Australia’s worst office lunch box thieves revealed

A MAJORITY of Australians now claim their lunch is being stolen from an office fridge, and many have confessed to taking others’ meals and snacks.

A MAJORITY of Australians now claim their lunch is being stolen from an office fridge, and many have confessed to taking others’ meals and snacks.

A new survey conducted by Deliveroo for Business has found that nearly one in two workers have had their lunch stolen at work.

The survey, taken by 1000 Australians, also found 32 per cent believe a food and drink ‘thief’ is in their office.

A further 15 per cent think it could be more than one person doing it. As for who their suspects are, 24 per cent think it’s the person who sits next to them, 23 per cent think it’s the office junior and 14 per cent believe it to be the CEO.

Across the country, figures obtained by News Corp Australia show the highest percentage of workers who believed someone had stolen their lunch came from NSW, where 39 per cent of workers said they thought it had happened in the last six months.

This was closely followed by Tasmania (39.5 per cent), Queensland (34 per cent), Victoria (31 per cent), South Australia (29.5 per cent), Western Australia (26 per cent), the Northern Territory (8.5 per cent) and the ACT (six per cent).

Lunch thieves are more common than some might think. Picture: Supplied

However, 21 per cent of workers in Sydney admitted to having stolen a colleague’s food or drink, followed by 11 per cent of Western Australians, 11 per cent of Victorians, 10 per cent of Queenslanders, four per cent of those in the ACT.

But no one in Tasmania owned up to pinching a colleague’s lunch despite Tasmania having the second highest rate of lunch theft across the country.

Overall, 14 per cent admitted to taking a colleague’s sandwich, 27 per cent have taken a biscuit that wasn’t theirs and 25 per cent have stolen a soft drink.

Jesse Howes, 30, from Prahan, who has had his lunch stolen in the past. Picture: Supplied

Marketing Manager Jesse Howes, 30, from Prahan in told News Corp his lunch was stolen a couple of times during his previous job.

“I’ve never been devastated about food before, when you’re in stress mode and you’re hangry and you’re looking forward to your lunch that you brought,” he said.

“It’s weirdly degrading when someone steals your food. When it happened to me I hadn’t labelled it but I do now.”

“It’s such a little thing in the moment, you think ‘I hate this person’,” he added.

“It’s your cowardly moment where you’re upset but don’t want to cause a scene about a $5 lunch.”

Mr Howes, who moved to Australia from New Zealand, said he found lunches being stolen to be more common in larger workplaces.

“I did have one colleague who took a few liberties and I’ve seen her eating my chips, but I’m happy to pull her up as she’s a friend,” he said.

“Now my lunch is clearly labelled and it’s a bright pink lunch box, so it’s easy to see if someone walks out of the kitchen with it.”

Jasmin Kelly, 55, of West Pymble, who has had her lunch stolen and she's also received many complaints as an office manager from other victims. Picture: Supplied

Jasmin Kelly, 55, from West Pymble in Sydney, told News Corp that she has had her lunch taken and she’s also fielded many complaints from workers.

“As an office manager, I have a lot of people complaining to me and it happens once every few weeks,” she said.

“It’s definitely more prevalent than when I started working as most people bought their lunch or brought in the old ham and cheese sandwich.

“Now they’re bring in Instagram worthy lunches but I’m not sure why people think it’s OK to go and grab what’s there and they don’t get caught.”

Ms Kelly says she now brings her lunch in and clearly labels it with her name.

“It still doesn’t stop people though, and I can understand if you’re getting paid monthly that things can get tight money wise and people might think it’s OK to take someone else’s lunch, but I’m not sure why they do it,” she said,

How jasmin kelly labels her lunch in the communal office fridge. Picture: Supplied

“I haven’t caught someone trying to do it, but I find that usually snacks are the first things to go, then lunches. They take the more interesting looking ones, not the boring ones. It really is weird.”

Ms Kelly said she’d even be in favour of communal office kitchens having a camera inside them.

“I would be in favour of that not just to stop lunches being stolen but because of how messy people are in these kitchens,” she said.

“They throw stuff in sink, it wouldn’t be a bad thing.

“When workers come to me with complaints I tell them to put their name on it, and I tell them if this is happening to you a lot, I say ‘Does it need to go in the fridge?’, as there’s nothing you can do to police it.

“I suggest they bring their own cooler bag, you see it on trains. People are carrying those more often now.”