People Discuss The Time They Got Revenge On A Fool
13. Either Leave Or Take A Huge Pay Cut? See Ya!
“I worked for Company for 14 years. I loved working there for 12 of those years. There were 2 main parts to the job.
The first part was the “sales” side of things. This was away from the office, in the customer’s location. This involved quite a bit of driving (and on a couple of occasions flying abroad) to work face to face with the customers to deliver a high-quality product.
We weren’t the cheapest, but we were the superior product. And I was the best employee when it came to delivering the product. I consistently got rave reviews from customers for my personal style when it came to delivering the product and executing the customer’s vision.
I got a huge amount of repeat business, and I got a lot of new business through word of mouth with customers recommending the company based on their experiences with me.
The second part was the office side. This was my weaker side. I hated cold calling “potential customers” with numbers I found in the phone book.
When it came to answering the phone and speaking to potential customers who initiated contact with us I was fine! But I wasn’t great at making the calls. This was my only real not-great part of my job.
So, in the office, I wasn’t asked to make any calls.
Instead, I prepared product. Designed new product. Trained new staff members (ended up being one of the biggest parts of my job). I was also the problem solver, helping out whenever and wherever. Filling in for sick employees whenever I could.
I liked the owner, and I liked the manager.
I liked all the staff who were around me. All in all, it was a great job that I was really good at and took pride in.
The company had been doing so well that the owner had slowly expanded over the 12 years since I started working for Company.
I had joined about 3 months after he started, so I’d been a part of this expansion. I worked out of my nearest office but often traveled to other areas to train their staff. I was “loaned out” as it were to other companies to help train their staff.
At one point, I was a guest lecturer at a university teaching medical students how to deliver complicated explanations to people who don’t have the base knowledge that you yourself do.
After 12 years, I was on a decent salary. Not massive, but I was happy.
Then the owner decided to sell off part of the company. He was selling the area where my local office was. He told me he would love for me to remain as his employee, but I would need to work from a different office. This was either going to require me to move or to quadruple (at a minimum) my daily commute.
The other option was to remain working from my current office but with a new boss. I chose the second option.
Before the new owner bought the company, she worked alongside the staff for a couple of weeks to see how we operated. This was before any of us knew she was about to buy the company.
As far as we knew, she was just another employee, and she was shadowing us to learn. She came with me on assignments in the field and saw my abilities.
When the sale was announced, and we were informed that she was the new owner, everyone was very surprised. She made some sweeping staffing changes.
The manager left to start her own business since the new owner was also going to be the manager. A lot of staff were let go. The secretary, myself, and a couple of newer hires were kept on. The new hires were on the lowest wages (not salaries).
Anyone who had got to a decent level was let go. Since almost everyone was on a zero-hours contract, she was able to do this.
Whilst technically it was a “new company” for the customers it was the same old business. The company still had the same trading name.
The only real difference was that there was a new owner, and the registered business name was now different. As far as the customers were concerned nothing had changed.
My job for the first few months after the sale was to train up the remaining staff to replace the more experienced staff members who had been let go.
I recommended a couple of new hires who I had experience working with in the past. I was open and honest with the owner, and let her know that one of them was a close friend, and one of them was my partner. Both were more than qualified for the work, and both were happy to join.
My friend had recently come back to the country after a year of traveling, whilst my partner could only work during school holidays (worked in a school). The owner gave them both interviews then hired them since we needed the staff.
Over the next 2 years, business started to fall.
The reason was simple: the new owner decided to try and maximize profits by increasing prices whilst decreasing the quality of the product. For new customers, this wasn’t noticeable. They just thought we were expensive, and the product wasn’t the best. But for old customers who had been with us for 10+ years, they immediately noticed. They were being charged more and were receiving less/worse quality.
So the owner doubled down and increased prices again. 95% of our old customers left us. New customers almost never became repeat customers. Complaints skyrocketed.
Whilst all this was going on our staff turnover rate was ridiculous. People left after a few months when they realized that the minimum wage they were being paid wasn’t worth it.
Under the old owner, the average hourly wage for new employees was around 2.5x the minimum wage. This made people care about their jobs and want to keep them. My partner quit. My friend remained but was looking for something new.
Then I got a phone call.
The owner needed me to come to the office. This was unexpected. I had just finished working on location with a customer. My next customer was in 2 and a half hours. It was a half-hour drive away. The office was about an hour and 10 minutes away from both locations.
If I drove back to the office, I would have about 5 minutes in the office before leaving. My mileage was paid above my regular salary, so I was saving the company money by doing this. Also, parking was a nightmare around the second location, so I intended to get there as early as possible to find parking, then read a book.
The manager didn’t care. She needed me to return to the office. So I did. I arrived back to be handed a letter by the owner. It was informing me of a disciplinary meeting to take place in a couple of days’ time. I could bring a “witness” along if I so desired.
This knocked me for 6. I was the best employee. I read through her list of complaints about my performance and started working on my defense.
At the meeting, I declined to have a witness. Instead, I decided to record the audio of the entire meeting on my phone without informing her.
Where I live this is legal and I didn’t need consent. The boss’ witness was her friend who she had met at Yoga and hired for an office role, firing the secretary who had been there long before the takeover.
Every point she raised, I could counter.
They ranged from the weak:
“You were unavailable to work for a week in August.”
“I booked a week’s holiday, so I could attend my cousin’s wedding on the other side of the country and turn it into a holiday.”
To the pathetic:
“You were late for work on the 12th of May.”
“Is that the day my car broke down, and I called the office to let you know?”
“I don’t know.”
“I do. Here’s the receipt from the garage dated May 12th.”
To the downright lies. This one I can’t write as a quote. Basically, she accused me of gross misconduct for breaking health and safety laws in the way I was delivering a product for a customer.
I hadn’t broken health and safety laws. I knew exactly what I was doing since, as I’ve mentioned already, I had been doing this for 14 years at this point. She had witnessed me do this on multiple occasions and had never mentioned it before. Because it wasn’t an issue.
She even had me, train staff, in this specific delivery method. Because it wasn’t an issue.
She finished her list by telling me that she doesn’t want to lose me, but she can’t justify keeping such a poor employee at my current salary. I had 2 choices: I could either sign a zero-hours contract and work for minimum wage, or she could fire me with 2 weeks’ notice.
I countered that she would have to give me 12 weeks’ notice, since my contract guaranteed me 1 week’s notice for every year of employment, up to a maximum of 12. She argued that I had only been her employee for 2 years since before then I worked for the previous owner.
I informed her that with how the business takeover had run, it counts as continuous employment. I quoted the exact law and code that backed me up. She asked for a 30-minute break in the meeting to “let me think about her offer.” She went to call her lawyer.
When she came back she informed me that since she was firing me for gross misconduct, she didn’t have to give me any notice at all. If I wanted to remain and move to the zero-hours contract, I could do that today. But if I didn’t then she would have to fire me.
But because she was nice she would give me the 2 weeks’ notice. I asked for a couple of hours to go home and think about this. She allowed this.
I knew the reason she wanted me to remain for at least the 2 weeks was because one of our few remaining bigger customers was set to have a product delivery from me in that time.
They would only work with me. The owner had tried sending other staff in my place on several occasions, and each time there had been problems. It wasn’t the staff’s fault. It was just a very difficult delivery for a very specific customer which needed to be perfect.
As a result, this customer would only deal with me.
I called the office and spoke to the owner. I declined the offer of a zero-hours contract and said I would be leaving. She then said she was giving me my 2 weeks notice. I declined her offer of 2 weeks’ notice.
I informed her that if I was being fired for gross misconduct then surely I cannot be relied upon to safely deliver the product. Therefore, it would be best for everyone involved if I didn’t return to work. She panicked and said that she needed me for those 2 weeks.
I feigned ignorance and let her know that I was just thinking about what’s best for the company. After all, you can’t have unsafe staff delivering your product to your customers. However, if she wanted to rethink the “gross misconduct” accusation, then I would work my 12 weeks notice.
They were her options. 0 weeks or 12. She chose 12.
For those 12 weeks, I worked the same way I had for 14 years. I didn’t coast. I didn’t slack. I didn’t badmouth the company on my way out. I continued to train new staff. I continued to deliver the product in my own, personal, exceptional way.
I also got in touch with a lawyer who was a specialist in employment law.
For those 12 weeks, the owner barely spoke to me. She resented the fact that I knew my legal rights and didn’t just believe her lies. She hated the fact that I could defend myself.
She was petty. She accidentally dropped my mug in the kitchen, breaking it. Most petty of all, she paid for every member of staff in the office to have a spa day… except me. I was asked to work my day off to answer the phones whilst everyone else was being pampered. Nobody knew I hadn’t been invited until they arrived at the spa, and I wasn’t there.
Here’s the thing: I’m a big, fat, bearded guy. I have no interest in a spa day. If she had offered it to me, I would have thanked her and declined the kind offer. But by pointedly excluding me, she was making herself look terrible.
For the last 2 weeks, I was training up my friend to basically take over from me.
At the end of the 12 weeks, my final day came around. The owner had nothing planned. Not so much as a card after 14 years (2 for her). The office assistant manager who had become a friend had got me some presents but had to give them to me once the boss was gone, for fear of reprisals.
The day after my final day 2 things happened. The first was my friend who I had been training up to replace me quit. He was on a zero-hours contract so required no notice. He was unhappy with her treatment of me and was unhappy that she expected him to do my (previously salaried) job for minimum wage.
He hadn’t informed me of his plans to leave, and I only learned of it when he knocked on my door in the middle of the day when he should have been at work to let me know.
The second was the owner received a letter informing her that I was bringing legal proceedings against her for unfair dismissal. I had arranged this with my lawyer to be delivered the day after my final day.
According to the office assistant, she went pale and started crying before leaving the office to call her lawyer.
She refuted my claims for unfair dismissal. Said it was gross misconduct. Tried to come up with some more reasons for firing me. But the truth was that the company was making less because of her business practices, and I was the highest (and only) salary.
I had evidence that I was a great employee. I had evidence that she asked me to move to a zero-hours contract. She initially tried to deny this, since the “gross misconduct” fabrication makes no sense if she wanted me to stay. But once my lawyer provided hers with a transcript of the entire meeting along with a copy of the recording, she knew she messed up.
Still, she let the case drag on for over a year. I think she hoped that the legal fees would lead to me dropping the case. Little did she know my lawyer was working on a no-win-no-fee basis, whilst hers wasn’t. She ended up settling out of court.
The aftermath:
The office assistant who had become a friend quit a couple of months after I left. She hated how I was treated and didn’t feel safe working for such an untrustworthy boss.
Several former customers contacted me personally to enquire why I was no longer with the company.
Apparently, the owner was telling them that I just quit. I informed them that I had been fired for cost-cutting reasons. They moved their business elsewhere. Several offered me jobs. One went so far as to offer me a part-time job and to pay for me to attend college to earn a degree required for them to hire me full time.
This was a lovely offer, but they were one of the customers who were a bit too far away to commute, and I wasn’t ready to move. In the end, I found a new job in a different industry where a lot of my skills transferred over.
Currently earning more than I was, working fewer hours, and for better owners.
The business is floundering. The new owner was desperate. She canceled orders but refused to refund customers, citing an “act of God” clause in the contracts. The business’ social media and Google reviews have tanked. Most staff left. The business is still afloat but barely.”
12. Can't Take An Hour Off To Go To The Doctor? Kiss Your Vacation Goodbye
“So, this happened in a job I worked at 7 years ago. My manager was planning to go on vacation for 2 weeks, and she needed to pick someone in the department to take over for her during that time and stay on top of her stuff.
I was her second hand in the department, the highest producer, and already responsible for many of her tasks, so I was the natural fit. However, there was a lot on the administrative side that I needed to learn, so the week before she was to go off was my “training week.”
Now, on Monday, I had a bit of a stomachache. I thought it was just indigestion or maybe gas and didn’t think much of it. Tuesday, it got a little worse, and after work, I tried to stop by a walk-in clinic to get checked out because my instincts told me it might be something.
Unfortunately, clinics usually hit capacity well before 6 pm when I get off work, and I wasn’t able to see the doctor.
It didn’t seem serious enough to warrant a visit to the ER, so I just figured I would try again the next day at lunch.
I asked my manager first thing if I could take an extra 30-45 minutes for my lunch and use it to run to the clinic (we got a 1-hour lunch; the clinic was 15 minutes away and usually an hour or so wait, so I figured that was all I needed).
She said no because there was too much to do. She said I was probably constipated and to just get a laxative after work. I realized that I hadn’t gone in a few days, so maybe she was right.
Thursday comes, and the pain has increased to the point where I couldn’t really sit comfortably.
I told her I was in a lot of pain and asked again if I could take some extra time at lunch to go to the doctor. Again, she said no; we only have 2 days left to train, and she has to be sure I was ready.
She says to just stick it out and go to the doctor on Saturday as it’s probably nothing. She says this is where I need to prove myself to the company and that if I want to move up, they need to see me as reliable.
I should point out too that when this happened, I was fresh out of college and young, and this was my first full-time job where I could really see a career. So I complied and decided to stick it out and go to the clinic Saturday.
I didn’t make it that far. Friday evening, I went to bed as soon as I got home from work, and at midnight woke up in excruciating pain. My partner at the time woke up to me screaming and took me to the hospital. The pain was a 10/10, and they immediately ordered scans.
I had a hemorrhagic ovarian cyst, so basically, a cyst on my ovary that formed on top of a big vein or artery, causing it to split open, and my abdominal cavity had been slowly filling with blood that was also clotting and sticking to my organs.
My family was called down and waited with me while we waited for an emergency surgical room to open up. I literally almost died.
They operated for 8 hours, removing the clots and all the blood. They said I had 2 cups of blood clots and would have likely died if I hadn’t come in when I did.
The best part was though, I had to spend a week in the hospital and another 6 weeks off at home to recover, meaning my manager had to cancel her vacation as there was no one to cover her now. She lost a ton on deposits and things as this was a big overseas trip for her family that they canceled last minute.
I absolutely relished letting her know as well that the doctors told me that had I come in a few days earlier, when I initially wanted to, that it likely would have just been a quick day surgery (laparoscopic surgery which is very quick and easy, no hospital stay required) and orders to just take it easy for a few days (which I could have done at work, it was an office job, so I would have been ok to sit there all day vs at home).
I could have still done most of the training and covered her. But because I complied with her instructions to wait until the weekend, I got 7 weeks of paid time off, and she lost her vacation and a couple of grand in lost travel expenses.”
Another User Comments:
“Oh my gosh. I’m very glad you are ok! What was the fallout with your boss? Her reaction? Management’s reaction?” Waifer2016
Reply:
“None as I never reported her not letting me go. I was young and thought this was the way the world worked and was terrified of losing my job.
Today, I would not make the same decision and would have just gone to the doctor when I felt I should have. I have learned that work is not more important than health.” UniqueHarmony7
11. Sure, I Can Give You The Amount You First Suggested
Can’t get much more “Karen” than this.
“I work at a family-owned videogame store in a big shopping strip at the beach.
We’re 80% retro stuff, but we always take modern games and consoles because they move quickly, especially these days.
I’m working my Tuesday opening shift, going as slow as weekday mornings usually do, when one of my favorite regulars (an old gentleman that loves talking movies with me) and a woman (who I’ll be referring to as Kountry Karen due to her accent) come into the store within a minute or so of each other.
I say hi to the regular, Kountry Karen comes to the counter, I’ll tell him I’ll be back once I’m done. The regular goes to check out our Blu-ray trades from the weekend.
Kountry Karen starts to explain she bought two Switch Lites for her nephews, not realizing they already had a regular switch in the house.
Says the kids lost the receipt (entirely her own fault for giving it to kids), so she can’t return it and wants to know what I can do for a trade-in. She seems a little frazzled, but I chalk it up to stress/annoyance at her situation, since she explains she just came in from being told no at Target.
I take the Switch Lite and take it out of the box. It’s about as factory new as it gets, with only a small tear on the box and a few kid-sized fingerprints on the screen I can wipe off. She says she just wants as much back as she can at this point.
I pull up the trade sheet to double-check our trade rates.
A Switch Lite retails for $200. We normally sell used ones at $180, and give $100 store credit OR $80 cash. Since this Switch Lite is basically factory new with the box, I decide to give her a bit of a deal.
Me: “Well, normally Switch Lites only trade for $80 cash, but I can do $110 for this because it’s a popular color and in really good condition with a box.”
KK: “What? That’s so low. GameStop has a promotion and will give me $140 for it. Can’t you do any better?”
Normally we try to beat GameStop’s everything by at least 15%, but being corporate with more employees and less stock per store, they can get specials and promotions done we can’t. Plus, we can only match them on trade value for newer consoles, due to the little profit we turn taking them at GameStop’s prices.
I explain this to Kountry Karen, and she goes from frazzled and a little impatient to… well, a Kountry Karen.
KK: “Wow, I thought you guys would be better than GameStop since you’re a small business, but if you’re going to nickel and dime me, I’ll just go to them from now on.”
I audibly scoff at the woman’s rudeness and tell her good luck (a perk of working family-owned, I don’t have to lie down and take terrible behavior), she gives me a nasty look, takes her Switch Lite back, and leaves the store. There’s a couple in line behind her with a bag or two of game trades each by this point, so once she’s gone, I start helping them, and our regular brings up a few of our movie trades, and all four of us start talking movies while I get the games done.
Mornings on weekdays usually aren’t too bad, but for some reason, I had a huge line of nothing but boxes of trade-ins per person come in while I was helping the first two guys out, and I was the only employee in the store that day.
I finish the second person’s trade and excuse myself from the movie talk to focus on powering through the new line of people.
I’m about halfway done with the second box of (absolute goldmine titles!) SNES and Nintendo 64 games when Kountry Karen returns, looking very unhappy.
I put on my best customer service smile and say welcome back, she ignores me, and cuts past the rest of the line.
KK: “I need to trade this now. I have to pick my nephews up from daycare and need the gas money. GameStop said their promotion is over.”
Me: “Sorry to hear that, but I’ve got other customers I’m helping right now. You’ll have to get in line.”
KK: “I said I need to trade this now. They’re out soon, and all this running around is going to make me late as it is.”
I look at the gentleman I’m helping, who shrugs and says he doesn’t mind, then at the four other people in line with boxes or bags of trades in hand, patiently waiting for their turns. The next person in line is watching and giving Kountry Karen the best ‘The audacity of this idiot’ face I’ve ever seen.
Since it’s one item and normally only takes a minute, I tell Kountry Karen fine, I’ll ring her through quickly.
I suspend the current trade, take the lite, doublecheck it, then add it into the system, and ask Kountry Karen for her ID, which she loudly sighs about and takes a minute digging through her purse to find.
The next guy in line definitely isn’t happy with her attitude, makes a comment to the woman he’s with that Kountry Karen and I can’t make out.
Karen finally finds her ID and hands it over, I enter her info into our customer database, up the trade of the Switch Lite to $110, and tell her the total. Much to my surprise, she balks as if I’ve just peed in her morning macchiato, and indignantly states:
KK: “You told me 139.99 earlier. I want what you said I’d get the first time I came in here.”
Me: “No ma’am, I said $110 because it’s–”
KK: “NO, you TOLD me 139.99! I want what you said I’d get the first time or there’s going to be an issue!”
That’s nonsense, since every single trade in our store rounds to a whole dollar amount, but Kountry Karen keeps insisting I told her what I’m assuming was the GameStop promotional trade price.
At this point, both I and the next guy in line are done with Kountry Karen.
He loudly sighs and says, “Come on man…” but Kountry Karen either can’t hear him or doesn’t care. I, on the other hand, give Kountry Karen another winning service smile.
“Sure! Your trade will be $80 cash then.”
I can see the few brain cells left in Kountry Karen’s wine-o head trying to process how the value has gone down instead of up.
KK: “THAT’S LESS! I want the–”
At this point, she’s yelling in the store, so I use my 8+ years of singing bass in church chorus to talk over her without sounding like I’m yelling back.
Me: “I told you normally Switch Lites trade for $80 cash but that I’d cut you a deal for $110.
If you want the amount I told you the first time, that’s $80.”
My regular and one of the first two trades are still near the till, and they both pipe up to support me and say I did, in fact, give her those numbers. Kountry Karen, red in the face and realizing her mistake, starts to backpedal.
KK: “God, fine, just give me the $110 so I can leave already!”
Me: “No ma’am, you were very firm about wanting the first amount, so it’ll be $80 cash for the trade.”
Kountry Karen looks like she’s about to explode– before she checks the time on her phone and deflates.
KK: “Just give me the freaking money.”
Me: “Absolutely!”
I ring out the transaction for $80, make her sign the receipt saying she agrees to the trade, then loudly count out $80 cash in twenties for her, which she snatches off the counter and storms out the store with.
While the next guy in line is bent over the box of games in his arms laughing his butt off.”
"All good? Arright here we go, TWENNY!!! There's twenny right there, everybody see that, arright, FORTY!!! That there's forty, we're halfway there, SIXTY!!! Sixty bucks people, just smooth mcgroove over here, AAAAAAND EIGHTY!!! Arright, have a nice day, you crazy son of a--whoop, sorry, MA'AM."
10. Getting Payback On Controlling Mother
“So, I’m in my 20s, and as is my significant other that I’ll call Fiancé for this post. Keep in mind I’m heavily disabled mentally and physically (important for later) due to certain reasons caused by my biological parents.
I refuse to relive those events, so I won’t say what happened to me during the time I lived with them growing up, but I will say my parents are divorced and HATE each other. I have a service dog, and she’s the best thing that ever happened to me.
I’ll call her Melly for this post to protect my privacy. Strap in for the ride folks because this is NUCLEAR.
Due to my physical disabilities and my mental illness that I had legally diagnosed by an actually certified professional, I receive federal aid because I am physically unable to work as a result.
I’ve been receiving benefits and using them for the RIGHT purposes like my rent, getting my college loan paid off, and among other things, I’m using it to afford my medications for my conditions. See, my mother is a firm DISBELIEVER of mental illness and states that because she had a bad life NO ONE else can suffer and would always use that excuse with me.
She was, unfortunately, the person that the government dubbed in control of my aid benefits, that was until I moved away eventually when my now significant other helped me get out of that situation. During the time that I was with her, she wouldn’t report to the government like she was supposed to; I even told her she had to.
Her reply? ‘Why don’t you report it yourself then?’ Now, I would but… the government doesn’t want anything to do with ME since I’m not the one that the government dubbed was in charge. I tried on multiple occasions to convince her, to no avail; that’s when I tried myself.
They literally asked me directly after getting my name for my representative (my mom) and cut me off as I was trying to explain the situation. When that failed, I tried going in person only to get met with, ‘We need to talk to your representative, or they have to be present for you to speak to us.’ This is because my mental illnesses made me physically incapable of distinguishing reality from the psychosis episodes I randomly get (shout out to Fiancé for literally always being my anchor and Melly too), so I could understand from their point of view.
That did still kind of sting, though. Imagine being told that because you have a mental illness that you’re unable to be a functioning enough adult to speak to someone. I got penalized for lying to the government as a result of her stupid choice.
See the years that I lived with my mom, I wasn’t told HOW MUCH aid and benefits I was getting. I knew it was more than she told me since she and her partner both always seemed to get EXPENSIVE things like jewelry and new phones around the time of my payments.
In short, the rule for my payments is that I can’t have access to it, but it has to be used for ME, not her. The only other option I had other than magically getting better was to get kicked out of the house and end up homeless without my benefits; I needed those to treat my conditions, though… My mother and her partner also would hurt me a lot, steal my meds, etc. Fiancé learned the truth because I had a call up one day with him while I was cooking, and he witnessed my mom coming in and placing my hand inside a burning hot pan and screaming about getting more money I don’t deserve.
It took everything in him to not lose it at her when he saw this. He began to monitor everything because I would just be on Discord or Skype call with him during these times, so we could start gathering evidence by me leaving my phone on record at the same time as the call whenever I saw her enter the same room as me.
Cue the nuclear revenge. One of the ways my mother tried to tie me to her was she would get me in debt with anyone and everyone she could, such as doctor appointments, college, etc. by stealing the funds that I had hidden from her to pay for those things.
She was clearly also using my benefits for herself, which is against the law since it’s meant for me. So Fiancé being the amazing man he is, saved up money from his job and his active duty pay. He got me out of debt while keeping our evidence compiled and ready.
THE DAY FREEDOM CAME! I snapped because she tried getting rid of Melly. After about 2 years of saving and biting the bullet, Fiancé paid off my biggest debt, so I was able to have enough room to be able to move out – he had me move in with him.
We then had all the recordings from the past 2 years and turned it all in. Social security of course let me change my representative, so I then finally convinced them to switch the rep to being Fiancé instead of her. During this time, though, he was called to get stationed in a state that was very far away for his military duty – and social security approved and said it was okay since he had orders to go.
The result? From what my older brother explained, my mom tried desperately to keep herself as my representative. She lost the funds she was using for all her fancy things as well as her HOUSE — yes, you read that right… She used my benefit to pay for the HOUSE without telling me.
She was found guilty of federal fraud and falsifying federal documents among other things. I don’t know how long she got; I didn’t bother asking because I just completely cut her out of my life.
Note: my brother and I are on happily sibling-friendly terms, and we talk a lot, and my condition has improved since I was able to start treatment without having someone get in my way.
Fiancé is amazing and acts like a caretaker for me. When I left my mom, I didn’t tell her I was leaving either or else she would have done literally anything including murder to try to get me to stay.
The reason I didn’t leave sooner was because it’s hard to leave a situation with zero money on top of having a medical issue to treat.
And despite her allowing me to live there, she charged me rent and didn’t inform me how much I was getting. If I left without doing anything, I would have fallen on my face and been unable to care for myself. Leaving a situation like this isn’t as simple as one phone call and done, especially when you don’t even know the full scope of what they’re doing to you.
I wasn’t a minor when I found out about this, and she had legal guardianship, so I could receive benefits in the first place. And yes, she did get charged: I just don’t like saying that word which is why I put ‘among other things.'”
9. Betray Me? I'll Make You Nearly Fail Your Chemistry Class
“So, I (19M) and my (now ex) partner (18F) have been together for more than a year. We were in the same class during middle school and high school now, a 2-year friendship eventually evolved into a relationship — y’all know how it is.
We were happily together (at least so I thought) since December 2019. I thought everything was great between us the whole time.
Although recently (about March), I noticed her becoming very distant and barely writing first, dry texting, etc… I asked her multiple times if everything is ok and gave her some space, but it continued for the next few months.
I was naturally very upset as I’ve been through nightmares and back together with her when she was going through depression and was having a really hard time at the end of 2020. It suddenly felt like all this time was wasted and worth nothing.
I, as a naive high schooler, truly believed that she was the one; it was serious after all. We matched perfectly together, and we spent about 3 full months crying together at night when she was going through a rough time. We had similar plans for the future, similar interests, and it seemed we were meant for each other.
My partner (let’s call her Caroline) was studying to become a lawyer, so she was mostly into humanity subjects. I on the other hand am studying bio-chem for medical school (I apologize if this is all confusing/different; we live in Europe). She was required to attend at least one science subject to graduate (physics/biology/chemistry/psychology).
She always hated these subjects and just took them because they were necessary to graduate. She ended up picking Chemistry as I was a natural and tutored 9th and 10th graders chemistry in my free time, and I always helped her with assignments, etc. It started as helping her before exams and assignments, so she could get a good pass grade, and after her rough time, warped into me writing half of the assignments for her.
In February, she started to do everything with me again though (we had online the whole time). Anyways, enough backstory.
After noticing Caroline started to get distant, and she never properly answered my questions regarding her behavior, I wanted to see how far it would go.
For one week, I didn’t invite her/call her/text her first, and in a total of one week, she called me three times… twice to ask me about her assignment and once telling me how she felt insecure and bad. I’m not a jerk; I helped her out with her school stuff and comforted her when she felt down.
Me being the naive ‘love is perfect’ lovebird I am, I chalked it up to her feeling depressed again but feeling embarrassed about it. I continued helping and comforting her for the next month until nothing changed, and she never opened up. I was honestly doubting everything by then, “Is it me,” “What am I doing wrong,” etc…
I tried everything I could, eventually, I asked her friends if something happened, but they said she was the same as always towards them. I knew something was up, but I didn’t know what it was yet.
One day when she came over to my place (it was only the second time she did that in March; usually she came at least twice a week), we were sitting in my room and talking while she was trying out Valiant.
After she went to my kitchen to make herself something, I hear a notification from her phone. I’m usually not a snooper, but I had a quick look at her screen that lit up; I wouldn’t be able to read the message or who it was anyway.
It was a Discord notification. I was very surprised. I knew for a fact that she didn’t have it a month ago. Plus, she only plays Minecraft once in a while; she never uses Discord or anything. So the next morning, I did some snooping, and sure enough, I found a whole other social media account of hers where she branded herself to be an aesthetic gamer girl (not that there is anything wrong with that).
She had never told me anything about this; I couldn’t find any of her friends following her on that account either. Sure enough, she had her Discord username in her bio, and curious me decided it would be a good idea to create a throwaway account and try to text her to see what she was all about (before you complain to me, I know I was a butthole here).
After texting her on my new account, we talked for a bit until she became flirty (we played a few bedwars games together, once again on a throwaway account I bought for $1, haha), I kinda broke down and started questioning my sanity. I had been with her all this time and through so much crap, I couldn’t believe she would do this to me.
After the sadness came the anger, I wanted to know how far she took it. I found it hard to believe that she would just casually flirt with guys like this. After setting up my first recon mission plan, I found out more about her until I found out about her supposed man.
At that point, I had a huge emotional breakdown, and I felt I’ve wasted so much time helping someone who would betray me like this. And from her stories, I would later find out they were sleeping with each other for a whole month by now (about when her behavior started to change).
At this point, I started hatching my revenge plan. I know I would not let her off the hook this easily.
I spend two weeks pulling all-nighters making sure I had all my work done till the end of the year (until graduation). I spend all my remaining time creating fake chemistry textbook pages, so I could make my revenge more believable.
All of the information was wrong; I knew I had to give her a taste of her own medicine and betray her like she had me. For the remaining 2 months of the school year, I fed her all this fake information and made sure she got all of her assignments wrong.
I knew she wouldn’t be able to tell anyone she was copying off me as our high school had a very, very, very strict rule for plagiarism; as much as three small attempts on small exams could get you expelled. So after letting the pot stew for those 2 painful, awful months I let the poop hit the fan.
As our teacher had to handle an outrageous amount of classes, she always checked our assignments late often by 2 or 3 months all at once. I knew I could use this fact to my advantage. After she submitted her final assignments that were worth a huge percentage of our final graduation grade, I told her I knew that her shenanigans had been still ongoing for 3 ENTIRE months by now.
I told her how she hurt me and how it will come back to haunt her; I made sure of that. She mostly brushed me off and acted as if I were the villain as I couldn’t just leave her and that she “was only friends with that guy.” Although I told her something was going to happen, I never told her what it would be.
Trust me, she never saw it coming.
One week later, the end-of-year results rolled around. When we received our final grades, I was over the moon as I passed with flying colors, and on the other hand, her, not so much. Due to her final assignments and all quarter 4 work equalling to an F, she called me crying and asked for help.
She told me she wouldn’t be able to graduate if she wouldn’t receive at least a passing grade for this year. She told me our teacher gave her a final chance after telling her how disappointed she was. Caroline has two 2 more months at school with extra one on one online lessons with our saint teacher.
Honestly, props go out to her.
To be honest, I felt really bad for her and her situation, knowing very well if she didn’t work her butt off in these two months, in a subject she hated she would have to repeat the last year, without someone constantly helping her with her chem.
That compassion quickly went away, and I told her I would help her, but only if she apologized and paid me my regular tutoring fees. Caroline went full-on ballistic after that and screamed at me, how I could do this to her.
I hung up, and she called me a few seconds after, apologizing and agreeing to pay me for my help.
She now has two months of intense memorizing with her ex if she wants to graduate.”
8. Sure, I'll Rethink My Employment Here
“So this is from over a decade ago, but it is the only time I’ve ever quit a job and thought y’all might enjoy it.
I worked for Target on their overnight team from 10 PM to 6:30 AM. And eventually, a “specialist” position came up, for which I applied and was granted. This was the position of Receiver (scheduled to work 6 am to 2:30 pm), which basically was the person who would take in vendor orders (I.E., not things that were sent straight from corporate, but instead the Coca Cola guy or the Lays potato chip guy, etc.) and specialty orders that came in at times other than the main truck.
This was a job where instead of one major task you dealt with about 20 minor ones throughout the day, and your day varied based on the whims of the people who are bringing things into you. (We had a delivery cutoff of 12 pm, but management would always say just take things no matter when they came.) I generally was really good about managing my time and making sure if I needed to stay late for something important I did, and if it was something minor (say, the harlequin romance books that could wait overnight to process), I’d get it first thing in the morning.
I had a good rapport with my boss, and I got great reviews.
Then, my boss got a promotion, and my new boss was a piece of crap.
The new boss (we can call him John because that was his name — you suck, John) was a tyrant of the pettiest type.
He’d wonder why things were left overnight when I wasn’t busy earlier in the day when he saw me (because I’d completed all my tasks, and I can’t make UPS come faster than they do). When Target’s corporate told my department it was busy enough for a 20 hour a week worker, he refused to let me get anyone for longer than my 30-minute lunch breaks.
The straw that broke my back was PFresh.
For those of you who didn’t work at Target in the early 2000s, Pfresh was what they called their new initiative to have groceries in the stores. It was a big deal for them, and my store was one of the pilot stores in our area.
I would be the first person to have to deal with it, and then I would have to teach receivers in the area how it works by having them shadow me for a day at my store and me at theirs when they got their fresh food.
The fresh food came in a separate truck, that arrived at 4 am. I expected like I was informed, I would simply have to process it first thing in the morning when I got to work.
Instead, John decided that my schedule was going to be changed to 4 AM to 12:30 pm.
Getting up at 3 AM to be at work at 4 AM was not fun, but I dealt with it because I was a team player. However, John still insisted I needed all of my work done by the time I left at 12:30 PM, an impossibility when the cutoff for deliveries was 12PM.
I still prioritized things as well as I could, and nothing urgent was left undone for more than 24 hours (when Target was pretty good at making sure we had plenty of time to receive things before they had to hit the floor for street dates and such).
The straw that broke my back was when the “specialist” position was terminated. Basically, Target wanted those special positions in the normal chain of command, which is fine. However, when they did this, they also gave lots of power to John. You see, it was in my old position that I had weekends off (because people don’t deliver on the weekends) and was not required to work holidays, along with being a guaranteed 40 hour a week M-F position.
When this change came through, HR informed us that we had a week to decide whether we wanted the position or if we wanted to go to another position in the company, or if we wanted severance. HR informed me that nothing would really be changing with my job (because it was still important whereas other jobs like the jewelry counter weren’t considered as important and were being rolled in with other things.).
I was going to stay with the position until John brought me into the office later that day. He told me he was tired of my poor attitude involving getting things done, so he was changing my schedule to a split shift. Basically, he wanted me to come in from 4 to 5 am, then go home for an hour, then come back at 6 am and work until 1:30 pm.
He also told me that any overtime would no longer be allowed and that I’d have to start working one weekend a month and holidays. He also wrote me up for something that I did not do, but the person who covered my lunches did, under the guise of me not training them properly.
His words were “You need to think long and hard about how you are working and think about if you want to be employed here in a month.” I told him he was absolutely right. I told him I would be right back; I had to run to the restroom.
Instead, I went to HR and told them I’m taking the severance and as it was 12:25 pm, I’m guessing this is my last day. I then got to go back to John and tell him what I just said. He told me that I had to come back next week to train my replacement.
I walked out of that building happier than I had been in the last three years working there.
I got texts over the next few months of the fallout. The receiving department was a freaking nightmare for months, and since I was the only one who knew how to handle their refrigerated trucks, they lost an entire truck worth of merchandise that week.
That was NOT a good look for them. Additionally, corporate had to send out people from out of the area to cover all of the training I was supposed to provide, which cost them a lot and made corporate even more angry at John. Last I heard, he had been let go, and the next place he worked fired him for harassment.
I had a month’s vacation where I got totally prepared for WoW: Cataclysm, and then I took a new job. I was happy as a clam.”
7. Wrongfully Accuse My Sales Person Of Forgery? Get Your Services Cancelled
“I used to be a sales manager for a B2B Services company.
We provided a service to businesses. Unlike a lot of companies, we would not auto-renew a client’s service UNLESS they signed a new contract. The contracts were generally for 1-3 years.
All our contracts were signed on an iPad that recorded the GPS coordinates of where the document was signed, AND we emailed the client a copy of the agreement instantly, and in the email, we basically said, “If you disagree with this contract or would like to make changes, contact us within 5 business days.
If you don’t, we will move forward and bill accordingly.”
In addition one of the cancelation terms in the contract was dishonesty. If the client could prove we were dishonest, they had a right to cancel without penalty. If the client acted dishonestly, we had the right to cancel their contract with us.
There was a client that was actually quite a small account but always proved to cause a lot of headache for my reps. I remember calling the rep and going over the common issues I’ve seen with this client, and I stressed, get the signature on the iPad in his office.
I also stressed that if the client wanted to cancel, let him cancel because he’s been proven to be very difficult to work with.
Salesman went to the sales call, signature was signed, client’s service was executed according to the terms of the contract.
4 months later, I get an email from a customer service rep, and the client is claiming that my salesman forged the client’s signature.
I did my due diligence before calling the client.
-
I checked where the newest contract was signed, and it was signed at the client’s place of business via the iPad.
-
I compared the signature on the newest contract to the many signatures on the numerous contracts we had on file with the same signer from the client.
They were all very close.
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I also looked at the email that we went to the client right after the contract was signed. The client opened the link to see his contract 65 minutes after the contract was signed and did nothing. Also, the link was open for several minutes.
-
I looked up the client’s current billing status, and he was 45 days behind. He knew we didn’t start charging late fees until 60 days behind, and at 120 days, we would begin litigation/collection account status.
I called up the client, and this is how the call went…
Me: Hello, this is Luther from ABC. I was told you are accusing my sales rep of forging your signature on the renewal?
Client: Yes, I never agreed to pay that much. I never would have. I told him to give me a discount, and I wanted to see it in writing before I signed.
Me: And did he give you a discount and show it to you in writing?
Client: No, he said he had to go talk to his boss, and I never heard back from him.
Me: Ok, and then what happened?
Client: Well, y’all kept up the service, and I noticed on my billing it hadn’t gone down but up in cost, and I looked back in my emails and saw the sales rep forged my signature, and that’s illegal.
Me: Yes, you are right. If the salesperson did forge your signature, that is illegal.
Client: Well, good to see that we agree on that.
Me: After the contract was signed regardless if the signature was forged or not, you would have gotten an email with a link to the contract asking you to verify that everything is correct, and if it’s not, to let us know within 5 business days.
Did you get the email? If you did get the email, did you review the contract?
Client: Well, yes, but I was pretty busy and didn’t open the email until recently.
Me: I totally get it. We are busy nowadays, so assuming he did forge the signature, what would you consider an acceptable resolution to this?
Would you want to end service with no penalty? Would you like a discount?
Client: I would want a discount.
Me: And what would you consider an acceptable discount?
Client: 3 months of free service.
Me: Got it. Well, Mr. Client, I got several problems with your claim that my sales rep forged your signature, and before I fire this salesperson for forgery and offer you a discount, I’d like to see if we can’t address those problems.
Client: Sounds fair.
Me: The signature was captured on our iPads, which records the GPS coordinates of where the signature happened, and per the GPS coordinates, it happened inside your place of business.
Client: Well, he knows that right?
Me: Yes, he did.
Client: That just means he forged it inside my building.
Me: Ok, well, the next issue is that the signature on the renewal contract looks exactly like the previous contracts.
Client: He just copied my signature. I know I didn’t sign that.
Me: Could it be possible someone else in your company signed it?
Client: No, everyone here knows I’m the only one that gets to sign those contracts.
Me: I understand. The next issue I have with your claim is that the link to the contract that was emailed to you was opened 65 minutes after the contract was signed.
Client: No, it wasn’t.
Me: Yes, sir, it was. The reason why we have you click a link to view the signed contract is so we know if you opened the link or not.
Not only that, it appears like the link was opened for several minutes, which to me would indicate the person who opened that link reviewed the contract. Also the fact that no one ever responded to the email would indicate to me the person who reviewed the contract was fine.
Client: Are you accusing me of lying?
Me: Yes, and because of that, I will be canceling your service with us effective immediately. How would you like to pay your current balance?
Client: You’re canceling my service and want me to pay?
Me: Yes, I want you to pay for the services we provided.
Client: I’m not going to pay.
Me: If you’re not going to pay for the services we provided, I’m going to refer you to our collections department, and they will add late fees, and if you don’t pay them, they will refer you to our law firm for litigation.
Client: We have a contract; you can’t just cancel my service.
Me: Actually, I can, since I have good reason to believe you’re lying about the accusation that my salesperson forged your signature. Everything I have says you signed it. Our contract states that we cancel your contract for being dishonest, and that’s what we are going to do.
Client: Screw you! Hangs up
I referred the client to collections. He eventually paid them without us having to sue him. (Honestly, we probably would have just sold his debt to a collection agency due to the dollar amount not being high enough to be worth it to sue).”
Another User Comments:
“I’ve never understood why people do stuff like that. You’re willing to risk an innocent man’s job and probably send him to jail to get 3 months of free service?” Sammyb2fst4u
6. Shut Up While You Drive? You're Really Going To Mess Up Your Car Now
“Let me tell you a short story of me and two former friends on a short trip to France. We live in Germany and only an hour away from the border, so we agreed on a quick day trip by car.
Let’s call the friend that is driving her car Brenda (because I know she would hate that — no offense to Brendas that read this), and the other friend in the back sneaky Patricia. Her name will make more sense in a minute.
Brenda doesn’t have her license for long, maybe a couple of months, and doesn’t even have the necessary experience yet to justify her reckless driving in general. We’re talking about turning without speeding down enough trying to compensate it with steering and going “whoops” every time instead of using the FREAKING breaks like a person that cares about their passengers.
She was also texting and smoking while driving, sometimes simultaneously, and it didn’t matter what kind of road she was driving on. She behaved like an experienced driver in any way just without the experienced driving part and neither did she try to take more care while driving.
So as a co-pilot and the responsibilities that come along with it, this woman puts me in a difficult situation because how else would it be? Brenda does not take criticism well.
On the mentioned day, we’re approaching a red light with a car in front of us, and Brenda is reaching for her phone.
I hold back thinking she is checking the time or whatnot. She gets stuck on the screen; although, I already let her know that it makes me uncomfortable, and I yell, “WATCH OUT!” She hits the breaks, and we don’t crash into the car in front of us.
She begins to lash out at me saying: “What the heck? I got it under control. Stop irritating me, and just shut the heck up when I’m driving cause you yelling around is gonna make me crash, not me!” It was something like that I think.
I’m completely irritated at this point because not only is this woman putting us in danger but also not capable of learning from her apparent mistakes. So I “shut the heck up.” I’m silent for the rest of the drive through the city we wanted to visit and we reach a parking garage.
Back when I was a beginner, I remember parking garages as narrow nightmares, seeing my dad yelling at me for the scratches I would get the car at the next turn. Luckily, it never happened to me because I was cautious enough until now, but I bet you can guess who is not feeling so cautious today.
Brenda sees a parking spot she likes and just goes for it. Judging from her confidence, one would assume that she has been driving since preschool. Unfortunately, this only applies to her confidence. I think back then, she didn’t grasp the concept of parking yet which is to make your car go slower, so it comes to a freaking stop, girl!
The result speaks for itself. She is too fast and turning into the spot like a cool driver in a movie scene. I see it coming, yet I hold back… and it happens. The front right forcefully caresses the concrete pillar which separates the chosen parking spot from another.
Imagine the long, loud, and gruesome sound every car owner fears. Imagine the echo carrying it to the farthest corner of the garage. Imagine my face going stiff from trying to keep my posture. And now IMAGINE the first thing this MANIAC said after she recovered from the shock: “You saw it happening but didn’t say anything on purpose.”
Of course, I’m not surprised and take a deep breath to do what I had to do. I lied the crap outta her, claiming I didn’t say anything because she knows the car better when it comes to parking, so I didn’t want to irritate her with that either.
This is where sneaky Pat comes into play. I’m sure you already forgot about her being all passive and stuff. She jumps in only to raise suspicion and retreats to the back seat because she immediately remembers how Brenda can get. She sensed the danger but had to up her chances for car privilege.
She wanted to drive back because she too had made her license in the recent past but was even more of a beginner. I stuck through my lie for a certain reason. I wanted to take myself out of the situation to have Brenda assess the result by herself.
I did not want to give her a chance to shove the blame off on me, so she can avoid reflecting on her behavior. Even sneaky Pat confessed afterward that she had been worried about her safety too and realized she had to sit this one out quietly as to not offer any vulnerabilities which could hinder Brenda’s mental metamorphosis towards a responsible driver.
In the end, Brenda had no choice but to accept the situation and deal with it herself. The outcome was disappointing, the trip was ruined, and we had to drive back because she wasn’t in the mood for it anymore. I can’t say I didn’t feel bad for her.
I can’t say she didn’t deserve it. I can’t say what I did was right. But what I can say is that karma is awesome!”
5. Refuse To Admit You Bought The Wrong Software? Pay 5 Times More And Lose Your Job
If you can’t be honest, it’ll bite you in the butt later.
“I had worked about two years at this point for an MSP (at the time called a systems integrator), and they generously paid for the engineers/techs to obtain industry certifications.
I started out as an on-call contractor setting up desktops, and they hired me on full-time after about 3 months.
By the time the revenge occurred, I had worked my way up to junior level engineer, obtained my MCSE, CNA, and was working towards my CNE and Cisco certs.
At the time, Novell and Microsoft were neck and neck in server operating system dominance, hence getting both certs. With book study and field experience, I wasn’t an expert, but I held my own.
One day I get called into the boss’ office to meet with him, the owner, and the salesperson.
The owner told me with a gleam in his eye that the company just landed a major, high-profile client: our city’s pro basketball team, and they’ve agreed to give us a small task to prove ourselves. I was to install and configure backup software on their Windows Server (important later) and test to ensure it works.
The team offered the carrot of not only signing a long-term support contract but also a recommendation to their business partners and other teams if I was successful. This was definitely within my wheelhouse. I figured 1 hour tops, in and out.
I showed up to the arena, checked in with security, and I’m escorted to the business office area.
A lady we’ll call Karen comes out and introduces herself as the CIO. Karen spent the first 45 minutes of my time there to take me on a grand tour… of the business office. I saw the owners’ offices, the GM’s office, her office, pictures of framed, autographed jerseys, the nearly empty trophy case, and the big glass window that overlooks the court.
She even said I’m welcome to eat lunch in the staff dining area. She then said she’s taking me to the server room.
In another circumstance, I would’ve considered the tour a treat, but three things. First, I had another client to see that day, and this was messing up my schedule.
Not a big deal, I can have the office call the client to move the visit back a little. Second, the team hadn’t exactly been playing championship-caliber basketball except for the last two years prior. Before that, they made the playoffs twice in 15 years and got their heads kicked in both times.
Third, my favorite basketball team is this team’s rival, so it’s cool, but I’m not over the moon.
Then she asked if I was ready to see the server room. We turn a couple of corners, and she unlocked the door to… a really small office.
Boxes stacked in one corner, spare furniture in another. At the back wall sat an old school CRT monitor hooked to an old school KVM switch box on a desk connected to two tower computers sitting side by side on the carpeted floor. Right next to the monitor sat a stack of network switches with a spaghetti of cables that ran haphazardly up the wall and into a removed panel of the fake ceiling.
On top of the towers sat a box with the backup software. Karen waved her hand at the setup, pointed to a sheet with some handwriting on it, said I should have everything I need, and she’ll be in her office if I had any questions.
She left me to it, and after I called the home office to reschedule my other client, I started assessing the situation.
I quickly saw the first problem: the NetWare server was already set up to run backups but going by the status report date on the screen, backups hadn’t been running for months.
The software was only an add-on module to backup email folders. Using the credentials on the sheet, I logged in to the Windows server running Exchange to handle all the email. I tried to look at different settings, and I quickly realized I only had limited permissions.
I logged into the Novell server, and I didn’t have enough permissions. I walked back to the CIO’s office.
So far, Karen’s been pretty chill, but suddenly Karen flipped the Karen switch on. Maybe I didn’t seem impressed enough with the tour.
Me: Two problems. First, I need admin permissions to do the work you need to be done.
Second–
Karen: Why do you need admin permissions?
Me: To… install and configure the backup software? The software also–
Karen: Why can’t you just use the accounts I gave you?
Me: Because… they don’t have enough permissions? Also the backup soft–
Karen: My other tech (let’s call him Paul) uses those accounts fine to run the backups.
Why do YOU need extra permissions? (Picks up the desk phone and dials) Hey Paul, could you come to my office now, please? Thanks.
Me: Probably because he has backup operator permissions. Higher permissions are needed to install the software. Speaking of which–
Karen: (after Paul knocks on the door and enters).
Have you had any problems with the daily backups?
Paul: No. Why?
Karen: federalant9 here says he needs extra permissions to install the backup software. Do you agree?
Paul: (Looks side to side) I’m not sure as I just handle the deskto–
Karen: If Paul can manage backups with those accounts, I don’t see why you can’t install the software, federalant9.
Me: How did you install the software originally?
Karen: All of this was set up before I started here, and I was brought in to clean all of this up.
Me: Is there anyone else who manages the servers?
Karen: No, it’s just me and him.
Me: I see. Would you come with me, please? I need to show you something.
Karen: Why?
Me: It’s easier to show you than explain.
Karen rolls her eyes, gets up from her desk, and motions for Paul to come with her. We all go back to the “server room.”
Me: Ok, first let me ask. My understanding is you want the backup software installed on the Windows server, right?
Karen: Of course, so it can perform brick-level backups of the email. You guys said you were sending one of your best; how do you not know about backups?
For those who don’t know, brick-level backups at that time (not sure what it’s called now) meant the software allowed the backup and restore of individual emails, not the entire email database. So, if someone deleted one email and wanted just that one restored, that could happen instead of restoring/overwriting the entire database and losing new emails processed since the last backup.
It also saved a lot of time.
Me: That’s why I’m asking. You bought an add-on module for the Novell server (showing her where it says on the box). I can’t install this on Windows.
Karen: (snatches the box from my hand). I called the software company myself and ordered it from them directly after I told them the setup here.
Are you saying they lied to me and sold me the wrong product or made a mistake?
Me: No, I’m not saying that as I wasn’t part of the conversation. I’m only saying this is for Novell, and I can’t install this on Windows.
Karen: So they sold me the wrong software?
Me: Can we go to their website or call them?
Karen: (Rolls her eyes) fine. Let’s go back to my office.
Back at her office, she sat down, went to the website while I stood behind her, then spun around to me with a smirk on her face after a few mouse clicks.
“See? This is what I bought. It says right here it will backup Microsft Exchange servers.”
Me: Well, this doesn’t say brick-level backups. And, it says for Novell servers. Can you click where it says Microsoft?
Karen: (Sighs and clicks). This is pointless. I bought what I bought because it’s half the cost. When I called, they said this would also back up my Exchange server.
Why would it backup a Windows Server but not install on a Windows Server? That makes no sense.
Me: (pointing to the screen) It says right there the Windows version performs brick-level backups. The NetWare version will back up the emails, but the entire database.
And it will restore the entire database as one file, but it can’t do brick-level backups or restores. A server can backup anything as long as it can see it on a network and it has permissions to it.
Karen: Here’s the bottom line. They told me this would work.
I’m paying you to make this work, so make it work. Or tell me you can’t make it work and I’ll find someone who can.
Me: It’ll work but not like how you think. And if you want to (air quotes) “make it work” it will only install on Novell.
Can I show you?
Karen: (Sighs and hands me the software box).
Me: I still need an admin login.
After several more minutes of debate over the admin login, she reluctantly logged me into the Windows server. I put the CD into the Windows server, and nothing happened. I brought up the CD in Explorer to show her folders and files, but no executable and no way really to install.
She unlocked the Novell console, I inserted the CD, mounted it, and the install auto-ran. I didn’t look back, but I could feel her eyes burning holes into the back of my head.
In about 30 minutes, I installed the software, configured it to backup the Exchange server boxes as well as the rest of the data on both servers, and performed a successful test backup all while she hovered over me with her arms crossed. I noticed that backups hadn’t been running, and after checking the logs to find the problem, I configured the scheduled service to log in with the backup operator account credentials.
Tested again successfully.
Me: By the way, your backups haven’t been running for about 3 months. I fixed that for you. The scheduled service didn’t have a login account configured, so I plugged in the backup operator username/password.
Karen: What do you mean?!? You saw the status screen when we walked in and it said a successful backup?!?
And you said you needed admin rights?!?
Me: Yes, that was the LAST successful backup which was months ago. (Switching to the logfile on screen) Here’s the date and time of the last successful backup. Configuring a backup job and installing software are two different tasks that need two different sets of permissions.
Karen stomped to the door, opened it, and yelled for Paul. When he arrived, she lit into him so loudly someone from the cubicles came into the room to see what the problem was. I still feel bad about that because it wasn’t Paul’s fault…
After three hours, I left and immediately called my boss from the car, explaining exactly what happened. Sure enough, Karen had already called. My boss reassigned my other client and asked me to come back. When I got back to the office, the owner, my boss, and I went to the conference room, and we set up a conference call with Karen and the backup software support team.
They looked up Karen’s account and politely explained that according to the notes, they told Karen to buy the Windows version for brick-level backups of Exchange email accounts. But Karen balked at the price, so they offered her the Novell version with the caveat that it would perform entire Exchange database backups and user folders only.
I wasn’t completely right but right enough.
Karen now insisted that they only sold her what they sold her because she threatened to buy their competitor’s software. After she demanded a supervisor, the supervisor got on the call and said she needed to buy the correct software, they would make an exception to their no refunds on opened software policy, and give her partial credit.
Otherwise, she could go ahead and buy the competitor’s software and she would get no refund at all. Karen huffed and puffed and tried playing the “do you know who I work for” card, but they wouldn’t budge. She had no other choice.
After the software company hung up, Karen asked the owner when he could send me out to finish the job.
He muted the phone and asked me if I wanted to go back out there, and I said no. He asked me if I would go if he sent a senior there with me, and I agreed. He then unmuted and told Karen that to make sure there are no issues, he was sending me with a senior engineer, and he made a deal with her.
If the senior corrected my work, there would be no charge for service. However, if I was correct, then she would pay for my time today plus the time for both me and the senior on the second visit. Also, she would need to make sure that we had full administrative access, and not hover while we worked. Agree to all conditions or we don’t come back.
Karen agreed and added in that she would definitely not work with us again then hung up abruptly.
We went back after Karen got the correct software, I installed it without a hitch even though she had enabled remote desktop on the server to watch me.
I also wrote up a job aid for Paul with screenshots to manage backup jobs. The senior saw I knew what I was doing, so to pass the time he made a list of recommendations for her: server racks, anti-static mats, UPS, racks for the switches, cable management, adequate ventilation and temperature controls, physically securing the room, disaster recovery plan, etc. He emailed them to Karen and cc’ed me, my boss, and the owner.
The invoice we sent her charged her for 3 hours for my first visit, plus the hour at my rate and another hour for the senior at the higher rate.
A few months later, my boss told me they got a call back from the team’s new CIO.
He said after the team restructured the business unit, he took Karen’s place and hired additional staff. Paul discovered the recommendation list among a bunch of emails Karen had deleted with a brick-level restore of her emails that I set up. The new CIO wanted to know how soon the company could send someone to complete the recommendation list and consult his staff on additional recommendations.
Since the new CIO was hiring his own staff, he wouldn’t need us for a long-term support contract, but he would definitely call us when he needed any work done they couldn’t handle.”
4. Steal My Meds? Lose Absolutely Everything
“16 years ago, I made a friend one day on the bus. Up until about a year ago, I considered this guy a member of my family. Let’s call this guy Joel.
So, I keep a crystal bowl on the mantle above my fireplace, full of my smoking stuff.
I started noticing that after poker night, my bowl seemed a lot emptier than it should. So I set up a camera to see which one of my guests was helping themselves when my back was turned.
Next poker night, once everyone is gone, I pull up the video. There Joel was, plain as day, stuffing like $60 worth of my medication into his pocket.
I sent him the video and told him he had to return my medication or pay for it, and I told him that if he chose to do neither, he should no longer consider me a friend.
Even with the video staring him in the face, he said he hadn’t taken anything. He even had the nerve to act offended by the fact that I accused him.
So I decided to ruin his life.
Over the years, he had told me a LOT of things he didn’t want his partner to know: affairs; shady stuff he did with their joint funds; substance issues; terrible things he said about her, her mother, and her sister.
I went back through all of our messages and took screenshots of EVERYTHING “secret” he had ever said to me. There were over 70 pictures.
I sent her the screenshots.
Here are some examples of the kind of stuff that was in the screenshots:
He admitted to two-timing her with 8 different women over the course of our friendship.
Taking funds they were saving for a car and using it to buy illegal substances. The fact that he was continuing to do substances after he promised her he was clean and sober.
Some of the things he’s said about her and her family:
She’s a vile disgusting woman, and the reason they never make love is that he can’t stand her smell.
He said that all of her friends only pretend to like her, so they can buy pills off her. Also, as I’m editing this, I just remembered that he said he wanted to get one of his side chicks pregnant because he’d always resented his partner for being infertile.
Her sister is “faking” her autoimmune disease for attention. Her mom is a fat lazy cow, who doesn’t actually need to be in a wheelchair; she just likes not having to stand up or bathe herself, so she’s malingering.
There were more things, but that’s what came to mind without me having to dig through the screenshots I sent.
She filed for divorce and reported him to the police for the substances he had in their house. While he was doing his 8 months in jail for the smoking stuff (THAT HE STOLE FROM ME), his boss filled his position, and he lost his job.
His (now ex) partner won’t let him in her house.
Now he lives in a car and showers at truckstops.
I found out about the aftermath in parts. Some came from his ex; she told me about the divorce, kicking him out, and getting him arrested. Some came from a guy Joel and I used to both be friends with, who works at the place Joel used to work.
He told me about the job loss, car living, and the truck stop thing. I’m still on good terms with his ex. I even sent her some enchiladas the other day for Cinco de Mayo.
I also sent the video to all of our mutual friends, so he lost 90% of his social circle.
I cut that other 10% out of my own life since they want to associate with known thieves. Birds of a feather.”
Another User Comments:
“”Over the years, he had told me a LOT of things he didn’t want his partner to know: affairs; shady stuff he did with their joint funds; substance issues; terrible things he said about her, her mother, and her sister.” Honestly, my dude, if you still considered him a friend after he did crappy stuff to other people, that’s on you.
If you watch someone do crappy stuff to other people, don’t act surprised when they do crappy stuff to you too.” Sky_High8422
Don't really know that you come off looking that great here either.
3. Since She's Not Getting The Promotion She Was Promised, She Won't Do Any Extra Work
Fair enough, right?
“This isn’t my story but my woman’s. Allow me to set the scene.
My wife – Harper’s – official title is Mental Health Professional, or MHP, and she has been in this position for three years at a live-in care facility for adults with mental illnesses.
Before that, she worked for several years at the mental health ward at the hospital, so she had more experience walking into her current position than anyone else they had hired.
Within her first year, she got 2 lifers to progress in their treatment plans so thoroughly that they both got the okay to move out into the sister program that has more freedom and independence.
She was working with a third “lifer” who was about ready to apply for the sister program and the transfers between housing, or even non-AMA releases, were suspended.
All this is to say that she has made some very serious and positive changes to this facility from the moment she started working there.
They made her the Lead MHP, and her direct supervisor’s boss started giving her more responsibilities; like the morning team report for the whole facility, handling client money, making decisions on big changes to help the overall workload, etc.
Her yearly review happened in December, which was promised to come with a large raise to reflect all the added responsibilities she has been gradually given.
Of course, it didn’t. She stayed on HR about her raise for a month or so after the review itself until the big boss finally brought her into his office to discuss with her a promotion. It would be a bit tricky because she has her Bachelor’s in psych and social work but not her Master’s – which we’re working on getting her back in school soon to complete and which she needs to officially fulfill the job title they had in mind.
Still, she was clearly leaps and bounds beyond her coworkers, often staying over to help clients or to help finish paperwork, filling in wherever she’s needed. So, promoting her would be cheaper than hiring on someone new, and of course, this would come with an even better pay raise.
So, for the last few months, my woman has been doing even more for her supervisor’s boss and the big boss. Anything they ask of her, dangling that official promotion over her head, constantly saying it would be a “gradual transition,” and she needs to learn this or that – do this or that – to train for it.
Out of her own pocket, she bought new binders and other supplies that made the various parts of her job and theirs easier. She planned, reorganized, filled in, whatever. The supervisor’s boss even told her verbatim, “I don’t know what I would do without your help!” several times.
All this with the promise of an official promotion and a raise.
Then it happened. Last week, Harper was tasked with sorting through potential new hires – as they had been hurting for more MHPs for some time, and the bosses had taken some of Harper’s clients off her workload to make room for the new responsibilities – she noticed that of the stack she was given, all applicants had a Master’s or qualifying credential in social work.
Hrmm… Worrisome.
Two days ago, it was business as usual for most of the day until about an hour before Harper was supposed to clock out. She called me in angry tears ranting about the conversation she had just had with the supervisor’s boss. He told her she would, unfortunately, be taking on more clients, and the promotion would be put on hold for the time being.
She said he didn’t come right out and say he had decided to hire one of the people with a Master’s instead for the position, but what he did say was, “You’ll have to relinquish any added responsibilities and return to being just an MHP.”
Okay. Bet.
After trying to calm her down, I gave my normally frustratingly accommodating wife a nudge in the malicious direction. One of the first added responsibilities she was given was the morning report. It was her job to have all the staff gather during the clients’ breakfast to relay what happened during the 3rd shift, the plans for the day, coordinating client appointments, etc. She would have to be in the facility before the 3rd shift clocked out to get their notes, and then plan a traveling and gas budget for all the appointments, review any safety concerns or incidents, and this all added about an hour to her morning.
So, how happy was she the next morning when she got to snooze her alarm and sleep in a bit longer. When she got to the facility at her usual clock in time as an MHP, she said the place was already in chaos. A fight had broken out and someone had some funds stolen out of their room (all normal events for this place) but no one was exactly sure on the who or why of it because 3rd shift had had no one to pass along the notes so they just filed them and left. Of course, Harper knew where they had been filed because she organized the filing system no one had thought to check.
As soon as the supervisor’s boss saw her clock in, he asked why she wasn’t there for the report. See, he is always a seemingly sweet and soft-spoken man, which made the sudden change of mind all the more surprising. Harper said she just stared him down, trying not to grin, and said “I’m just an MHP.
I can’t handle the morning report.”
She then spent the rest of the day giving him the cold shoulder; relaying only necessary information to him while focusing on her clients and paperwork. I want to be clear, it isn’t that they chose a more educated person for the hire position.
That makes plenty of sense. It’s that they promised her that position, spent the last few months transitioning her responsibilities to that position, promised her the pay raise to go with it, and then ripped it out from under her. That’s some underhanded bullcrap.
Oh, and since she isn’t getting the promotion, she went to HR to see about her over-due yearly raise.
She was told no one is getting a raise at the moment.”
2. Killing Manager's Houseplant
“I had a job after leaving school at 17. It was a decent job for a teenager, but the manager was an utter and complete nightmare. Nobody liked him. His subordinates hated him, his superiors openly ridiculed him and our regular customers disliked him. He was a liar, a hypocrite and condescending.
An all-round despicable person.
There was one other kid at the store who was the same age as me and we got along great. We played football at lunchtime and went out together on weekends. He despised the manager every bit as much as me and shared our negative experiences involving him with each other.
One day, the manager brought in a houseplant and placed it on the window sill by his desk. It was just a crappy plant and we probably wouldn’t have noticed it, but he went on and on about it, like it was some rare exotic orchid.
He would tell us how much it had grown and make a big deal about feeding and watering it. We began to hate the plant, because it was his and because he obviously cared a lot for it.
One day, we both had had enough of his crap for some reason and, since we were otherwise powerless to do anything about it, we decided to take it out on his beloved plant.
There was a large container full of sodium chlorate in the workplace that was used for killing weeds on the paths, roadways and car parks around the buildings. It was a white powder that had to be watered down before use. It had to be stored carefully and dispensed into smaller containers for the building managers with care, so we knew that it was pretty strong stuff.
My workmate and I both decided that the plant was going to get a dose of sodium chlorate and laughed like excitable children at the thought of killing it! Trouble is, in our childish excitement, we never actually decided who was going to do the dirty deed and we had no idea how much weedkiller to use.
The following morning, I saw my opportunity. The manager left the office to go somewhere, so I mixed up a spoonful of sodium chlorate with half a cup of water and poured it into the plant pot. I could hardly contain my glee, but I had to play it cool to avoid drawing attention to myself.
I said nothing all morning and carried on as though I had done nothing untoward.
At 10 am, I went to break-room early and, as soon as my workmate entered the room, I checked that the coast was clear, smiled like the Cheshire Cat and then proudly announced that I had poisoned the plant!
I was fully expecting praise and hearty back slaps, but, instead, my workmate covered his mouth with shock and then told me that he too had given the plant a dose of weedkiller! We could only stare at each other in shock! What had we done?
We were sure that giving the plant such a large dose of weedkiller in such a short spell would be too obvious and we would be found out and sacked. Oh well, the deed was done and there was nothing we could do other than nervously keep an eye on the plant.
By lunchtime, the plant was slightly leaning over and the manager was clearly concerned for its well-being. By late afternoon it was on its side and the manager was looking more confused and concerned. By the next morning, it was dead and shriveled! We had probably given it enough weedkiller to clear a car park!
We were sure that we would be challenged and found out, so we feigned confusion and sympathy! The manager eventually decided that he must have overwatered it and we were happy to nod in agreement that this might be the reason for its super-fast demise.
In hindsight, I don’t think the manager’s ego would ever allow him to believe that we might despise him enough to poison his beloved plant. He was the sort of person who believed that he would be popular with the young lads no matter how badly he treated them.
It was a truly petty example of childish revenge, but my workmate and I laughed about it for many years afterward whenever we met up!”
1. I'll Take My Lunch Break Exactly On The Dot From Now On
“Back then when I was in high school, I was working at a crepe place in a food court.
I was always working 8-hour shifts after school, and because it was a small storefront, there were two other people besides me, Kevin and Manager. Kevin was my friend since elementary, and the manager was a really chill dude. It was 6:50 pm, the store was busy as heck, we had a long line of customers, and all three of us were working our butts off (Tammy was at home) churning out crepes.
Soon it was 7, and it was my time for my 30-minute unpaid break, Kevin was supposed to get his at 7:30 pm. But the line was super long, and I thought it would be a jerk move to leave my coworkers there while I eat my lunch (or dinner — same difference).
Eventually, I went on break at 7:15 ish, and I was going to take my long 30-minute unpaid break. At 7:30, Kevin went on break, and a few customers came to order food. My manager handled it no problem. Then Tammy calls me during my break and says she saw me thru the security camera that I was taking a longer break (which I wasn’t) and demanded that I go back even when I was only halfway through my break.
Of course, I protested and told her the situation. She said, “You have so many problems, so just go back to work. Just take your break at the time you were supposed to, not a minute early and not a minute late. You don’t need a 30-minute break.
Go back to work now.” I told her my phone’s connection was bad and that I couldn’t hear the last part she was saying and asked if she could text it to me. Sure enough, she did.
A few days later, I was on a shift working with her fiancee (a Korean gentleman that didn’t speak English that well.
He mostly just worked in the back, making batter and stuff for the crepes albeit at a very slow pace cuz he knows he’s not gonna get fired. Isn’t this a conflict of interest?) Kevin had a volleyball tournament, so he called in sick ahead of time, and Tammy didn’t bother to call in someone else to man the store.
My break was at 7 as well, and as expected, a huge line formed in front of the store. I took off my apron and went to get food. I purposely sat in front of the store, within view of the security camera, and started chowing down.
Tammy called me, and it went as follows:
Tammy: “Go back to work! It is so busy!”
Me: “I’m on my break.”
Tammy: “You already rested. Now it’s time to go back to work.” (It’s 7:13; I just sat down with the food that I ordered.)
Me: “Uhhh no, last time you told me to go on my break on the dot.”
Tammy: “Don’t you see that he is working all by himself? Don’t you have any sympathy?”
Me: “Last time I worked my butt off, and you forced me to eat only half of my lunch and told me to work 15 minutes unpaid; you didn’t have any sympathy at that time.
Plus, it’s not like you are going to fire him anyway. If you will excuse me, I am going to finish eating my food before it gets cold. Bye.”
I hung up, and Tammy started bombarding my phone. I ignored it, and I ate until 7:29, after which I put on my apron (which took 30 seconds tops) and was behind the counter before 7:30.
She texted me afterward and told me that she would be docking my pay for an additional 30 minutes because I didn’t help out during the break. I took a screenshot of that conversation and sent it right back to her along with the previous screenshot I took of our conversation where she told me to work during my break.
I told her she can dock my pay all she wants, but I’ll send this to the Ministry of Labor along with a letter telling them that she hired her fiancee.
She fired me the next shift because I wore a graphic tee under my apron (she told me it was unsightly because my graphic tee had a depiction of a slice of pizza that negatively impacted the reputation of the store).
I didn’t send anything to the Ministry of Labor, but I made sure everyone I knew knows that Tammy is in fact a Karen.”
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