So I work at Starbucks as a shift runner and travel to work using a PEV (fuck paying for extortionate public transport fees and petrol). On Wednesday, I accidentally left some waterproof clothing that I use when the weather is shitty (as is often the case in the UK) in the back of house area that my manager had decided to clean out.
I had Thursday off so when I came in to get my stuff on my shift on Friday, I found that none of it was there. Apparently my manager was ‘sick of the mess’ in the BOH area so decided to do a deep clean, during which he threw out everything that was there, including over £60 of my personal clothing. He claimed that my belongings must’ve been in a ‘discard’ box along with a lot of spare uniforms and aprons that also got binned. It was £60+ worth of clothing, I earn £12.20 an hour.
When I confronted him, he laid the blame on me for leaving my stuff in the discard box and flat out refused to believe they were left elsewhere, he also refused to let me purchase replacement clothing and put the cost through company expenses.
The box in question had been there for months and had been used by staff who had forgot aprons and such to get spares when needed.
The one day I forgot to take my stuff home is the day everything in that box was thrown out, a possible 3 scenarios could’ve taken place –
1) my belongings were in the box, he didn’t check what was in it and threw it out anyway.
2) my belongings were in the box, he did check it, ignored that they were clearly not uniform and belonged to a staff member and threw it out anyway.
3) my belongings were where I’m 99% sure I left them (in a corner so they could dry off) and he binned them to prove a point.
I’m beyond pissed off, ignoring the fact that I’m disputing I left my stuff where he claims it was, even if I had left anything behind in a random box it in no way gives anyone the right to throw away my personal belongings.
I emailed the operations manager (his boss) to ask if I could run it through expenses as I wasn’t my fault (never been offered a locker in the year I’ve been here, and even if I did have one, mistakenly leaving property behind doesn’t give another person the right to discard it), she ignored my email and instead went straight to my manager to tell him that under no circumstances would I be reimbursed.
I’m at a loss on what to do, I’m saving for a house and £50 isn’t a small amount of money to shell out for replacement clothing.
Do I have any options?