To think being asked for money at work like this is not ok?

[xmasmoney]

I don’t know if I’m feeling sensitive about money and actually this is totally reasonable…

We have one dc in full time nursery costing 1500 a month. I work for a professional services company and we have a lot of support staff. We are seen to be paid huge money. However I am only on 63k and we are struggling so much at the moment, some people more senior are on well over this with grown up dc. A month ago a Teams message was started by someone senior saying does anyone want to pitch in for a gift for the secretaries. I found this very inappropriate on teams as it was difficult to say no in a group chat.

I know the answer in practice is just don’t give anything if you can’t afford it but I’ve since been chased on a separate teams message asking if I am contributing and when I ignored that I got an email.

I feel this puts so much pressure on people and think it is massively inappropriate thing to do at work? Am I being a dick?

@BouncingJAS ODFOD

you have no idea at all of the geographic location of women on this thread or how much they earn

bold of you to assume none of them live in London or earn similar or above salaries

Grow up. What do you know about, for example, how much OP's mortgage may have increased lately, or what other financial commitments they have?

You sound jealous and bitter.

You're getting a hard time here OP
Your income is irrelevant, it's how much disposable income you have - and it doesn't sound much

I tend to reply that I've already got a gift. I scoop up small gifts in the sales for admin, secretaries etc
, works out a lot cheaper and it's more personal
Might be an idea for future

@pretzelbreath and all the other comments are equally shitty. OP has not made herself look bad at all. It's all the "how dare she earn £63k AND complain about not having spare cash" people that look bad. Imagine being so self-centred that you can't imagine someone being tight for cash after paying back a plan 2 student loan, £1,500 a month nursery fees, mortgage, feeding and clothing their children, buying petrol, paying their energy bills, council tax. Yes of course other people will also be struggling, but it is the picking on OP purely because they earn more and therefore they can't possibly be struggling at all!

OP, you keep saying that your financial issues are because of nursery fees, but you said in your OP that these are £1500 per month. Given that you're on £63k and I presume that your partner is earning at least minimum wage, that still leaves quite a lot each month - more than some households earn in total even before childcare costs are factored in. Have you massively overstretched yourself on mortgage payments or something?

Do you ever buy a sandwich or coffee when you’re at work?

if you forgo one of those you can afford the fiver

£63,000 is still a lot more than very very many people (who have kids and housing costs, who need to eat and commute etc) earn- it isn’t an amount that should make anyone feel sorry for themselves.

@Vintageport Who the hell are you to tell anyone how they should feel?

The "woe is me" attitude in these threads when someone posts a non-poverty income is simply insufferable.

Enough. That £63k person is paying a lot of tax in order to subsidise the people that are complaining. On top of very high nursery fees.

Its astonishing this even needs to be explained to you folks.

There must be a lot of us bitter types about. Maybe the supply of Murphy's Stout needs increasing?

YANBU to object to the repeated asking. I would find this annoying myself. Although I assume they are asking you to chip in a relatively small amount? I would feel differently about this than if they were asking for hundreds of pounds.

YABU for using the word "only" next to £63K, when surely you must know that this is nearly double the UK average full time salary. This will get people's backs up and lose you sympathy.

Presumably £63K is also much higher than the salaries of the people you are being asked to buy gifts for; these are people who also have to deal with costs of living (childcare, etc) despite earning far less money than you. Show some perspective.

I’m just pointing out that if you earn that much you are in a privileged position in relation to very many others in society, and that is something to be grateful for, not to moan about.

Clearly though if people prefer to concentrate on what they don’t have and feel unhappy with their lot, then that is their prerogative.

Just reply to the email and say no, you don't want to contribute. That will immediately solve your problem. And please stop complaining about earning 'only' £63k on a public forum where people will be earning a hell of a lot less and struggling a hell of a lot more.

Did the sarky posters read the part where the OP said she has monthly nursery bills of £1500 and credit card debt? Just because she’s on £63k, it doesn’t mean she has loads of spare cash every month 🙄

Dont put money in if you can’t afford it, your family is more important. We had to stop foodbank donations for the last 6 months as I got made redundant and will only restart from this payday as it’s my first full pay packet. Got to think of yourself first sadly 🤷‍♀️

Happy to be a shitty person in your eyes then to be honest. Will await you slagging off every other poster in here rather than just aiming it at me because I dared to post my own salary. And actually it wasn't the fact that OP earns such an amount AND complained about not having spare cash that got people's backs up. That's a very simplistic view. The OP's mention of their salary was tone deaf. Their repeated comments about the secretary's earnings and their partners earrings are tone deaf. There was no need at all for the OP to claim they 'only' earn £63k. It bares no relevance to the situation in reality.

A lot of people are massively overstretched on mortgage payments at the moment due to interest rates suddenly skyrocketing. My friends are having to consider selling the house they bought in 2016 because they can't afford an extra 900 quid a month to service the mortgage.

The OP says she has been asked to contribute because she is "senior" but that the other people contributing are on higher salaries than her.

If the OP is on 63k with student loan repayments, nursery fees and suddenly having to find a lot more money each month because her fixed rate has come to an end, she's going to be a lot more strapped for cash than a "senior" colleague in their 50s on 80k with no student loan repayments, no nursery fees and their mortgage all paid off. But according to the company they are both "senior" enough to contribute to Christmas presents.

It's just generally a bad idea to make assumptions about what other people whose circumstances you know very little about ought to be able to afford on their salaries.

You're getting a kicking, OP, but £63k is not that much, especially not in London. I'm on £67k since July and have not had children yet because I wouldn't be as comfortable as I want to be; it's only recently that I've felt like it might be possible.

I don't know why the OP had to tell us her salary, as that was guaranteed to divert the thread into comparisons with others' earnings, but in principle it doesn't matter what she earns - she earns it and it is up to her how she spends it. I don't like assumptions about how much people 'can afford', whether it's for means-testing or expectations of generosity. Most people live up to their means.

I also think that buying gifts for the lower paid is condescending. They earn their money too. Lobby for them to be paid more if you want to help, but emphasising the hierarchy may very well make them feel patronised.

Not replying is not the way to deal with this sort of thing though. If you've ever organised anything in a work situation you'll know how annoying it is when people don't get back to you until the last minute then expect to join in, and how tricky it can be to know when to build in a deadline. A quick 'no thanks' to the organiser if you don't want to do it publicly (and why should you?) is fine.

That's hilarious. What a sweeping statement.
And have you never heard of 'Buy cheap, buy twice'?

They're chasing you because you're not giving an answer. You need to decide what you want to do. Do you want to say, sorry nothing from me this year as I'm struggling financially. Or would you rather pick a figure you can afford and suggest that? E.g. Hi money's a bit tight at the moment, but I'm happy to donate £20.

YANBU. Being asked once is fine IMO - you are on 63k and secretaries are on nowhere near that - but being hounded loads is too much. I would reply to the email saying as much. No response is a response - no.

Yes, if the general consensus is that the admin staff are hard up because they are poorly paid, surely the answer is for their actual employer to give them a Christmas bonus or even a pay rise.

People don't go to work to be asked for money, they go to work to make money. Being asked to buy/pay for things like that at work is just annoying. I used to work at a place where the receptionist regularly sent around an all-staff email to buy from their makeup MLM and it was highly irritating.

Having said that if I were struggling on 63k I'd be looking at my finances because something is definitely wrong there.

Presumably though the lower paid staff members are also affected by the cost of living crisis, nursery fees etc. But on half your income.

There’s truth in what you say but it’s not necessarily the case all the time. Some people on high incomes really do have little choice. Many people on low incomes have help in other ways. And there are very many people on low incomes who have significant wealth or very few outgoings (eg a lot of pensioners).

Don't pleed poverty with your 63K. Your nursery fees are the same as anyone else's with a child. And they are a choice.

Fine to say sory moneys tight this year but please don't pleed poverty you'll look a fool