www.iva.co.uk

Hi,

Just sat and worked out that I’ve “contributed” nearly £50 [:0] this month in work collections (made up of various sponsorship/wedding/sickness collections). Talking with other (solvent!) members of staff we’re all getting fed up with the frequency of collections and amounts expected. Anyone else get this type of “pressure” at work?

If you’ve ever seen the “Geordie Georgie” sketch by Catherine Tate, you’ll know what I mean! [:)]

I have made a point of refusing to 'put in' to these. There was one a couple of weeks ago, and I said something along the lines of "I'm going to give these a miss from now on" - I'm sure everyone thinks I'm a scrooge now - but they didn't do anything for my 30th in February (not even a card), so as well as improving my cashflow, it also has personal meaning to me!

Hi,

I agree, all these little donations add up and can cause us stress if anyone can't afford to "put in".I've introduced a policy that our offices do not have any collections.If its a birthday/wedding,a card /gift is paid for by the company. Might be worth speaking to your manager for options available?

Where I work we don't have collections for birthdays. Some of us girs buy each other a present, but there is a ceiling of £10, so that isn't too bad, and because we are a small office, and not everyone does this, it is not a problem at the moment. Obviously if people get married we bung some money, but I think all our weddings have gone now. We don't tend to have much in the way of sickness collections either.

I do a lottery syndicate, but that's only £1 a week and you don't have to belong. It certainly doesn't add up to £50 per month, I would definetly draw the line at that.

The only other thing we do is provide cream cakes on our birthdays.

We are an office of 12 and the girls (8 of us) put 2 pounds into birthday collections, unless it's a 'special' birthday in which case we put in more. We also have to buy cakes on our birthdays!

We also have a compulsory charity donation of £2 per month which I am responsible for collecting and distributing. You wouldn't believe the problems I have getting £2 out of people - 'sorry, I haven't got it as I had to put petrol in the car' etc! I wouldn't mind but everyone knows I collect it just after pay day!

I would definitely draw the line at £50!

I'm a bloke so only have to remember the wife & daughters....sorted!

Is this charity donation compulsory because of work? I wouldn't like that at all. I do donate to charity, but I would hate to be told that I had to. I am always bunging the odd quid to the collection tins, and I am a member of RNLI (even though I live nowhere near the sea!)

We have a dress down day every Friday and if you want to take part you pay the £2. Everyone is welcome to suggest a charity, but people rarely bother so I always end up choosing.

Charity contributions of my choice are taking from my wage at source, the wifes work is as bad as tiggers place, it costs her a fortune in birthdays/weddings/leaving/baby etc...
I only contribute to people retiring now, that way everyone knows where I stand.

I don't know where all the collection thing and cakes comes from. I never had to do that when I started work, it was only for weddings and leaving that we had collections.

We can't do a dress down day on a Friday as we wear a uniform. I take it Skippy that you don't have to dress down if you don't want to?

Hi,

It's the amounts we're expected to contribute that causes concern. A quid or 2 here & there wouldn't be that bad but we're talking about £5 or £10 a collection at my office. I've even just found out that there's another £10 wedding collection next week!

Even if you're not around they "throw in" £5 or £10 on "your behalf" !!!!

If you don't want to pay the money that's fine, you just don't dress down and vice versa. You'd look a bit out of place though as we're all in jeans or combats but it's your choice!

Such a tricky issue this one. Really is a case of "damned if you do and damned if you don't" in many instances.

A pound or two here and there is not so bad as Tigger says but when it is more, and especially if it is a very regular thing, then already tight budgets can be seriously compromised. However, people don't like to be seen as mean, and they certainly don't want, in the vast majority of cases, to let others know of their financial situation so sometimes you can't win either way.

Hi Tigger,

I know exactly what you mean, whereas pre IVA we probably wouldn't have thought twice about it.

I work at a secondary school, in september we all put £10.00 (about 80 poeple)in a fund and any weddings, retirement, illness, babies etc comes out of there.

I work with 6 other admin girls and we just by a pressie for about £5.00 for each birthday.

If I was you I would have to put a stop to it or come up with another idea, I just couldn't do it now[:)]

We have similar situations in our office but luckily most people just stick in a £1, unless you personally feel you want to put in more so that works quite well and at least then you don't feel too much out of pocket.