Get her one of those plug-in scent generators in "new car" scent. If that doesn't work, maybe just leave your dirty laundry in her office and await clean clothes. Lol.

Time for her to talk with her boss about finding her another place to work from. You aren't the problem, she is. She needs to find new digs. And I might offer her good luck finding a place that's totally free of laundry detergent, fabric softener, and dryer sheet odor.

I fully understand her problem. Most fabric softeners and some perfume/colognes are poison to me--I seriously need to exit the area and use a rescue inhaler. On the other hand, cigarette smoke doesn't bother me much, if at all.

In the workplace environment, I would DEFINITELY involve HR in the resolution. Hell, present jointly to HR to show that it's a problem toward which you are both willing to find a solution.

Personally if you cater to her requests- it'll always be something more, something else- But always something.

Talk to whoever handles cube assignments at your company and get one of you moved into another cube.

It should be too simple not to do it. She should be moved near where the ventilation supply is vs the exhaust.

My wife also cannot be around the very strong laundry odors from dryer sheets and detergents. I can't stand next to someone whose clothing smells like toxic perfume. It's a thing in this country, frankly totally out of control, including the plug in smell control things.

The solution is simple...stop using the scented stuff. In short order one will realize why so many of us find the attack on our senses so uncomfortable.

I personally think she needs her own office with an air purifier. I'll have a friendly chat with HR tomorrow. I'm willing to be moved as well since me being at my cube is a rarity. If I'm at my cube regularly, business is not going well.

We've been doing laundry like this for years and this is the first complaint from anyone ever. But I have a feeling I won't be the last person she has this encounter with.

Thanks guys.

Tony.

Dude, just buy some unscented stuff to use for the next two weeks. You are coworkers. She isn't out to be annoying. Where is the team spirit?

buy an $11 fan from Amazon and be done with it.

Take up smoking cigars in the office. Then the fabric softener scent won’t hardly be noticed.

I’d go with the unscented softener and detergent. Synthetic fragrances don’t “smell good” to everybody, but everybody has to smell them.

A little out of the box, but some time around 2011 or 2012 there was a Sigforum thread on household uses for vinegar. One of the uses was replacing fabric softener, and I've been using it ever since.

The benefits are:

your towels are no longer waterproof (i.e. actually absorb water) since the fibers aren't filled with fats, fragrances, and dyes.

zero carry-over of vinegar smell after running through dryer

It's dirt cheap ($2.64 per gallon) and Downy is 3.7x more expensive. I buy 1 gallon containers of generic vinegar at my grocery store for a fraction of the cost of fabric softener. Prior to that, I used to buy 2-packs of 1.32 gallon bottles at Costco.

None of my guests has had an allergic reaction to the guest bedroom sheets and towels. It did happen when I used fabric softener.

Switching to vinegar as a fabric softener would be a win-win.

---

Ego is the anesthesia that deadens the pain of stupidity

DISCLAIMER: These are the author's own personal views and do not represent the views of the author's employer.

I have and continue to deal with these exact types of complaints while representing management. There are two outakes from this:

1. Her reaction may be legitimate and it is a true medical condition however if she is exposed to offending odor as claimed, you would expect to have some sort of ongoing reactions when she's out in public shopping or in other places where people are at. Also consider if she's making similar complaints about other co-workers and perhaps you'd also like to know, from discrete inquires, if certain odors are offensive or is it just you.

2. The second possibility is that she is making up the entire thing to be either transferred out or she's going to go on a work comp claim for dust, odors and fumes. This is more common than you might in trying to avoid people or places she doesn't like or want to be around for a variety of reasons. She will also ask for days off to clear out her respiratory system and no one can really challenge her. Her private health records would be key here, if they even exist and whether she's reqeusted an ADA accomodation in the past.


If I were you I'd just go about my business as you normally do. While you want to be helpful and accomodating, that's a call for HR. Inform them and let them handle it.

They'll talk to her and the general saying goes, just like when talking to the cops, whoever gets there first get to play the harassment and victim card. Be that person to say she's raising previously unknown workplace issues and you're not sure how to react.

HR deals with this stuff all the time.

quote:

Originally posted by Aeteocles:
Dude, just buy some unscented stuff to use for the next two weeks. You are coworkers. She isn't out to be annoying. Where is the team spirit?

Do this. If her complaints stop, fine.

However, if she still complains, document document document. It’s not you.

Good luck to you.
.

Dryer sheets all over the office, starting Friday afternoon so the smell can permeate the entire area.

I agree with those who noted that you should involve HR. This is a company problem not a benny6 problem. The business needs to figure out how to accommodate her condition in a way that doesn't force other employees to impact how their families live and tend to normal domestic chores.

Fuck all these people and their sensitivities. It never used to be like this. Now, everybody is sensitive to everything. I call bullshit. Tell her to sit by an open window.

Maybe your HR is different, mine would find a way to make it my problem since they would side with the female. I’d let her worry about it, if she has something medically that causes it that’s different but I don’t think that her seeing it as toxic means a hill of beans to you.

In high school I worked at KMart in the health and beauty aids section and stocked all that stuff weekly. To this day I don’t like the smell of the feminine hygiene products and I can smell that scent on women. I suppose I could complain about the women I work with when I smell it but I’d sound as stupid as she does complaining about your fabric softeners.

quote:

I’d go with the unscented softener and detergent. Synthetic fragrances don’t “smell good” to everybody, but everybody has to smell them.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
This. No need to be confrontational at this point. Go along to get along. If I remember correctly Arfmel you had a thread about scented trash bags a while back. I bought some by mistake and the scent is so strong I want to puke. I have them aging in the garage for several weeks in the hope that I can still use them. Obviously they would not make these things if some people did not like it.

Watch your step with this, you will be on the losing end. She probably falls into a protected class, and you will be the source of the problem, HR type people will take whatever you say to them and consider it to be sexist, racist, hostile, violent, offensive, intolerant, toxicly male, oppressive or God knows what else. The only thing that will make it worse, is if your a white, straight, Christian, conservative, Gun-owner, male whom votes and believes in things like honesty, loyalty, and things so arcane as right and wrong.

Now if are one of the other 72 genders, or in transition to one of them and believes the collusion is in the room with you, and believe in oppression theories and kneeling, she's out the door