r/civilservice

Hi everyone, I’m dealing with a really surreal and toxic situation at work and could use some outside perspective.
For context, I keep my head down, focus on my job, and maintain a very healthy lifestyle and strict fitness routine. Meanwhile, one of my managers (let's call him Gary) has known health issues like high cholesterol and strict dietary restrictions.

For a while now, Gary has had this really strange, passive-aggressive habit of targeting me to push junk food, carbs, and pastries. It feels like he's projecting his own food hang-ups or trying to sabotage my discipline. But today it escalated to something genuinely unhinged.

I was sitting quietly at my desk, completely minding my own business and working, when he walks over out of nowhere and says: "I have another task for you
, eat a sweaty mouldy muffin" (referring to literal leftovers from the previous week).

There was zero provocation. I wasn't engaging with him, I wasn't complaining, I was just doing my job. When he and a colleague pull this kind of stuff, it feels like a deliberate psychological game or a boundary-testing power play to get a reaction out of me.

Every week he tells me to eat the food left out for colleagues, even though he doesn’t eat it. He seems fixated on me eating these carbs in the office

Has anyone dealt with a manager who fixates on what you eat or uses gross, bizarre comments like this? How do you handle or shut down this kind of passive-aggressive harassment without giving them the reaction they're fishing for? Any advice is greatly appreciated.

For context, I am nearing completion of my pre-employment checks for an EO Fraud Officer role with DWP and at the same time, I have received a provisional offer for an HMRC Compliance Caseworker role.
Both roles are at a similar salary level, however the DWP office is quite far while the HMRC office is relatively close to my home.

My main questions are:

1. Can I accept the HMRC provisional offer and continue its pre-employment checks while the DWP checks are still ongoing, or would this create any conflict or risk of either offer being withdrawn?

2. What are the chances of getting moved to a DWP office closer to my home?

3. If I start with DWP, would moving to HMRC later whilst still being under probation be treated as an internal Civil Service transfer, or would it require resignation and re-joining?

4. From a career development perspective, which role is generally considered stronger for progression or will give me best skills and experience to progress to HEO/SEO level or private sector opportunities

I understand the HMRC role has a structured 18-month training programme and may restrict internal applications during that period, whereas DWP may offer more flexibility for early progression. I’m not trying to hold two jobs indefinitely. I simply do not want to reject one provisional offer before the other becomes a confirmed formal offer, particularly given how long PECs can take.

Any first-hand experience for any or all questions would be really helpful. Thank you.

Hi everyone,

I'm looking for some advice from anyone who has experience in either of these Civil Service roles, as I've been fortunate enough to receive two job offers and I am struggling to decide. Both are AO level roles

Option 1: HMRC CUSTOMER ADVISOR Cardiff. This role would require me to commute from Newport to Cardiff three days a week. About 28k per annum

Option 2: BUSINESS OPERATION ADMINISTRATOR, ONS, Newport. About 25k per annum. I would have to be in the office twice a week.

I’m worried about day-to-day activities, opportunities to progress, culture and management, and workloads. I have a 3 year old who starts school in September, so flexibility is important.

Thank you!

Afternoon all.

Civil servant here who actually enjoys their job; however wanting to make further income on the side due to ever rising cost of living with food prices up, and mortgage rates set to increase when I renew etc, and our wages not rising in line.

The issue, I work in the valuation office side of HMRC as a caseworker (great place to work may I add for anyone looking to move departments). I want to offer a service business outside of work not work to surveying / advisory services, and I do not believe would cause any conflict of interest - obviously I would seek permission before going ahead with anything.

My question, has anyone been able to set up their own business on the side of when you have requested permission has it been considered a conflict of interest and declined?

If the work included a specific type of property such as agricultural, and I declared this to the employer and was prepared to not deal with such cases, am I more likely to have such request approved?

I’m curious to understand peoples experiences, as if people have had requests declined, it may be what forces me to move to the private sector.

I want to try something new, but love what I already do so any information anyone can give could be the deciding factor.

Any advice / experiences greatly appreciated.

Wishing you all a lovely evening ❤️

Hi, can anyone tell me a little bit more about the above job please? Just wondering what the job is like, how flexible the job is (starting hours etc) and what your dat to day is like? I have applied for this job but also on the reserve list for HMRC compliance caseworker and trying to see which job would suit me best ( obviously depending if I am successful or not). thank you so much!

Over the course of training - which has been death by PowerPoint. Going over 150 presentations I’ve come to realise that CO’s will be doing 80% admins work.

We will be spending a lot of time redacting bank statements , checking for vulnerabilities before interviewing customers and we’ve been informed realistically only looking for 2/10 cases as a positive outcome.
All these recourses in mass recruitment for fraud officers but limited with the work we can do.

It’s a big step up from working in the jobcentre however does anyone feel almost let down as during the entire training they stated were only “evidence gathers.”

There are so many posts on this sub complaining about working in the CS. it just absolutely screams that they have never had a proper job elsewhere. The conditions and benefits are phenomenal, working hours are great and pay is (for most of the lower roles at least) extremely generous.

Obviously there are exceptions, but if all you do is moan about the civil service then I suggest you try a few years working somewhere else and check how you feel about your 40% wfh, 35 hour weeks and reasonable targets.

Access To Work (EO) - Reserve List
I’ve been put on reserve list for this campaign where I selected 3 locations and got overall 24 and found out my reserve list position is 184. Just wanted to is this position hopeful or is there no chance of an offer in the next 6 months? It was 360 vacancies and I believe offers are still getting sent out. Any advice anyone from previous large campaigns.

Good evening. I’m looking for some advice.

I’m currently an EO and have passed my probation. I applied for another EO role through an external campaign and have now been offered the position, same department.

When I informed my manager, I was told that I would not be released for a move at the same grade and could only leave for a promotion. I thought a successful external application would be treated differently from an internal level transfer.

Has anyone experienced this? Can my current department prevent me from accepting the new role even though I applied externally?

I considered resigning and joining the new department as an external candidate, but I understand this could affect my continuity of service and pension, so I would rather avoid that.

I genuinely like the new role, so I would appreciate any advice on my options. If any.
Thank you

Edited to add more context: My manager is actually very lovely. The decision came from above and this was communicated to me by my manager, after i had informed them.

I (31F) recently started a new administrative job, and one of my male colleagues in his early 40s has developed the most bizarre, overbearing fixation on me.
For context, I keep a very active routine of daily swimming and full-body strength training, and I'm pretty health-conscious. This colleague, meanwhile, is on some sort of constant restrictive diet and constantly calls himself the "Michelin man."

It has escalated into this exhausting cycle where he micro-manages what I eat:
He will comment on or judge whatever I have for breakfast.

Then, out of nowhere, he’ll aggressively push junk food on me—like walking into the office first thing in the morning and loudly announcing, "There are muffins here!"
When I casually say "no thanks," he gets genuinely angry and snaps, "What?! You could burn that off in an hour at the gym why are you so fussy!"

He also frequently tells me that the gym is "bad for me," which feels hypocritical given how much he stresses over his own weight and food.

It culminated on Friday. Right with about 10 minutes left in the work week, he called me into a closed-door meeting under the guise of discussing minor flexi-time paperwork. But instead of talking about work, he used the time to lecture me for 25 minutes (claiming he had an urgent "appointment" right after, which makes zero sense if he was pressed for time). My gut is screaming that the flexi-sheet was just a fake excuse to trap me and control me right before the weekend.

Everyone I talk to says this isn't normal behavior and that he's projecting his own food/body issues onto me and trying to undermine my boundaries. But because it's dressed up as "workplace administration" and "office banter," I sometimes second-guess myself.
Am I overreacting, or is this blatant boundary-crossing and control issues? What would you do?

I recently joined the Civil Service and I’m a bit worried about something that I’m hoping someone with Civil Service/HR experience might be able to advise me on.
Before starting, I had to complete a health questionnaire asking about any health conditions and whether I was fit to work, etc. I have endometriosis, but I didn’t disclose it on the questionnaire.

The reason I didn’t disclose it wasn’t because I was trying to hide it for any particular reason. I knew that disclosing it would potentially mean having an occupational health assessment or having to provide further information, and I was desperate to get into work quickly. I had previously lost out on a job because of delays/issues around my circumstances, so I was worried that disclosing it would delay my start date or potentially affect the job offer.

However, since starting, my endometriosis has actually been affecting my ability to work. I’m experiencing quite severe pain and I’m realising that I probably do need to tell my manager and/or HR so that I can get the appropriate support and potentially reasonable adjustments.
My concern is whether I’ve now put myself in a difficult position by not disclosing it initially.

Could they later ask why I didn’t disclose it on the original health questionnaire and see that as me being dishonest or not being transparent? I obviously didn’t suddenly develop endometriosis after starting, I’ve had it for years.

Also, if they ask for medical evidence, most of the evidence I have is from years ago because that’s when I was diagnosed/being investigated. Would old medical evidence be sufficient, or would I need to go back to my
GP/specialist and get something more recent?

I’m not trying to get out of anything or mislead anyone. I genuinely just panicked about the possibility of the recruitment/start process being delayed, and now I’m in a position where the condition is actually affecting me at work.

Has anyone been in a similar situation in the Civil Service? Would you just disclose it to your manager/HR now, or could the fact I didn’t disclose it during the pre-employment health questionnaire come back to bite me later?

Finally got my first civil service job!! 7 interviews, 2 Reserve lists (still active), 1 offer today!!

Finally got my first civil service job!! 7 interviews, 2 Reserve lists (still active), 1 offer today!!

Does anyone have experience with working around school pick up times? Working hours are 7-7, does the whole day have to be completed in the office to count as an office day? Could I work from home early or late and work the majority of the day in the office around drop off times?

Thank you!