where I work, with food, it happens constantly that employees take some of that food and before it goes to waste, they eat it. I’ve been doing it for the last 3 years. It’s really a lot of food.
Apparently somebody doesn’t like me and complained to our manager accusing me of eating some of that food. My manager and an employee who used to eat the food and even told me once to help myself, asked me if I took some of the food. ‘yes, like I’ve been doing for the last 3 years, exactly like him, otherwise it goes to waste.’
‘that’s stealing’ was all the manager said. ‘Don’t do that again.’
I just said fine and left it at that thinking that would be the end of it.
2 days later I get a letter from hr, asking about an accusation against me for stealing food and asking me to see them to tell them my side of the story.
It wouldn’t make any sense to lie at this point, because my manager and that other guy who used to eat that food before it goes to waste already heard me clearly stating that yes, and I don’t know who made the accusation. I did eat it, so I stuck to that story.
Stupid? Only you can decide, but would it have made any sense to claim otherwise at that point?
If this is something I should change in the future, how would I get away with it, or try to get away with it?
To those of you to the left tempted to write I shouldn’t tell on my coworkers, when one of my coworkers did exactly that, you really don’t see how stupid is that?
Where do you work? How hard is it to find a new job? How likely are they to fire you if you stand up to them?
The best case scenario would be that you and the entire staff stand up to HR and say that you were all led to believe this was permitted policy, and that if they’re going to declare retroactively that it isn’t, you all want a compensation raise because you considered this a job benefit.
Obviously you shouldn’t do this, though, unless you feel like you’ve got a strong position and you’re not afraid to find a new job.
If you’re looking for the safest option, I’d go with lie and deny: deny having eaten what you ate. Deny having confessed. Deny that you even work there if you have to.
Don’t bother throwing your coworkers under the bus. This is very unlikely to change HR’s reaction. They will punish you the same either way, they just might punish others too. There’s no benefit to you, so either stand up and fight or deny deny deny and promise you’ll be good.
ahahahaha, you sure are funny :D
your last paragraph is very true.