Sharing an Office: Not allowed to use wardrobe

[itchyfanny]

Work in an office job. I’m currently rotating around different teams on a three year programme. 8ish months in each team.

I share an office with a direct manager. Two desks, two computers e t c. There is one wardrobe.

We are expected to have a fresh jacket and blouse etc ready in case a client comes in.

However, I’m not allowed to use the wardrobe. Even just to hang my jacket. I’ve been told it’s my current managers private one, so I have to hang things on the back of my desk chair. This isn’t very good for the structure of a jacket, and a shirt I just don’t have.

Did she buy the wardrobe? If not, and it belongs to the company along with all the other office furniture then she's being unreasonable. Actually, no, strike that - she sounds like a complete nutter.

How very strange. I'd say unless she provides you elsewhere to hang it you'll be using the wardrobe. Stand up to the craziness.

In my last workplace, they installed wardrobes around the office and took away the coat stands. This caused an uproar.

People were complaining because smokers were hanging their coats next to non smokers coats and polluting their coats with the smell of smoke. Fair enough.

The smokers got their own wardrobes.

Next on the complaint agenda was perfume. Someone was wearing strong perfume, or a lot of perfume and folks were saying my coat is smelling of perfume and it's making me feel sick/giving me a headache/pissing me off.

And no one wanted to put their coat next to a smelly person's coat.

The company brought the coat stands back.

trackpants, Iron Maiden tees and your gardening crocs

You've just described my current outfit to a T 😂

TBF mine at the moment isn't much better - sweater rather than a T, a decades old Puffa, and ratty old slippers. The trackpants were DM's and she died years ago, which is a bit of a tribute to the quality of the clothes Target in Australia sells, I feel.

Miss Glamour I am not.

Can I just ask why you need a fresh jacket and blouse if a client comes in - what's wrong with the jacket/blouse you would already be wearing?

That does sound weird you aren't allowed to use the wardrobe though - I would just get a coat hanger and hang on the back of a door then, if someone complains, direct them to the manager.

Work in an office job. I’m currently rotating around different teams on a three year programme. 8ish months in each team.

What did you do in your previous rotations?

This isn't legal. HSE require that offices provide somewhere - NOT the back of a chair - for employees to hang coats so that they dry properly. See https://www.hse.gov.uk/simple-health-safety/workplace-facilities/welfare.htm

In a casual sort of way as if it's no big deal. 'Oh, manager told me on no account was I to use her wardrobe, can I have somewhere to hang my wet coat?'

Who has a wardrobe in an office?

This is nothing to do with a wardrobe- it’s the manager showing she is more important than you 😂
Get back in your place peasant.

What if there's a terrible coat hanger accident when someone's hanging their coat up in the health and safety wardrobe? Who's liable for that?

Freshen up for clients...

Don't think much of the office-mate and would ask for a new office assignment since that's just ridiculous.

We are expected to have a fresh jacket and blouse etc ready in case a client comes in. However, I’m not allowed to use the wardrobe. Even just to hang my jacket. I’ve been told it’s my current managers private one, so I have to hang things on the back of my desk chair. This isn’t very good for the structure of a jacket, and a shirt I just don’t have

There's no way I could put up with this kind of pointless, petty, pathetic bullshit. Unbelievable bollocks.

Know your worth. Raise it again, and raise the perfectly reasonable points made here. If you're still treated like a second-class person then decide whether you deserve more.

I just couldn't put up with it, I really couldn't. I'd find any other job I could to avoid this kind of ridiculous crap. Honestly, I'm aghast at this kind of thing.

Sorry, am I missing something? What kind of office job do you do which you get so dirty/smelly that you are required to change clothes during the course of your working day?!

tell them that if they don't provide you with somewhere to put the clothes they insist you have there, what they think you should do with them.
And that "back of chair" is not a solution

I'd bring in a hook for the wall, one of the ones you can stick and remove.

I’m very confused. Why don’t you just wear corporate clothes (blouse, jacket) every day?

Then you wouldn’t need to store them.

WRT using the wardrobe for your coat, do you smoke? I used to work with a woman who was not allowed to use the communal wardrobe because she smoked and her coat stank. Nobody else in the team wanted to have her stinky coat making their clothing smell too.

Only thing I can think of. Otherwise it’s nuts and I think it would piss me off to the point that I would think about applying for another job.

This reminds me of "screengate" in our office. They were rolling out bigger monitors and there were much politics at play to ensure that the senior members were first to receive theirs. Honestly all hell would have broken loose had a more junior member received one before their turn in the pecking order.

In what other ways is your manager an arsehole? I would look for other examples and then raise a bullying complaint with HR... Either that or do nothing until your last day, then hide some prawns in the wardrobe.

That's absurd and would piss me off no end.

However, I'd probably buy on if these

BB Direct PACK OF 2 OVER THE DOOR IRONING HOOKS ~ HOLD 20 HANGERS https://amzn.eu/d/e9kpVBt

Then your stuff can be hung off the wardrobe door but it's not in the wardrobe.

At my last place the more senior you were the less likely your were to get a desk never mind drawers/a locker.

So much bewilderment about changing clothes to see clients! Very common in my area - law. I don't want to wear a suit and heels all day and (most) clients (probably) don't want to see me in my sliders and football shirt.

Manager sounds like a dickhead but some of the suggestions are mad and will burn bridges. You're only there for 8 months, hopefully then never to work with them again. Seems sensible to email either your training coordinator to ask where you can most easily store a change of clothes, or if you have any friends who are on the programme too in other offices, ask if you can put your suit in with theirs? Annoying not to use yours but probably not worth falling out over.

Buy a £10 rail and put it in the office

Yes. And don't let your manager hang anything on it.