TEMPERATURE WARS CAN TURN OFFICES INTO ICE CUBICLES.

Byline: BARBARA CORREA Staff Writer

These days, everyone agrees that it's way too hot outside.

But inside, there's little consensus on where the office thermostat should be set -- fanning flames of dissent among work mates who have their own ideas about what is comfortable.

``Nobody knows who controls the A/C, but there are a lot of people wearing coats and jackets all the time and it (ticks) me off every day,'' said Victor, a data-entry worker in the Woodland Hills office of Blue Cross & Blue Shield of California. ``Even in winter, they keep it up too high.''

Indeed, according to an informal field poll of office workers, overly frigid offices seemed to be the dominant complaint, despite this week's triple-digit temperatures outdoors.

``I keep a sweater in my desk all the time,'' said Maggie Drummond, a project assistant at engineering firm Hall & Foreman Inc. ``Most people are cold.''

That's not to say there aren't plenty of people on the opposite side of the issue.

``When people get hot, they get desperate,'' said Bob Wiseman, general manager of Canoga Park Heating and Air Conditioning.

``They get very anxious, and I don't blame them.'' He said pregnant women are typically among his customers who like it the coolest. At the offices of a petrochemical company in Van Nuys, a pregnant woman was convinced that the working thermostat was broken because she just couldn't cool off. ``It's a hard thing for office managers to handle,'' said Wiseman.

Providing fodder to office conspiracy theorists everywhere, he also confirmed that some companies mount fake thermostats on walls, just so frustrated office workers feel they have some control over the temperature they work in. ``It's not really common, but it definitely happens,'' he said.

More often, employees seeking climate control find a functional, but locked, thermostat on the wall, which would seem to be even more frustrating. ``What happens is you have so many people with different temperatures they're comfortable at and facilities managers and people in charge get sick of dealing with it. So they put a thermostat up, set it to an average temperature and then have it locked. People pry them off the wall. We get lots of calls where the thermostat is just hanging there by a wire.''

Attacking the messenger is not the answer, said B.J. Gallagher, a Los Angeles sociologist and author of ``Yes Lives in the Land of No,'' a book about how to deal with negative people. Gallagher said the most important point in solving the thermostat wars is that the solution has to be one that works for the entire group.

For some offices, that might mean shuffling the seating arrangement. It might mean lowering the thermostat as the day drags on and the sun gets hotter, or asking staffers to dress in layers. Whatever the solution may be, it's important that everyone agree on it.

``Avoid the personal ridicule, because people don't decide to be cold or hot. Their bodies just are,'' she said, adding that the first step to coming up with an answer the group can live with is to gather data.

That's exactly what Citysearch.com did at its West Hollywood offices.

To stem a brewing temperature war, the firm sent out a survey to employees about how they felt -- physically, that is. The responses were so variable that facilities engineers installed multiple thermostats in different areas in an attempt to please everybody.

Instead, the new system has resulted in atmospheric anarchy, with each room adjusted to a different temperature chosen by the person who last used the room. ``Every conference room has different temperatures,'' according to a human resources manager, who spoke on condition of anonymity. ``It's still a problem.''

A/C wars aren't restricted to large offices. The four-person office of Platinum 1 Insurance Services in Agoura Hills pretty much agrees with a 70-degree temperature. But when the owner comes around, he turns it way down and everybody freezes. ``He's been in Cancun for three weeks, so we've been good,'' said Kenisha Patterson, office manager and customer satisfaction specialist. ``But tomorrow, he's back.''

In some small offices, the democratic process doesn't even come into play. ``I'm the only one allowed to touch it (the thermostat),'' said Alan Castillo, owner of People's Mortgage in Van Nuys.

Some say age and gender patterns are to blame for the too-hot, too-cold argument.

``Younger women tend to be cold and postmenopausal women tend to be hot,'' said Gallagher. ``Men tend to run hotter than women because men's metabolism is higher than ours.'' Others echo gender-based differences not just in how office workers feel, but in how they deal with the whole problem. ``Females whine more,'' said the female human resources manager from Citysearch. ``Men won't say anything. They'll come in with huge jackets.''

``Guys tend to tiptoe around political issues, so you would think the guy would be the one who would turn the A/C off first without asking anyone,'' said James Bassil, editor in chief of AskMen.com. ``But maybe they are more acute to office politics than we give them credit for.''

barbara.correa(at)dailynews.com

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