How can I politely say no to this request?

[Fedupandstressed]

I’m an Ea for our SLT. I volunteered a couple of years ago to be ‘milk monitor’, as in taking their £5/month and buying the milk, tea, coffee and biccies for the 9 of us. No issues so far. I nip to Asda twice a week on the way to work. I get the bus btw and all the money goes via a dedicated tea fund Revolut.

Now a fairly new member of SLT, has asked the other departments (over 100 people) if they want to join to save on the multiple milk situation in the fridge, and asked me to organise this. So I’d have to organise a regular delivery and payment AND be responsible for chasing every single person for their money!

I'm not a purchasing clerk, or what they’re called. I do this for our team voluntarily.

How do I politely say that sorry, but it’s beyond my remit!

I've worked in the private sector almost all of my working life, current firm since 2006, and it's only in the last 4 years coffee tea and milk has been provided. No other employer provided it either.

In all honesty, I am se or management in a team of 60 ish staff and it’s the job everyone hates! It’s a huge pain getting those who can’t be bothered to pay, so as pp have said maybe suggest you’ve about this voluntarily for a long time and can i
someone else take the reigns now

The Council I used to work for made everyone bring in their own supplies for a while. It did not work well. Each fridge held lots of tiny containers of milk in various stages of freshness. Needless to say, some got forgotten. Visitors could only be offered whatever their host liked to drink (or water). I remember a visitor asking for decaf coffee, but no one in our small team drank decaf.

Yes it's common.

I would just give them a flat out no. I wouldn’t worry about being polite about it. If the employer were providing this stuff, it could reasonably sit within an EA’s job description. But no way should you be required to do any kind of informal arrangement for that many people.

In NZ it’s in everyone’s contracts that tea coffee and milk is provided. It’s still the bain of the office manager and Team Assistants jobs.

We have alot of analysts type of people and It got really out of hand they started “needing” speciality milks, so we had that for a while and now it’s just gone back to cow and soy I think.

We have toasters as well at least. And a refs room with about 5 huge fridges.

Reply that it is only sustainable for you to continue as you are doing. No can do, sorry.

Also suggest that a YEARLY payment for milk could make it easier for the boss to organise a regular delivery.

Long Life milk could be an option too.

Excellent reply OP.

FWIW one of the situations I ended up dealing with as a school governor was around tea/coffee arrangements which was exactly as you described - started small, grew, got complex with allergies etc. In the end it was determined that this would be centralised by the catering team.

In my day job we have free milk, and people have started having absurd amounts of cereal, protein shake powders etc. There’s also weekly fruit which would be enough for everyone to have a piece a day but is gone by day 2 as people take it home. That might be fine for a larger company to absorb but you absolutely don’t want to be the monitor of how people think their own money will be spent!

Sounds like that person want’s your position as Milk Monitor. Happy Days. Hand over the reins.

@Fedupandstressed tell the person that suggested the arrangement and nominated you as the purveyor that you think it's an excellent initiative that you hope works for them and hand over helpful hints as you don't have the time.

Tea coffe and milk should be supplied by the company. Honestly! This is basic employee welfare. If then people want specialist tea or milk they buy themselves. Cant believe they ask one person to organise £5/month collection to 1000 ppl and deliver it to the office!

This. CF joins team and does this? My answer would be do it yourself or GTF.

Rubbish. Not on planet normal.

You have never worked for the NHS then.

The only time tea and coffee was provided was when I started to work in a private hospital.

OP Just pick one of the excellent replies up above.

God yes - and the thought that the CF (there's always one) who didn't pay their subs would then demand to have their share of the winnings even though they didn't pay that week. Horrendous!

What a burden to put on you.
Just laugh and say no, it's too much.
Tell her it's her idea, she should do.it.
You're being perfectly reasonable. She's being cheeky.

Yeah but who's paying for it? OP will have to spend her own money and try and get it back from a 100 people. Total joke from new manager who is trying to make themselves popular while dumping on OP.

That’s a brilliant response, so well written and effective while professional

Sorry I’ve just seen you’ve responded to them

Might be outing if she’s on here. Ooops

Disappointing that a female SLT has done this. Our employers (both male and female) have always protected female and early careers staff from being seen as default providers.

What you’ve sent is fab. They’ve done you a favour - one less job for you to do! In all of the schools I’ve worked at, they wouldn’t provide toilet paper and electricity for the kettle if they felt they could get away with it.

I bought the soap for the staff toilet at the last school I worked at (along with just anything I needed for the classroom) as the only time it was provided was during OFSTED (funny that!)

In the Public Sector (or at least my part of it), we have to provide our own tea, coffee, milk,etc.

@Fedupandstressed great response. Polite and professional.

In a job I had not so long ago the PA to the college SLT used to go and get their lunches from the college canteen facilities. Fair enough. However in the holidays when they were in the college she would actually go to a supermarket before work and buy them sandwiches/ lunch etc - including drinks. They were grown men with wives and kids but she made it something she did and they let her do it but always had a little moan if they didn’t like what she had chosen for them. Utterly ridiculous and everyone knew this. Good on you.

Yes agree with this. I managed to get SLT to agree to purchase tea,coffee etc as staff welfare.
it was such a faff otherwise and didn’t work out that expensive in the end.