiving, summer boardwalks, iced cranberry popsicles etc.....so I suppose it suits their market.

But like you say, not chic, as you would expect to find in an upmarket London hotel.

We used to do a sort of Secret Santa with a difference. You spent a max £5 (was a long time ago, I'd say £10-15 now) , and wrapped the present. On the night of the Christmas party, all the presents were put in a sack. An anonymous vote was taken to vote who was Santa. After the meal, Santa would don the hat, then rummage in the sack for a present. S/He'd feel it carefully (we used to pack things somewhat unusually), decide what it was, then present it to the person they thought would best suit the present. That person would then unwrap it, and Santa would move on to the next present till thed's all been dished out and everyone had one.

Absolutely hilarious after a few drinks. I think the 'bondage cufflinks' that was actually a bicycle chain (lots of us cycled to work) were the most amusing.

“Keep my name out the hat please I can’t afford/don’t want to spend a minimum of £40, thanks”
Secret Santa is not a compulsory thing it’s optional for a bit of fun but like others have said it’s usually £5-£10 maximum

Like I said there wasn’t an option to opt out. When the hat was brought around to me, they had already been around the office. It would have become a big deal for me to say I didn’t want to.
I don’t celebrate Christmas but others of the same faith or other/no religions are participating. It’s billed as an end of year gift giving and apparently is the first year doing it!!