Colleagues keep using my milk!

[Immo8]

I don't want to sound petty as in the grand scheme of things, milk isn't an expensive item and maybe I should leave this be, but it's really starting to grate on me...

Work in an office with around 30-ish staff, the majority are on shift work including weekends so people are in & out a lot. I work standard hours 4 days a week. The company provides tea & coffee but staff bring in their own milk etc. I buy a large filtered milk every month as it lasts and I only have a few cups of tea a day so makes sense.

However, over the last 6 months or so, people will ask me if they can 'borrow' some milk. I would never say no to someone asking but they NEVER bring in their own milk or buy one to replace mine that they've used over the weeks...

Today, I brought in a brand new milk, name on it, placed it at the back of the fridge so hard to find, and I've just gone to make a cuppa and it's been opened without asking, and a 1/4 of it has gone!

How do I word an email to my colleagues (if people think I should) that is polite and doesn't sound too petty?

What a shame. Write a label stating it has medication in it.

I'd just email & say, "This morning, the last drop (of milk) has veritably overflowed my magnanimous mug. I'm not bringing milk in any more, so you can fend for yourselves you lazy using fuckers...
Good Luck with that."

We had this in an office I used to work at. Lots of us were getting pissed off, someone organised then created a MILK CLUB and we all gave £2-3 a month or whatever to this admin person who bought it for the milk club members only each week. We looked out for non club members nicking our milk and said they were welcome to join the paid club!!

This is the answer. Get your own milk and keep it in a locked drawer of your desk.

@Immo8 , bring in a flask with your milk for a week but put some milk in the fridge laced heavily with laxative. Write clearly on the bottle ‘This milk contains laxative DO NOT CONSUME!’ Next week bring in a bottle similarly labelled but without the laxative, hopefully anyone who didn’t believe you the first time won’t want to repeat their mistake.

FoxtonFoxton you can be sure that this will be stolen before too long. In my old job everything that wasn't nailed down in the kitchen would soon go missing

Another vote for bringing a flask in each day.

if my sister had this issue at work i would tell her shes welcome to a few sachets of my breastmilk i got plenty just pop in a smaller normal milk bottle.Clearly label as yours dont touch,if they drink it inform them =p

Thats one way to put people off stealing ,but maybe just labeling it as such will help

I had to leave a snotty note when my salt mill disappeared from the porters' rest room. I knew it wasn't them and I was happy for other people to use it just not take it away with them. Four or five days later it turned up. I had already bought some table salt for the little salt pot that had run out. I have had to have the likes of macaroni cheese without salt. Not nice!

Lol or tight
iN the NHS we only got tea/coffee in covid, even got a sign saying as covids over no further tea/coffee will be provided. Crazy the difference something so cheap makes for moral

Don't do that 😬......I have heard of creepy ass men who get tuned on by the thought of breast milk.

Maybe get some 'Welpi'' 😆

It's bloody annoying, @Immo8 apart from bringing in a small bottle of it daily, don't know what else you can do?

If it was coffee, you could use coffee mate {horrendously expensive though}- but in tea, coffee mate is not nice.

That may not help …
In our school staff room someone took someone’s breast milk and put it in their tea !
Presumably accidentally!

Cheeky bastards, especially the cereal milk thief! Hope the bottle lock works well OP, let us know 😁

Someone at our work went in the fridge and used a colleagues item. Colleague thought they were imagining it. One day happened again, colleague caught them
And they had the audacity to say they didn't see the big deal! They were very stroppy about being asked to stop! So strange!

RUDE! Can you change the useby date? Or get your 4yo or a friends if you dot have one handy , to decorate it. Textas, playdough, paint etc . Nobody will go any where near it.

In one workplace, I used cappuccino/latte sachets which just requires hot water no milk. Bought them when they were on offer

You never know, some folks are so weird even dog milk wouldn't put them off 😂

What?? the NHS don't provide tea or coffee to staff?

That seems very mean.

I'm sure they waste millions on managers who come up with these ridiculous rules.

I worked as a volunteer in a 'specialist nursing home'' for years when we lived nearby, and there was a new rule that came in that said Volunteers weren't to get a slice of cake at afternoon tea time.

They used to have the most gorgeous home made cakes made by the cooks there, and as people funded their own petrol or bus fares to get there, a hot cup of tea with a slice of delicious cake was a morale booster.

They soon turned the ''no cake'' ruling around, as cake was going to waste!

Glad you've ordered the lock thingy but I'd be tempted to do something to the other milk too... like add salt. Laxatives seems excessively mean

It lasts a month without going off??

Oh no.... Yes, you are probably right...!🤣

What?? the NHS don't provide tea or coffee to staff?
That seems very mean.

Welcome to the public sector. No one gets free drinks.

Hopefully the search for that image hasn't tainted your search history forever 🤣🤣🤣

I too thought that!...However ''filtered'' milk definitely lasts significantly longer in the fridge compared to unfiltered milk.

{I think they suggest 7 days once opened and kept in a fridge}

I'd definitely not be keeping for a month though.

id get a smaller container and label it soup.

Some of new containers will keep things cold all day so just keep it on your desk, I did this, I would then put the normal bottle of milk in the fridge and squeeze lemon into it so it curdles.