DAC Beachcroft has told staff not to steal toilet rolls and hand sanitiser from the office in response to the coronavirus outbreak.

The firm's HQ is based in the Walbrook building in London, which it shares with other businesses. It appears that the panic stockpiling that has swept the nation has now hit the firm.

A partner at DAC Beachcroft wrote to staff warning them not to take a five-finger discount to bog roll supplied at the office. "I understand from the Walbrook management team that there has been a spate of thefts from the lavatories throughout the building...of sanitiser dispenser and lavatory paper", the partner said in the email, calculating that "some 120 rolls" had gone missing "this week alone". 

A spokeswoman for the firm, who might be on a bonus per pun, said, "It’s mind bog-gling that loo roll has been ‘disappearing’ from the Walbrook building, where our Global headquarters are based, alongside a number of other firms. We understand that the Walbrook building’s management team is taking a paper-thin view of the matter. As good tenants we notified our colleagues, and asked them to keep a loo-k out.”

It is not the first time that the firm has become embroiled in a toilet-related scandal.


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Paddy's long game to smuggle out the sacred paper required 57 trips to the toilet per day 


A number of City firms including Slaughter and May, Clifford Chance, Hogan Lovells and Linklaters have been rolling out remote working and IT stress tests this week to prepare for staff to work from home. 

However, sources at Squire Patton Boggs in the UK complained to RollOnFriday that the firm has not rolled out a similar policy for all staff to work from home and so they will have to continue to come into the office.

A spokesman for the firm said there was a policy where staff could request to work from home, but that an office-wide mandate hadn't been given. The firm may not be the only City firm to take this line - let RollOnFriday know whether your firm has told you to work remotely or if it’s keeping you in the office.

In the US, a partner at Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan has contracted COVID-19. "We got results showing that a partner in our New York office tested positive for the coronavirus" said a spokesman for the firm. "His symptoms are minor, and he is resting at home."   

"Our No 1 concern is for the health and well-being of all staff," said the spokesman. He added that the firm was "taking several steps" which included a work-from-home period for the New York office this week. The partner, who has not been named by the firm, had been self-isolating at home since Monday 2 March "because of reported infections in his religious community in Westchester County", a suburb outside New York City.

Another lawyer, Lawrence Garbuz, has also been affected by the outbreak in Westchester County. Garbuz who is a partner of eponymous boutique New York firm Lewis and Garbuz, was diagnosed with COVID-19 last week and admitted to intensive care. The synagogue that he attended in Westchester County has been temporarily closed and congregants have been told to self-quarantine.

The lawyer's wife, Adina Lewis Garbuz, who is also a partner at the firm, posted a statement on her Facebook page saying that as soon as she was made aware of the diagnosis she "personally immediately contacted everyone in our firm and all were quarantined".

 

Tip Off ROF

Comments

Clean underwear every day 13 March 20 11:53

If I die of pneumonia I want to make damn sure I have a clean arse.  And I'm going to make the firm pay for it.

RoFlcopter 13 March 20 12:16

SPB management handling of the ongoing coronavirus issue is utter shambles and typical for the firm. No information on what to do with regards to WFH, but plenty of emails from the managing partner holed up in Manchester exhorting “harder work” and hawking “Covid-19 expertise” to clients via inane BD email handouts. HR telling people WFH is not an option in London, etc.

 

shocking firm

Anonymous Concerned 13 March 20 13:56

This raises a very serious point. If you are told you have to work at home, you would be using up your own finite bog roll resources, saving the firm the cost and increasing partner profits at your expense.  Firms definitely need a policy on this. We should be told. 

Lollerskates 13 March 20 15:12

A bombardment of SPB management emails today only after the ROF request this morning, no doubt. There is no policy to request home working. It simply isn’t true. SPB is years behind. 

Anonymous 13 March 20 15:54

SPB... where to begin... No pay rises this year, management forcing a move to an open plan office, HR refusing requests to work from home, important young talent leaving in the swarms.

LOLcannon 13 March 20 17:40

From SPB’s ‘chairman’ via email today:

”I would also like to stress that each of us has a responsibility to each other and to our business to stay as productive as possible as we navigate these challenging times. Please plan ahead in order to minimise any disruptions to serve clients and maintain a productive workplace, which is critical to our success.”

People could be dropping dead left right and centre and these cretins would still be calling to pump the staff and bill harder. Unbelievable

 

Anonymous 13 March 20 20:42

There is a virus which has spread unchecked throughout the legal profession and is ruining peoples lives. Its called SRA Corruption ; see the Trustpilot SRA Reviews

Anon 13 March 20 21:25

Really, why do firms not think before they send  such crass messages to staff?  In this day and age it’s naive to think that these stories won’t get out.   It’s embarrassing that a firm appears concerned about a few loo rolls.  It looks petty and tight.  It just shows what a joke of a firm this place is.   

Cautious Karpov 14 March 20 08:25

From SPB’s ‘chairman’ via email today:

”I would also like to stress that each of us has a responsibility to each other and to our business to stay as productive as possible as we navigate these challenging times. Please plan ahead in order to minimise any disruptions to serve clients and maintain a productive workplace, which is critical to our success.”

How about a new category in FOTY: Arsehole of the year.

 

 

A big name in Neasden 14 March 20 11:42

Typical fancy lawyers.  Think they're so much better than everyone else with their thieving.

They should punch a stranger in the toilet paper aisle of the supermarket like everybody else.

Anone 15 March 20 06:55

Not a bad suggestion Karpov.

Given how the majority of MPs/Senior Partners/Chairman of firms behave I suspect it would be a highly competitive category. 

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