Smoking in the workplace

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Balchy

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#39849 20-Aug-2009 15:03

Ok first of all I dont want this to become a smoking flamewar...some people choose to smoke...

anyway, my work is trying to stop the smokers from smoking in a public courtyard area - IE outside of the work environment and not even on work property.

Does anyone know if there is any minimum distance from a business entry way in which you are allowed to smoke, or conversley is there a distance from a doorway in which you are not allowed to smoke, and can they enforce this if you are in fact a decent distance away from any entrances and on public property....

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wellygary

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#249074 20-Aug-2009 15:27

Balchy: Ok first of all I dont want this to become a smoking flamewar...some people choose to smoke...

anyway, my work is trying to stop the smokers from smoking in a public courtyard area - IE outside of the work environment and not even on work property.

Does anyone know if there is any minimum distance from a business entry way in which you are allowed to smoke, or conversley is there a distance from a doorway in which you are not allowed to smoke, and can they enforce this if you are in fact a decent distance away from any entrances and on public property....

There are no minimum distances specified in the NZ legislation at all.

It simply mentions Workplaces, So I suspect you are not able to prevent people from smoking while not on the property.

vexxxboy

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#249075 20-Aug-2009 15:29

depends what your work is and if it is covered under your employment contract, i know that the health board here is strict on staff smoking anywhere near the hospital or out buildings and grounds

Common sense is not as common as you think.

Balchy

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#249076 20-Aug-2009 15:30

yeah, for health boards and stuff I can see the reasoning.....anyway I think my protests to date may have shut them up for the time being lol

Buttonmash

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#249082 20-Aug-2009 15:45

Smokers I've worked with in the past have tended to shoot out for cigarette breaks fairly regularly. Not sure if this is the case in your instance but I wouldn't want to piss my boss off if I was taking breaks I wasn't entitled to. It may end up being a "Sure, go ahead and smoke there. But from now on ONLY on your designated tea and lunch breaks".

Balchy

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#249083 20-Aug-2009 15:48

heh, not a problem with me, im not "one of those" only have 4 a day: before work, morning tea, lunch, afternoon tea :)

Asmodeus

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#249089 20-Aug-2009 15:59

Sounds a bit iffy to me. Is it obvious that the workers are from your business? Is there a uniform or anything like that?

They might not be able to legally stop them if it's not on the property

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Balchy

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#249090 20-Aug-2009 16:00

nope no uniform at all, after I have quoted them the smoke free workplace act etc, they seem to have backed down rather quickly, especially after I asked them if they were going to ask the homeless people to stop smoking there also

stagnant16

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#249102 20-Aug-2009 16:41

Buttonmash: Smokers I've worked with in the past have tended to shoot out for cigarette breaks fairly regularly. Not sure if this is the case in your instance but I wouldn't want to piss my boss off if I was taking breaks I wasn't entitled to. It may end up being a "Sure, go ahead and smoke there. But from now on ONLY on your designated tea and lunch breaks".

Ooops - Thats me ;-)

Trying to stop you smoking in a public area - What a load of bollocks!!!

8d52797c436

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#249137 20-Aug-2009 17:49

stagnant16:
Buttonmash: Smokers I've worked with in the past have tended to shoot out for cigarette breaks fairly regularly. Not sure if this is the case in your instance but I wouldn't want to piss my boss off if I was taking breaks I wasn't entitled to. It may end up being a "Sure, go ahead and smoke there. But from now on ONLY on your designated tea and lunch breaks".

Ooops - Thats me ;-)

Trying to stop you smoking in a public area - What a load of bollocks!!!

Yeah thats me too on a slow day haha. It's ok though, I make up for it by having my lunch sitting at my desk still working and coming in an hour early etc so the boss doesnt mind as long as the work is done, and I dont smoke in front of any clients.

However every time he actually sees me outside having a smoke he always hassles me about quiting and telling me that he will pay for the first prescription of drugs to help out. It's nice and all, and I thought it was cool the first couple of times, but its a weekly thing now for the last 5 months.

itxtme

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#249474 21-Aug-2009 15:59

8d52797c436:
stagnant16:
Buttonmash: Smokers I've worked with in the past have tended to shoot out for cigarette breaks fairly regularly. Not sure if this is the case in your instance but I wouldn't want to piss my boss off if I was taking breaks I wasn't entitled to. It may end up being a "Sure, go ahead and smoke there. But from now on ONLY on your designated tea and lunch breaks".

Ooops - Thats me ;-)

Trying to stop you smoking in a public area - What a load of bollocks!!!

Yeah thats me too on a slow day haha. It's ok though, I make up for it by having my lunch sitting at my desk still working and coming in an hour early etc so the boss doesnt mind as long as the work is done, and I dont smoke in front of any clients.

However every time he actually sees me outside having a smoke he always hassles me about quiting and telling me that he will pay for the first prescription of drugs to help out. It's nice and all, and I thought it was cool the first couple of times, but its a weekly thing now for the last 5 months.

Champix, legendery stuff!!

kirkA

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#252089 1-Sep-2009 05:52

I used to work in and ad agency where everybody smoked, in the office. We even lost a client once because the marketing manager was pregnant and someone fired up a cig in a middle of a meeting with her (-:

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ZollyMonsta

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#252094 1-Sep-2009 07:18

Seems like a load of rubbish and not that legal.

(coming from an newly ex smoker of 10+ weeks and still going strong)

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Balchy

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#252100 1-Sep-2009 07:39

ZollyMonsta: Seems like a load of rubbish and not that legal.

(coming from an newly ex smoker of 10+ weeks and still going strong)

Congrats on the quitting, not an easy thing to do, I'm trying to cut back with a view to quitting, I've been smoking for 15 years now, the scary part is that is more than half of my life..

tonyhughes

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#252102 1-Sep-2009 07:49

Balchy:
ZollyMonsta: Seems like a load of rubbish and not that legal.

(coming from an newly ex smoker of 10+ weeks and still going strong)

Congrats on the quitting, not an easy thing to do, I'm trying to cut back with a view to quitting, I've been smoking for 15 years now, the scary part is that is more than half of my life..

4.5 years since cold turkey, not even a single puff.

Blimmin hard! But so happy, for a multitude of reasons.

Couldn't go back now!

Good luck to anyone who takes the step!

Kaos36

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#252545 2-Sep-2009 12:58

Funny thing my last boss was so damn laid back that he encouraged us to go outside and have a smoke whenever we needed too. This came as a surprise for me on first day he told me the layout - have lunch whenever you want if i want to work till 2pm then have lunch fine, have a smoke whenever you want. After a month i knew why he encourage this. The work was so boring being inside a room with 3 others with windows that were covered with that glass type you see in 1970's buildings we couldn't even look outside while working on the PC's all we had was the radio to keep us in contact of the outside & apart from going outside for a smoke which we use to do often. I had to learn an old Linux program last update was 1996 so was working in a dos type box all day banging out numbers. Job was road contracting - businesses would ask us for the road data and he would send out the drivers to meassure the road we would collect the data and put it into reading material he then would sell the data depending on the length of the road anything from 8k - towns to 25k cities. We would get on a busy season anything from 4 contracts a week. He was making a mint from this bussiness plus he had 25 years experience as a driver so knew the in's and outs.

Anyways after a couple of months i changed jobs as working in a boxed room all day just about drove me crazy if we had see-through windows i wouldn't of mind.

Sry went of topic A bit your thread just reminded me of the job where smoking was encouraged! lol

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