Boss's ex wife

[ThisPinkEagle]

I work for a small company (there's about 25 of us). My boss (45) left his wife over Xmas after having an affair. This new woman he is with has the same name as me (I am 35). I am also married.

I man the main phone line in my role at the office and when I pick up I say hello you're through to 'Jenny' at....how can I help? Two weeks ago I got a call on the office line with a private number. Picked up and was met with 'are you the prostitute' then the phone hung up. Another call shortly after asking for my boss, I asked who it was an was met with a woman screaming down the phone that she was his wife and I am a slag, she ended the call again. This continued to the point she was getting her young kids to call the office line asking for daddy and then yelling down the phone saying 'girls you're speaking to daddy's new girlfriend who he left us for'.

Alot of people call us back from private numbers if they have had a missed call from us to find out who we are so ignoring them is not an option as we will miss work calls so we have now had to get another guy in the office to do the initial call answering before they can be passed to me.

My boss (who owns the company) is telling us to just leave it and it'll eventually blow over but I have had to get my own husband into the office for my boss to explain his life story to him in case she tries to contact me over social media and my husband suddenly thinks I am sleeping with my boss. The other guy in the office is getting increasingly pissed off he has to stop his quite frankly already very busy job to answer the phone in case I get screamed at. My boss is my HR....he's apparently called the police but she's not stopping and they've said there isn't much they can do.

Myself and my colleague are now at the point of frustration and we have no idea what to do. It is now affecting our jobs and office atmosphere which before now was absolutely lovely. It's only me and him in the office (the rest are guys out on the tools) and he is not always here and I lock up on my own three nights a week whilst he does the school run and I am terrified she might turn up one night if it continues to escalate.

I have explained to her in the calls, I am not the woman but she just isn't having it. I have also logged it with the police myself.

No it's in case the ex wife tells the posters husband she's having an affair. I mean what would you think if your partner's employers wife contacted you directly in person to say you were having an affair?

Also everyone saying use a different name...the op is the only woman in the office, it's not going to stop the wife.

Op you need to tell your boss to contact his wife and convince her it's not you or that you and your husband will

Had a similar problem at my work. The employee was given a different name to answer the phone with.

Ask the boss if you can do that. They can let other employees know that 'Mary' is actually you

Your boss has a duty of care to protect you from harassment at work. He needs to be removing you from telephony work and ensuring you are not alone in the building and/or any reasonable arrangements you see fit to ensure you are not harassed. If he refuses you need to put in a grievance. Consult ACAS as this is a serious breech of his responsibility to you.

Repeated

She sounds completely unhinged and should not be in charge of children.

Genius! This OP. Call yourself another name.

God I couldn’t be arsed putting up with this at work. I’d give her the full name of the woman and then tell her to fuck off harassing you from now on. Then go off on sick. If boss isn’t prepared to resolve the issue himself, then lay it out in simpler terms to the wife yourself. Realistically what is your boss gonna do about you telling someone to fuck off when this is a problem he created for you in the first place.

We had similar at work about 15 years ago. Boss had a affair with a colleague and left his wife for her. Wife would call the office at 10am, drunk, demanding to speak to the ‘slut.’ We didn’t have a designated receptionist, if the phone rang whoever was available answered, so poor little colleague was taken off phone duties in case wife called. But not before wife hurled so much abuse at her that she needed two weeks to recover, boss in tow, in the Caribbean.

We all knew the wife well and felt she had been badly treated. So when she would call we would try to calm her down, be kind, basically show empathy. Wife would tell us allllll his dirt - he has no money, it’s my house, he owes XYZ, and really really personal stuff about how he scratches his asshole and constantly has feces under his fingernails (I know!!!). So he wasn’t the catch colleague thought he was after all…

Real boss got involved, checked the accounts and found many discrepancies about expenses. He stormed in one day and gave them 10 minutes to get out.

Last I heard, they were living in her two up, two down in a dodgy area. He’s in his seventies now and it turns out the only way he afforded the 30% in the company and all the likes was through the wife. She’s doing great by the way - she’s not his carer.

Very pathetic of your boss but can you stop answering the phone with your name.

Instead of
Good morning, Bensons, jenny speaking, how can I help you.

Say
Thank you for calling bensons, how can I help you?

Would that possibly help? Maybe try that.

I can see why he left her. He needs to sort her out and get the children away from her.

In a way I feel for the woman. Her husband leaving her and the kids for another woman at Christmas is unbelievable. However, that does not give her the right to carry off like this and harass his staff.

If I were you I would refuse to answer any phone calls. At all. Make this clear to him. Tell him you are being threatened and harassed by his ex and that you refuse to answer any calls whilst this situation is ongoing.

This. But that horse has already bolted.

I have had to get my own husband into the office for my boss to explain his life story to him in case she tries to contact me over social media and my husband suddenly thinks I am sleeping with my boss.

Why would you have to do that, why wouldn't your husband believe you?

DO NOT ENGAGE with this woman. Answer the phone generically instead of giving your name. If she starts, tell her you are ending the call due to abuse and hang up. If she calls back, hang up. Tell the boss you need the calls recorded. Talk to your boss about what you need in this situation, and that waiting for it to blow over is not acceptable. Tell him how stressed this is making you. Tell him you need to see him sending her a cease and desist letter, or you are not sure if you will be able to continue working there. Consider going on stress leave.

OP, this sounds really stressful. I don’t understand why your DH needed to speak to the boss though. He really should have believed you.

Another poster said to treat this like stalking and I think that’s excellent advice. Record every incidence. Speak to the police again.

I don’t have a legal background but I’m sure your employer has a duty of care to keep you safe. Someone more knowledgeable than me may know if his failure to deal with this and keep you safe could be constructive dismissal.

I worked at a debt collection agency and we had many unhinged customers who would make an awful lot of threats names were regularly changed because it's just not worth it for minimum wage

I know you shouldn't have to but could you use your middle name when you answer the phone?

Some are commenting without reading the post properly. The OP states that there's only two people in the office - the OP and a male colleague. There is no point in calling herself another name, if she's the only female in the office (and probably the company!). The ex-wife will know the OP's voice. There's no other woman the OP can be. The company is very small. The owner of the company, is her boss, and also the HR department and probably payroll too!! OP, you need to have a honest and blunt conversation with your boss. He needs to understand that you are an employee, and he has a duty of care towards you. You should not be in this position, and he should be taking steps to stop his exes behaviour. Sweeping it all under the carpet, to protect his new girlfriend, is not acceptable. Refuse point blank to lock-up at night, you don't feel safe. You are no longer answering the phone, in which case he will need to be there to do that. If he can't go out of the office to do other jobs, then that's tough. You will be reporting any instances going forward to the police. It's his ex, his company and his responsibility to sort the problem out, not yours. If he wants the office to go back to normal, then he needs to take action, not being a complete wimp.

Your boss is being very unfair - he’s happy to use you for a decoy while he and OW have a quiet life.
I would feel very vulnerable - who knows what wife will do to you if angry and upset?

Could your husband (or you and your husband) speak to wife about the mistake and convince her she’s barking up the wrong tree? Obviously you can’t alone and your boss won’t.

You can bet your life that if his new mistress was answering the phone, he would have had the police involved properly, CCTV installed, phone screening call equipment and solicitors letters sent by now!

But noooo he's letting you receive the blunt of his misdeeds?
Nah, that's a mediocre manager that one.
As most have stated, he owes you a duty of care.
Note down every single call with info (time, date, what was said etc) and keep a log.
He needs to man up and speak to the ex and TELL HER that his new squeeze is NOT YOU.
He needs to get systems in place for your safety, or else you will tell the wife the real mistresses name and the mistress can crack on with the fallout.

what a despicable man for throwing you under the bus to protect his new life.

Tell DBoss he better make it stop or you will seek legal advice. And it will be him in trouble as he has put you in a position that risks your safety.

I had something similar happen to me when I was a young receptionist. A male colleague had split up from his wife, although there wasn’t another woman involved to my knowledge. She was a psycho & took it upon herself to call him at work and I was left fielding the calls. When I wouldn’t connect the calls to him she accused me of sleeping with him and called me all the names under the sun. I got so sick of it and there was no support from the management. So when she called again and he wasn’t in the office I just said to her “why on earth would I want to sleep with him. The guy is a w**nker you’re well rid!” She was stunned, agreed and never called again.

So 'just in case', the OP has had to organise this meeting in order to pre-emptively reassure her husband that she's not shagging her boss? How is that normal? My word would be enough for my husband. His only concern would be that some lunatic woman was harassing me and that my useless twat of a boss wasn't doing anything about it. There's no way I'd need to organise a meeting to assuage his insecurity. And, even if there was any meeting, it would have a very different agenda.

It's very odd to have to bring your husband in to hear from the boss that you're not having an affair. So he'd believe him but not you? How mortifying for you that people at work had to see that was the case.

I have no actual advice. So I'm going to give you ridiculous advice. I'd start answering all calls differently "Hello this is the sperm donation centre, you wank it we bank it, how may I help you today?" "Hello you've reached the national centre of swear management, have you reached your quota of fucks to give and need to increase your spend cap?"

I mean it seems like he won't care until it starts to directly effect him 🤷. And you're simply coming up with creative ways to deter nuisance callers.

Or yeah just answer as a different name. Tell her the other one was sacked for tracing people's personal information via phone hacking and selling the information from incoming calls to scam artists?