British Workers and their Tea Breaks

If a workman is going to be in a job at mine for longer than a day then Ill usually bake scones for them. It's like Kamchatka says, these guys are going to be in your house for a few days so you may as well have a good relationship with them. Think of it like a UK version of tipping!!!

Well,  I suppose up until now, and perhaps even still, I am somewhat socially awkward over this whole “cuppa” thing. 

With regards to workmen: In the States, unless it was a personal friend coming over to assist with some work, it would have never occurred to me to offer a "cuppa" and maybe not even then.     I don't drink coffee; rarely drank hot tea and aside from the occasional Starbucks, most of my friends didn't either.  I came from an iced tea / lemonade culture.    We went out to lunch together a lot but "cuppas" were not yet in my vocabulary. 

Workman who are only at the house for an hour or two would be assumed to take their "breaks" in their trucks between jobs. Those who were putting in an 8-10 hour day would break halfway through for 30-45 min to eat a bagged lunch or visit the local fast-food facility and they always came equipped with their own bottled water. They are there to get a job done and the sooner they do, the sooner they can move on or go home.  From my experience, workmen here in the UK are more casual.  They don’t always phone if they’re not going to show up.  If their scheduled work is outdoors but it’s raining, they leave it to you to figure that out. When does it not bloody rain in this country.    And few seem to be in a hurry.  We ordered a kitchen cabinet two years ago. Still waiting to hear from the guy.

Again with regards to “cuppas”, there is also the liability factor.  Do you really want to assume the risk of a visiting workman becoming desperately ill after you've served him?    Even if it wasn't your fault, try to prove it. We're pretty sue happy there in the States and I suppose this is why we tend to think of these things.  Granted, it kills hospitality.   

On a more social level with regards to family and friends, it would be rare that we’d offer each other a “cuppa” when popping ‘round for a visit unless by chance we already had fresh baked cookies just out of the oven or a party was previously "staged".  I don't feel we have to be drinking or eating something with each passing glance. 

Still, I’m trying to get the hang of it all. Trying to know when it’s appropriate to offer that “cuppa” and politely downing all those “cuppas” I’m served. It's a balance I hope one day I'll achieve. 

Maybe in the US it's a regional thing (I'm from Phila), because I definitely would offer friends tea or coffee when they came over.  In the summer it was more cold drinks, but not in winter.

I got used to offering workers in our house drinks very quickly because I like the tradition.  It never would cross my mind that someone would get sick from a cup of tea or coffee that I served them; that's just silly. 

It never would cross my mind that someone would get sick from a cup of tea or coffee that I served them; that's just silly. 

It never crossed my mind either. 

I don't think it's weird to offer workmen drinks. I always offered drinks in the US to workmen. I didn't specifcally offer tea or coffee like I do here, though.

Because I don't have workers over very often, I sometimes forget to offer them one and then I'm so embarrassed! 

It never would cross my mind that someone would get sick from a cup of tea or coffee that I served them; that's just silly. 

People are silly.  They'll make a case out of anything if they're desperate for money.  A family member's a lawyer.  I've heard it all.    But I agree with you, it is silly.  So I'm doing my best, though I still cringe a bit when I put milk into tea.  That concept is about as foreign to me as it gets. 

Of course, I offer them the tea we drink: decaf green tea

You have never seen people work so fast to get out of here! You would think we were serving them bleach!

This!

We don't drink caffeine, so we only have decaf tea in the house and we constantly forget to buy the full caf stuff. So guests get a choice of either decaf PG or whatever fancy herbal nonsense we're into. I had a plumber give our aniseedy throat tea a try once. I'm sure he was just being polite, but I'd call him back just for being adventurous. And one morning we had some furniture delivery guys by who actually requested the lemon ginger. I have to say, I was impressed they wanted to try out something other than just builders tea.

To the OP, I agree that taking breaks so often is just taking the piss. Time to start serving the herbal!

A workman coming to my house and expecting tea or coffee would be in trouble if I were the only one home. I don't drink hot tea or coffee, so I've never made either one in my life...not even for my OH in the almost 9yrs we've been married.

I usually offer workmen a tea if they are going to be over a hour or so. We had some in the house for 3 days, and as they were basically just taking over the downstairs, I decamped to the bedroom with my laptop and just told them to help themselves to a brew whenever. They only had 2 during the day, and at lunchtime I had one guy ask if it was ok to use the microwave. Best thing was one of them was heading to the fish and chip shop and asked me if I wanted anything bringing.

It's simply a cultural  tradition of hospitality to the visitor to your home that is common across the world.  It is nothing more than that, it is not about workers per se, but any visitor. If  you have to think about it, or micro analyse it, or question why you should do it, or not do it , then the whole point of the exercise is lost.

People are silly.  They'll make a case out of anything if they're desperate for money.  A family member's a lawyer.  I've heard it all.    But I agree with you, it is silly.  So I'm doing my best, though I still cringe a bit when I put milk into tea.  That concept is about as foreign to me as it gets. 

I was brought up in the US, and have always put milk, creamer or cream into my tea.  I've noticed it does seem a bit odd to my fellow Americans though.

We've got workers replacing our front porch today.  I had coffee, tea, sugar, milk, everything all laid out for them but they actually brought their own tea, sugar, and milk!

We've got builders in replacing our kitchen this week. I went out and bought PG Tips, freeze-dried coffee (hate the stuff but with everything in the kitchen scattered throughout the flat plus acres of boxed kitchen cabinets, appliances, etc., there's no room to make proper coffee), and about eight kinds of biscuits. Like Andee, I thought I could set it up and let them help themselves. Turns out nobody drinks tea, and I get maybe one person accepting a coffee per day. They are working incredibly hard--8 am to 7 pm, no break, no lunch. One guy goes out for one smoke a day. I keep saying "Don't you want lunch? You're working so hard!" They just laugh and say no, they want to keep working. They're all amazingly jolly, and their work is meticulous. They work seven days a week, they told me.

Maybe it's because they're Bulgarians, not Britons.

Maybe it's because they're Bulgarians, not Britons.

Bingo! We've had both British and a variety of eastern Europeans in to do jobs on this flat over the past few years and frankly, the eastern Europeans work circles around the Brits. Our limited experience has been that they have been faster, cheaper and have done better quality work. 

Hi,

A slightly different perspective for you all!

In my previous family business, we would do many calculations and one of them was the 'cost' to us for two 15 minute breaks for our staff. Over a year the cost was a smidgeon under £25,000 !

We'd also calculate the cost to us for when staff 'sneakily' took an extra 5-10 minutes here and there for lunch etc. Although an 'estimate' as we obviously didn't know 100% if everyone was taking sneaky extra minutes, we averaged it out at about £5000 in lost productivity time.

When our 'lazier' staff would then ask for pay rises.. ..   

Cheers, DtM! West London & Slough UK!