People Tell All About Their Inspiring Act Of Revenge
13. AIW For Messing With My Client's Website When He Didn't Pay Me?
“This happened early 2000’s.
I used to be a freelance front-end dev and a search engine optimization guru.
Back then, getting on the front page of Google was pretty simple. Link exchanging was popular but risky. I never did that, but I did have a single website that had serious page rank clout due to it being linked as a trusted source, directly from one of the top and most trusted websites in the world.
I would use this website for the best clients to get their page rank and search engine position leapfrogging other older and more trusted websites.
One day, I was approached by someone I’ll call Bob.
Now Bob sold travel packages. He needed to revamp his basic, existing website, with a complex website built with pretty tricky backend coding. I could do the front end, but I had to hire a backend dev to build the functionality.
Bob had a major launch in a month’s time, and it had to be ready. I usually ask for a 25% deposit upfront, but Bob said no; he was stung by the last dev and wasn’t going to lose any more money.
Now from the moment I met Bob, my gut was telling me this was going to end badly.
The problem was I needed the coin and it was worth quite a lot for me and the dev. I skipped the deposit on the promise he paid in full before it went on his server. Bob agreed.
For an entire month, we worked day and sometimes all night to get this done in his timeframe. With a day to spare, we had done it, and I’d never been so proud of what we had achieved.
I was honestly excited to show Bob.
The next day, I sent the link to my test server and he phoned me to discuss it. Bob said everything looked good, but he was worried his server’s PHP version may be too old to run it. I assured him it would, but he said he was too scared it won’t, and we would scrub our hands of it.
We went backward and forwards, but he was insistent the site has been uploaded and tested on his server before he parts with a penny.
I chatted to my Dev. He didn’t like it either but agreed we would upload our work onto his server.
Bob gave me the FTP details and server login, and I uploaded the site. I told him it was live and then… nothing.
I sent several emails and then phone calls. The emails went unanswered, and the phone went to voicemail.
Sensing a major problem, I rushed to my computer, fired up my FTP program to delete our work on his server and…
ACCESS DENIED.
He had locked us out, and the following day, he went live with our work.
For several days, I tried phoning until one morning, he answered the phone and said, “Listen, I’m not ever going to pay you, and there is nothing you can do about it,” then Bob hung up.
Rage was a good word for my feelings. I was shaking while I still held the phone in my hand.
For the next hour, my range of expletives was growing in complexity.
As I sat there figuring out what to do, it hit me. Revenge will be mine!
I registered a new domain name, which was Bob’s travel domain name, plus “sucks” at the end. If Bob’s website was called bobstravel.com, I had purchased bobstravelsucks.com.
I uploaded our work, basically an exact mirror of his live website, onto my new domain. I used my all-powerful mega page rank domain to link to my new sucks domain.
Within a month, my website jumped above his website in Google for every conceivable search phrase you would use for the packages he sold.
No matter what you typed in, my site was the first result, and his was always below mine.
During that month, I created a second website, which was Bob’s full name with “sucks” at the end. On this second website, I posted what happened, screenshots of his emails, and warning everyone what a conman he is.
Bob had a somewhat unusual first and last time. Again within a month, my website was above his own personal website.
I then forgot all about it.
About 4 months later, I get a cease and desist email from a solicitors firm.
A quick Google showed the solicitors firm was made up and didn’t exist. I reply back with, “I’m not ever going to take them down, and there is nothing you can do about it!”
Every now and then, I’d get emails from people he had conned by taking their dough for a travel package but never booking their package.
I’d put those on both of my websites, making sure those juicy important keywords, his full name, and company name were spread across each negative review.
A few more months pass, and I get an anonymous email linking to a new domain called mynameSUCKS.
I’m told to remove my two websites, and he will remove this new one.
A quick search, and what do you know? It isn’t even on Google. No one could find it. I reply back for a second time with his comment to me.
As each month passes, I’m getting more and more people emailing me saying they’ve been ripped off. I keep adding them to my website.
Turns out, the travel agency world is well regulated, and they started an investigation into Bob’s company, using my website as their main tool.
I get a call from Bob.
Bob is not a happy Bob. In fact, Bob is more of a desperate Bob. Looking at this text now, I know you can almost hear the despair and resentment in Bob’s voice.
Bob pleads and literally begs me to pull the sites down. Not only is he being investigated by the travel agency association, but he had some very important friends that didn’t appreciate the bad press he was causing in their circles.
He offers to pay me what he owed me.
Nothing more, just what he owed.
For the third time, and with a massive smile on my face, I say, “Listen, I’m not ever taking them down, and there is nothing you can do about it.”
Roll on a few months, and I discover his travel company has been removed from all travel associations.
No matter what you typed into Google, my website outranked his and all the bad reviews on my site were the first thing his potential customers would see.
I crippled his business so badly… It went bust.
During the collapse, one of his ex-employees contacted me and told me how hard he had worked to get my websites off the first page. He had registered dozens and dozens of other domains in the hopes some would jump ahead. Little did he know, only the top dozen websites in the world could jump it.
Apparently, his property was tied into loans on the failing business, and he lost his house too.
It took me just about a year to turn his business from a cash cow to a dead cow.
The motto of the story: if you ever think to mess with a Dev…
don’t!
Many people are saying I should have taken the money and not pulled the sites down. At that point, it wasn’t about what he owed me. He thought he could simply buy his way out of it after pretending to be a solicitor and then trying the same thing on me. Him knowing I didn’t care about what he owed anymore must have driven him crazy because ca-ching ching was all he cared about.
He then knew he could do nothing to stop his business going down the pan, and all he could do was watch it all fall apart around him.”
Another User Comments:
“ITR.
Kudos to your strength of principle, not taking his money when he offered it. I’d have demanded double, taken that, then went dark and did nothing after getting it just like he originally did.
You sir, pulled off not only pro revenge but also retained the moral high ground.” Manic-digression
Another User Comments:
“It would have been fun to take the money and still keep up the websites. I think you’d be fine legally since you could consider it a late payment for the website you built him in the first instancs. You could then just update your sucks websites with the information you know and that he finally paid you. By the sounds of things his business would have still crashed. ITR.” tfburns
12. AIW For Bringing My Shady Landlord Down Epically?
“This is going to be a very long, but considering I ruined this guy’s life (not an exaggeration)…
Location, the deep south. 2007-2008.
My ex-hubby and I have always gotten along very well, and we have (at the time of this story, 7-years-old), a daughter. We have always lived near each other for convenience sake and have on occasion even lived in the same house after divorce. So, I was thrilled when the people across the street from him sold their place, and apparently, it was going to be for rent! I had known the folks across the street, nice people, and had even been in the house a time a two, so when I showed up with my other half to look the place over, I kinda knew what we would be getting.
The landlord was working on the house when we pulled up (we had gone out to eat before this, and so I know he was unaware he was talking to someone who knew the people who had lived there and been in the house).
His big ole dually was in the drive with his company name stenciled on it.
He meets us in the garage and immediately starts lying. He told me this was his family home, and he was fixing it up, but there were a lot of memories there, and his kids had grown up in that house. I realized he was “adding value.” I kept my mouth shut because it was right across the street from my ex, and it was literally the bus stop for the school for my daughter.
He continued to lie, and I kinda tuned him out. The place was a little worse for wear, dirty, gross carpet, chipped paint. I made a comment on a broken light switch, and he told me he was having a cleaning crew come through and clean up the place and having everything painted and the carpet redone.
The price was a little high, but once again, I really wanted it, and it wasn’t nightmare high, just 200 over what I was expecting.
I had a small Australian shepherd, so first month’s rent, last month’s rent, and pet deposit… $1,250 for each one. Ouch.
So, about two weeks later, it was move-in day. I should have known something was up when the key was left in a combo box on the door. We had paid through a service, so he had the money, and we had the key… and a mess.
He had done literally nothing except replace a set of rotted outdoor steps that he probably had to for liability purposes. We dragged out the digital camera and started taking pictures. It was a 3 bedroom, 2 bath with a partial basement. We took over 1,100 pictures.
Here are some highlights.
-
Ketchup smeared on the kitchen walls and floor; nothing in there had been cleaned. The fridge was awful.
-
Had what smelled like hair gel rubbed into it in the dining room and outside the front bathroom door.
-
Fireplace literally had soot covering all of it and up to the ceiling.
(The reason for all the nonworking lights became apparent at the point; he kept it dim for showings.)
-
Garage full of trash
-
Partial basement which we hadn’t seen because he had a big saw set up and wasn’t really a selling point for us? Mold. All the mold.
So, I called him up and basically said, “what the heck?” And he replied that money and keys had already exchanged hands, and if I had a problem, I needed to put in a maintenance request.
He said, “I don’t remember it being that bad, sounds like you made a mess moving in.” Ok, so now I knew exactly how awful of a person I am dealing with.
Put in a maintenance request about the mold. Went out and bought ALL the bleach, other cleaning supplies, and a carpet cleaner. I am a military brat who lived in base housing. I know how to clean.
And we got to work.
It took two days for 4 adults, my ex, and a friend came over to help, to get the place passable. We even changed out the blinds. (They were broken and dangerous.) During this, the landlord comes over to look at the mold, and I KID YOU NOT, grabs a roll of my paper towels and MY BLEACH SPRAY, and starts wiping the mold off the walls.
He had just walked into the garage, grabbed some cleaning stuff I had down in the garage, and I found him about halfway through his “cleaning” job. That’s all he did.
Fast forward 3 months. Time for an inspection! Ok, he tells me he will be there tomorrow at 8 am. He shows up at 6:30 pm. Demands to be let in. I let him in, and he starts taking pictures of dishes in the sink, dinner was still on the table and lecturing me about cleaning up when I cook.
So, in front of him, I pulled out my digital camera and took one of him taking a pic of dishes for dinner with dinner still on the table and a time date stamp. Jerk.
He wanted to go through drawers in my bedroom. I laughed at him. Didn’t hear from him again till move-out time. (If you thought I was staying there longer than a year then you are crazier than I was when I rented that place.)
He sent me a move-out checklist.
Professional steam cleaning and white-glove clean of the entire house. New pine straw for landscaping. All rooms need to be repainted “wheat.” (When we moved in the bathroom was literally TURQUOISE.)
So we got to work. Steam cleaned, white-glove clean, etc. Then took another 1,000 pics.
He walks through and is livid. He even ran a white rag on the top of the ceiling fan. He snatched the keys out of my hand and told me to expect to hear from him in 10 days about the deposit.
Hmmm. That doesn’t sound good.
2 weeks later, I get a bill. For $3,750:
-
For more professional steam cleaning
-
HVAC cleanout
-
Apparently, we didn’t use the RIGHT brand of “wheat” (OH, YES WE DID!)
Two things I haven’t disclosed. I have a bad habit of recording bad people or just to cover your butt, and my mom is a landlord in the next state. (She is the good kind who never was able to make a profit from it.
If people told her they couldn’t afford to pay her because they needed to feed their children, well, my mom usually helped them out… So glad she got out.) But my mom was very familiar with the laws and had looked a few things up about my landlord.
So, I grabbed my little recorder and called him. He owns a real estate business, his side is rental stuff, and his woman and grown daughters bought and sold houses.
His oldest daughter picks up and transfers me to him.
It gets ugly fast, and he tells me that I must have let my Australian Shepherd pee in the vent grates, (what the heck) and that the way I take care of my daughter would be very interesting to CPS. He can help me work out a payment plan but pretty soon we would be getting into collections territory. At one point, he actually says that “all tenants are liars.” Nice.
About 20 minutes of being threatened.
I call my mom back. To be honest, I am pretty darn shaken up. CPS? For what? So my mom tells me to pretend like I am playing along and ask for an itemized receipt. Tell him your mom is going to cover it and tell him your mom needs it before turning over the money. I had one 10 minutes after I asked.
On my end.
The professional steam cleaner was a friend of mine who had a business and gave me a discount.
HVAC was a scam.
The company he listed belonged to his brother-in-law, was defunct, and out of another state. Since I had before/after/AND HIS NEW LISTING pictures I knew he hadn’t hired anyone to do HVAC cleaning. The vents were painted to the wall… In all the pics.
We saved our paint receipts, and I actually had pics of us painting. You can see the right brand and color clear as day.
I called his business and told his daughter that I would be taking him to court.
She obviously was unaware of what a crazy person her father was because when I told her, “No one threatens my little girl,” she didn’t know what I was talking about. So I put her on speakerphone and played a recording of her dad threatening to have CPS come visit if I didn’t pay up, and she made it most of the way through before asking me to turn it off.
And then she put me on hold to get her mom, his lady. She tried to “reason” with me, and I backed up the tape to the part where he talks about what happens to kids in the foster system and played it. She told me they would get back to me. They actually did! The mom and eldest called me on speakerphone and apologized! They told me how the business was divided and how they normally don’t deal with rental stuff.
I told them it was fine, but I was still taking him to court.
Time for court.
We ended up in arbitration. I showed up with two laptops, for before and after, proof of his fake HVAC nonsense, a stack of literal receipts, him committing a crime by threatening to falsely call CPS, and a pretty good working knowledge of renter law in that state. At one point, the arbitrator asked me if I was a paralegal.
Ha!
He had a picture of dirty dishes and stories about how I lived like a pig. I pulled up the pic of the same sink of dishes, with dinner in the foreground, time and date stamped. The arbitrator actually asked, “Did you expect her to do the dishes before she ate her dinner?”
Even the woman taking notes for the arbitrator was grossed out when I showed them the ketchup and basement mold pics.
Did you know you can get 3x what you ask for in a rental dispute, depending on your state? Yeah, you can.
I did. The arbitrator used the word “appalling” when describing the landlord’s behavior.
When I went out in the hallway afterward, there was a young couple there asking the clerk if the landlord was available yet. Apparently, they were waiting for their turn at arbitration. I asked them if their case was HVAC-related, and sure enough, it was. I pulled out all the paperwork I had about it and handed it to them with my number.
Actually got several calls from his other tenants. He had been running that scam a while and these kids I had handed the paper to had looked up every house on the landlord’s website and went door to door warning them. Smart! I hadn’t thought of that.
Meanwhile… My mother was filing a complaint with everyone she could think of because he had his business listed as a suite…
which turned out to be a P.O. Box. Huge no-no. Your business must be a location that can be served by the courts.
A year later, I saw a truck with his logo drive past. But it wasn’t the dually; it was an older F150. So I looked him up in the county clerk’s records.
Well first, it seems he got divorced. And cleaned out. The house, big truck, everything went to her.
Then she sued him for the business. He got to keep the name, and she took everything else. I looked up the realty website using her maiden name to search. She and the eldest daughter were using her maiden name and had a whole new web page and set up. Also, my mom got notice that her complaint was being addressed, and he had his license suspended and a huge fine to get reinstated.
My mom kept an eye on the records for home deeds in the area and all but two of his properties were sold at auction.
So, let’s sum up. He had to pay me 3 times what I asked for. Lost his scam. Lost his partner. Lost his house(s.) Lost his truck. Lost his license for a while.
No regrets.”
Another User Comments:
“ITR. Hey may have owned the house but you owned that butt.” AsymptoteMcGotes
Another User Comments:
“You destroyed his life but he seriously tried to take advantage of yours and other people’s.
This guy sounds awful and I think he got what he deserved. Bye Felicia! ITR.” Reddit User
Another User Comments:
“Love it! IN THE RIGHT.
My son had an issue with his landlord. He lives in a small bedsit apartment – actually the block is an old 3-storey motel. He is on the third level. He had issues with the shower leaking into the living part of the unit, which damaged furniture and ruined some clothing.
My son contacted the agent several times and nothing was done. The water started leaking into the unit below, causing black mold on the ceiling and pooling in the light fitting (!). He emailed photos to the agent, and still nothing was done. So he started withholding part of his rent every week. That soon got their attention, and he was summoned to court with a notice to evict. He turned up to court in a suit and tie, armed with all the correspondence and photos. Long story short, the judge tore strips off the landlord and told him to fix the issue, and under no circumstances was my son to be evicted.” bassmanOz
11. AIW For Sticking To My Truth When Asking For Vacation?
“I had graduated with a Masters in Engineering degree in the USA. As an international student, I had 90 days to find a job or leave the country.
So when I received my first job offer (the only in 2 months), I was very excited and took it, to stop the 90day countdown.
This job was paid minimum wage and was several levels below my qualifications as a Master’s degree holder.
During this job which I had for about 9 months, a few of my vacation requests were denied with the reason given “not enough notice.”
As this company relied on having inspectors available for emergency projects, the company relied on keeping inspectors employed without pay till a project was called in by a client.
They would rather have inspectors at home without pay rather than them being on vacation.
I needed vacation, it was the month of October, to celebrate my girl’s birthday. This time I had wised up and asked for vacation 1.5 weeks earlier. The week I needed vacation, I followed up with my supervisor, he checked with the project manager, who proceeded to tell me the request was denied as I didn’t give enough notice and also didn’t follow up earlier so they could make arrangements for my replacement.
I didn’t get the day off to spend with my girl; she was sad but was mostly ok.
But to make up for the birthday, we decided to take a long vacation in December, 2 weeks long to fly to the west coast.
I filled and sent my December vacation request in October to my supervisor and project manager. I copied the scheduler and a couple of other supervisors in the area to who I was assigned to from time to time.
I made sure to follow up every week or two till my December vacation.
I hardly got any responses, while some responses said it’s still far out, and they will check when my vacation comes closer.
Being sure my plan would work this time, we booked the flight, car, and hotels/Airbnb for our vacation by end of November.
December rolls around, I make sure to check verbally and by text message with my supervisors about my vacation request, and to remind them I show them the vacation request and the emails I had sent.
All say they will check but no one came back to me about the same.
By this time I had been promoted to team leader and would have a direct line of communication with the project manager when I was acting supervisor. I would casually slip inquiries about my vacation in phone conversations and in emails when it related to my vacation timeframe.
December 20, 2 days before vacation.
The company was spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on retraining its entire workforce. They scheduled my training during my vacation. (Yes, everyone knew trainings were going on, but you didn’t get put on the list till and weren’t notified till a few days earlier.)
I reached out to my project manager and informed him about the vacation I was going to take and couldn’t attend the training.
He was furious, yelling on the phone that he never received my vacation request and I have no option but to attend the training.
To which I say I put the request 2 months in advance and that I even emailed him about the same.
He mentions I never followed up and that I cannot take the vacation.
I mentioned the follow-up emails, the texts, the over-the-phone conversations, and my follow-ups with other supervisors and the scheduler.
He says he will get back to me and hangs up the phone.
I immediately open the work laptop and (which I now had as I was promoted) and forward the email conversations.
I get a call from the scheduler, he was angry as well and says that never assume a vacation request to be approved only because you submitted it earlier. To which I mention the email from the project manager I received in October which stated, the vacation request needs to be submitted well in advance and needs to be followed up to be granted.
He says my chances of getting the vacation are very slim and I should better attend the training as only trained staff will be kept employed.
Then he hangs up.
I get a call from my project manager about 15 minutes later who is calm by now, asking me to cancel my vacation.
(My girl at this point was furious and heartbroken at the same time, I assure her we will be going on this vacation even if it means I have to quit my job. She wasn’t thrilled with that either, as this would mean the 90 day counter to get a job would resume and we won’t be able to enjoy the vacation.)
To my project manager, I say canceling my vacation means canceling all the flight bookings and all reservations.
He goes back in rage mode saying how unprofessional I was and that I should have never made reservations till the vacation got approved.
In my mind: Whatever dude, last-minute reservations cost too much to afford and are never convenient.
He says he will call me back.
30 minutes later, he had made arrangements for my training to be in the next class which was tomorrow. (2 days till vacation) It was an accommodation — food, travel, everything paid for training.
I agree, go to the training, get paid for 8 hrs for both days of training free food and everything.
The training venue is 150 miles away, they pay us 0.45 cents per mile.
Come back and go on vacation.
During the vacation, I get calls from other schedulers and supervisors to show up at some client, which didn’t need to but I answered, just to get their reactions.
Some of them were salty and said they will check with the project manager, that I might have to cut my vacation short.
I let them know I am across the country and if they are willing to pay for my losses and flight I would do that. (Knowing the company didn’t need me that much, I knew they wouldn’t go for it.)
Some of my supervisors told me to enjoy and they would take care of stuff there.
I quit in January.”
Another User Comments:
“You did what you had to do.
ITR. This is a problem with so many companies in the US, it’s ridiculous. They ‘give’ you the vacation time but never let you take it and generally work to actively prevent you from ever using it.
Didn’t submit your request early enough? Denied.
Submitted your request early, but didn’t follow up? Denied.
Submitted early and followed up? You submitted too early to schedule, check back later.” HasturDragon
Another User Comments:
“ITR OP, way to fight the good fight. Employees need time off too.” Reddit User
10. AIW For Telling My Workers Exactly What Went Down?
“So, my life has been in the trash for a while now, but a tiny bit of revenge can feel really good. It does not end what I’m going through and is only a small chapter, but still.
I was working some small jobs just to stay working. Namely, I was working at a Walmart and also at Lowes. Well, as things eased up a bit more, job opportunities opened up, and I interviewed for Warehouse Manager at a company I will call Neurotic Co to protect the identity of those involved.
I was immediately offered the job, though at a pay rate I thought was a joke for a manager. Still, it was much better than Walmart. They put me on an hourly rate of pay and gave me a 50-hour-a-week schedule to meet my minimum income expectations. The pay was insulting in some ways because of the range of things the owners wanted me to be able to do, including: welding, plumbing, electrical, and carpentry all on top of managing.
The warehouse had gone through a short shutdown and was ramping back up slowly.
I managed a day crew of 2 that had been there forever, a night crew that at the moment had 1 person, and 4 drivers that had been there a while. My hours aligned mostly with the night crew as they needed the most help and the daytime guys could handle it well enough. So, I managed at this warehouse for 8 months, that was all I could take.
In that time, the owner slowly eroded my power. I watched him tell countless lies, change his mind on things at random, and change our working hours at the drop of a hat. He was a jerk. Also, the whole place was covered in cameras, and he would come in to talk to us about very specific things he had watched us do on camera while he was sitting at home.
It was disturbing.
Turnover was huge as the owner would simply anger people, and they would leave. It made my job impossible. But the other managers would tell me to hang in there and that he will be gone soon. Eventually, I had a crew that was loyal and worked for me. The only problem was if I was not in, they would call out to avoid working with the owner.
Then, finally, it came: the owner was supposed to move to Florida to be near his grandson. His woman was making him; I think he wanted to stick around and just run the business into the ground.
A couple of days before he left, the owner took me aside and gave me a huge write up for all sorts of dumb stuff that was untrue and then yelled at me for an hour saying things like, “I bet you are sitting there thinking how can this place make any profit without me.
Well, I was successful before you all by myself.” And so forth. This of course was a lie; he had been given the company by his father, and it survived largely on loyalty from the customer base and a single product they were the exclusive distributor for in the region. As he left for Florida he sent an e-mail naming out the management team and excluding me.
So, I told the other managers I felt like I was being treated like a supervisor rather than a manager, and I would, therefore, act as a supervisor rather than a manager. I started looking for a new job. I planned to give a normal 2 weeks’ notice and leave peacefully. Then one night, I had a funny feeling, and it made me take most of my personal stuff home for whatever reason (had a lot of my own tools in my desk and such).
The next morning, the stated management team took me into the office and fired me. The notice they gave me simply said you are terminated for insubordination, and they refused to sight an incident. To this day, I am convinced that the owner watched me take my personal tools home on camera from Florida and then called them and said fire him first thing.
Then the revenge.
On my drive home from being fired (my shift started 2 hours before my night workers), I called my workers one at a time and told them what happened, said I had enjoyed working with them, and if they ever needed a reference, I would be happy to help. I had a fantastic crew at this point, all good people to spite hating the owner.
A few hours later, the calls started coming in.
The entire crew had called out for the night. I had a good giggle about it. But 2 days later, I started to get more calls. To the man, the entire warehouse night crew had quit in loyalty to me. I was told they had been offered $4/hour raises to stay and all refused them. After the warehouse workers quit, I got a call from my favorite driver (I had mixed feelings about my drivers as a whole).
He told me that none of the drivers had certifications for driving the trucks we had (air breaks) and suggested I report it to the DOT.
Let’s just say that from what I heard: the owner had to come back from Florida at his lady’s protest to take back over. The only people they could get for the night shift are a guy who they fired previously when he got undressed in the warehouse and a guy who they previously fired for making far too many mistakes.
Deliveries were truncated for some time because they could only use the van instead of the 30’ box trucks they have while the drivers got certified. Oh, and as I understand it, there was a hefty fine.”
Another User Comments:
“Isn’t it nice to have staff that are loyal to you personally?
I was director of software development for a small but international company. (You’ve never heard of them, but you almost certainly use their products every day.) My team were all very loyal to me personally – they were from the beginning, because I wasn’t the boss, the boss quit, and the entire team came to me and said “we won’t quit if you become the new boss.” So I did.
I was boss for a year, then they started making things very painful both for me and for my staff.
I finally decided I’d had enough, found another job, and quit. There were three programmers, counting myself. (Programming was only a tiny part of my duties, but I did a little.) Two left, and only the most junior guy stayed – he was 25 (and I was 43), but I arranged for him to get my job (as “the only person left who knows how anything works”) and told him confidentially to demand at least what I had been making in order to stay.
The entire QA staff quit.
Heads rolled in upper management because without any of us, they couldn’t even touch any deadlines and they lost almost all their clients.” themcp
Another User Comments:
“In the right! I hope you realize how lucky you are to have colleagues who value you as a manager and person so much, they quit in solidarity and OP’s would not even take $4/hr pay raises. In some ways you’ve already won the human lottery. Congratulations! The revenge and fine were just the icing on the cake.” stormy8888
9. AIW For Playing Hardball When The Client Was Caught And Didn't Want Pay?
“A few things: First, I am a security officer with a private investigator certification, which allows me to take PI (private investigator) cases as long as it doesn’t Interfere with local police investigations, and any crimes that I witness must be reported to the police asap, so they can make an arrest.
PI cases come from a few sources. We are sometimes contracted by local police to do what’s referred to as spotter work, where we are brought on active wide-area investigations to do recon work and look but not interact with anything that might be involved with the case.
Basically, we are just an extra pair of eyes. Or the local police will mix us in a surveillance operation, and we would follow low profile individuals and report their day-to-day activities. These are completely confidential.
Then there are client contracts. This is where corporate clients contract our company’s personal investigations unit to investigate their employee’s day to day activities while on the job to see if there is some hint that an employee is committing a crime and to report if there is reasonable proof that an employee is breaking the law on company time.
The job is to gather evidence to prove guilt or innocence. These aren’t confidential but we usually sign a non-disclosure agreement.
Finally, there are personal contracts. When a person wants to hire a personal investigator to do a job, it’s usually something along the lines of a woman or man suspects the spouse is two-timing them and want some kind of proof. Or someone is looking for a relative or lost family and is trying to reconnect with them.
There is no disclosure agreement, and it’s up to the client to draw up a disclosure agreement. Most don’t, but we keep quiet as a professional courtesy.
Ok, now that the job description is done, let me tell you what happened.
About three years ago, I had been hired to do a personal contract.
The client, a rich sleazy snob, was apparently stupidly rich. He hired my unit (when I say my unit I mean the unit I work with a five-man team).
He believed his lady was going behind his back with other people, and he wanted proof of this, so he could start his divorce process with solid evidence. He contracted us in a six-month contract and was to pay the company xxxx dollars upon completion.
So, we set up surveillance cameras all over his large house and in the woman’s car with the client’s permission. We had at least one of the team tailing her at all times.
Good times. Day in and out, we watched their lives, and in this line of work, you either get detached or emotionally invested, like watching a soap opera.
As we watched them, we quickly saw this lady was a freaking saint. She volunteered at a soup kitchen and a children’s hospital. She helped with local churches’ canned food drives. Those kinds of things. She was the perfect definition of what a good human should be.
On the other hand, the man was a total jerk. He was the one we caught many times bringing women to his house. Sometimes, he would bring two or three girls in one day. And that is only what was recorded in the house.
We arrive at the four-month mark., which is basically where we show all the evidence and give the 3/4 report. We show him everything that we found and have a six-hour debrief with video and audio support, showing that she hadn’t done any wrongdoing other than a speeding ticket and a few double park situations.
After we concluded the debrief, he looked stupefied. He says, “So, you didn’t catch her lying. That what was the point of me hiring you?”
My boss, our captain, turns to him with a serious stare, which is perhaps in the most serious looking face I have ever seen in that man, and said, “You hired us to investigate your woman. You’re unhappy that your partner is an honest and faithful woman?”
The snob is visibly annoyed.
He stands up and is getting his jacket when my captain says, “Look, there are still two months on the contract. We will keep tailing her, and we’ll meet again after our contract is up and give you any updates.”
The snob turns to him and says, “Don’t bother. This is over. I’m ending it. Come when she is not home, and get your equipment out.”
So, a week later, we did exactly that.
Now, food for thought. When contracts like this are made, a small portion is paid upfront as a commission fee, and the rest is paid at the end of the contract’s allotted time. In his case, it is six months. Now pay works like this: the commission is divided up between each PI as a bonus to our salary, and then the salary is what we get from the company to get us through to the completion of the contract.
The remaining balance after being paid by the client is then divided into a cut for completion for the PIs and a cut for the office. Good money when done right.
So, fast forward to the next payday after the contract is officially over. My unit gets a call from our office to come in on the next payday as there is an emergency meeting regarding us and the last contact.
We get there and find out snob pulled the funding and refused to pay us for the work.
So, we’re getting paid, just not with the completion bonus. We all left super angry. We went to lunch and brainstormed how to get even with the jerk. Then we remembered all the house footage of his dirty deeds. At first, we wanted to blackmail him, but that’s low, and we’re better than that.
I remembered the lady, so I reached out to her.
I set a date to sit down and explain everything to her. I showed her the videos. She cried for a good half hour. I think I broke her whole world. It was gut-wrenching. I then advised her to get a lawyer and proceeded to give her all the collected evidence and my business card.
AFTERMATH: Fast forward about six months.
I’m called into court, as my company is suing him for fraud, breach of contract, and unpaid dues. My company wins the case easily, as his lawyer’s argument was that we failed to deliver the result he wanted. But we weren’t hired to deliver a product. We were hired to observe and report. We got paid in the end.
I was contacted by the woman who thanked me for all the evidence.
She got a divorce. Because of all the evidence I gave her, she got almost everything: his huge house, both cars, and a huge lump sum.
Moral of this story: don’t try to screw over people who specialize in gathering evidence and reconnaissance.
Update as of June 17, 2019:
A lot of private messages and a few posts asked about the woman. I promised I’d look into it, and I did.
I got in touch with her. And we agreed to meet with her yesterday. She was delighted to hear from me. We met up at a local coffee shop. And I got to meet her new partner. And she has had two kids (both girls and are cuties and so well behaved) with him and is pregnant with the third (confirmed it’s a boy). She has been remarried for almost two years now.
After a few coffees and idle chat, she told me about her own petty revenge story.
Now keep in mind this is what she told me, so take it with a grain of salt.
She told me of how the family of the super snob demanded that they get the house back as it’s their family ancestral home and offered to buy the house from her almost immediately after her divorce hearing.
She had a realtor come and evaluate the house. The family wanted to give her $250,000. But the realtor concluded that the house value was near $1.5 million. The family kept demanding she sells over the following months. She “told” the family about the realtor and his appraisal documents of the house are $5 million.
So she would be putting on the market up for sale for that price but would sell to them first because they were like family for a discount of $3.5 million.
They bought the house with actual banknotes the next day in hand.
End the pleasant evening with them. As I’m leaving, the lady smiles at me and grabs the sleeve of my arm. She says, “Wait, I never got to say this, and I want to tell you. Thank you! You are a blessing that rescued me.” She then reached in her purse and get her wallet.
I think she is going to hand me something. And a rise my hand to stop her. She smiles and pulls out my old business card. And says I tried to call you and your company a year ago to thank you. But the number on the card was disconnected. I wanted to know if you could update your contact information for me.” I ask her why she continues smiling.
“Because you’re the kind of person I like. You were looking out for me when I needed it, and I want to keep you in my back pocket just in case.” I updated my contact information for her and was invited with my family to their home for dinner on Friday.
The icing on the cake of yesterday is this morning, amazingly, I just got a call from my boss, very excited told me that “We, specifically you, have a new client who has offered you a five-year employment contract.” Apparently, the woman’s new man is a magistrate.
And has got his boss to approve a contract for the company. With the provision that I oversee as the new captain. This means the unit I will be running will be taking our job assignments directly from the court.
So thanks to everyone who asked me to check up on her. I went to meet for coffee and a chat and gain a high-profile and paying client.”
Another User Comments:
“ITR! I’m a PI myself and this gave me the warm fuzzies.
My firm doesn’t take domestic cases like this because of exactly this situation. We’ve been burned too many times and we don’t get the opportunity for this level of payback.”ThexGreatxBeyondx
Another User Comments:
“This guy WAS really stupid to think he could not pay you guys and not have any repercussions from the non-payment. Really stupid! Glad you got paid. I felt bad for the wife, but better for her to know and get out while she could.
You are totally in the right here.
Sounds like this jerk realized HE was wrong for cheating, so he was hoping that you’d find evidence his wife was doing him wrong so he could file for the divorce first, and get the upper hand. It sure did backfire on him!! What a loser!
This was a great story/topic. I even learned a few things. Looked up what it takes to get a PI certificate in my state. What an interesting job! Thank you so much!” blackberrybunny
8. AIW For Kicking Karen Out Of A Coffee Shop?
Hasta la vista, baby.
“I used to work as a reluctant supervisor at a Seattle’s Best Coffee, the kind that was attached to Borders back in the day. Although we were connected to the bookstore, we were definitely our own entity, something that the Borders management was quick to remind me of all the time.
One of our customers, who we called Silvers, was a certified nutball. She came in almost every day and spent hours sitting in the cafe writing on scrap pieces of paper and talking to herself and drinking cup after cup of coffee.
She ate lunch with us almost every day, too, which I never understood, because our sandwiches were basically soggy pieces of bread with meat on them. Because she was there ALL THE TIME, we were also privy to her crazy conspiracy theories.
In our communications logbook, we referred to her ramblings as “The Silvers Saga.” Among her more notable pieces of conversation: Oprah stole her idea for a magazine, Jennifer Aniston stole her haircut, her ex-man was awful (we suspect that he was making her take her medication), sandals were a conspiracy so that people could hurt your feet and blame it on you, the Pope was part of the Illuminati, witches had cursed her, etc.
Like I said, foolish.
As part of her insanity, she also used to regularly call corporate and make false accusations against us. Two or three times a day, she would use our payphone (I really wanted to rip that thing out of the wall) to complain that we were putting poison in her food and her coffee. She would act all nice to your face and then three minutes later would be on that phone telling someone that her coffee smelled like arsenic and she was probably going to die and she wanted us all fired.
And then she would come back the next day and do it all again. Everyone in the corporate office knew who she was and completely disregarded whatever she said. When I tried to get her banned from the store, I was informed that I didn’t have the authority — only the Borders could do that. Since the bookstore management never had to deal with her, they weren’t at all concerned about it.
That is, until the day she complained and a new employee at corporate, who didn’t know anything about this lunatic’s ramblings, raked the Borders HR manager, Bob, over the coals. “There is a whole file on this woman. Why haven’t you done anything about this? We are going to have to send someone to investigate because these are serious accusations. Your cafe staffs’ jobs are on the line.
Your job is on the line.” Well, now the management cared. Silvers was, as usual, sitting in the cafe eating a sandwich and drinking her coffee and pretending like she hadn’t just called corporate to complain about us for the hundredth time. With the woman on corporate still on the line, Bob marched over to Silvers and the following exchange happened:
Bob: Get up.
Silvers: (smiling) Are you talking to me?
Bob: Yes, get up.
Silvers: (with a look of righteous smugness) I guess you’re finally going to take me seriously now?
Bob: Yup. Get out of my store. Now.
Silvers: (smile gone) What?
Bob: What word didn’t you understand? Get? Out? Now? You are not welcome back here. No one wants to poison you, because no one cares about you. No one. Get. Out. Now.
And then my favorite part: Bob put the phone to his ear and asked the lady on the line, “Was that handled to your satisfaction?”
Coincidentally, after this incident, management was a lot more open to employee complaints concerning foolish customers.”
Another User Comments:
“Everyone sucks here.
Clearly this woman has some invisible diseases going on. She needs medical help and supervision. She needs support instead of getting kicked out. And why didn’t your superiors believe you when you called for help? Why couldn’t they send a mystery shopper to scope out the scene? I can’t believe it took a new employee to escalate this situation. I think everyone mishandled this and it could have ended terribly.
Lucky all of y’all still have jobs and no blood on your hands – or lawsuits!” Reddit User
Another User Comments:
“ITR. Cover your butt, simple as that. It’s great there was a log where you could keep track of The Silvers Sagalk but kinda crap it took so long for anything to come to fruition. Still, you did your best! And thank goodness! Silvers got what she deserved.” KittyKatKoo
4
7. AIW For Getting Our Worst Customer Cuffed And Removed?
We don’t want your drama here, dude.
“During high school, I worked in this little cafe in my hometown as my summer job. The cafe was open for lunch and dinner and was owned by this nice retired couple who got tired of being retired. The couple we called “Mom” and “Pop” were pretty cool bosses (I attribute this not only to the fact that they were great people but also that they didn’t really need the business to make ends meet) and were really egalitarian about who they hired, so the staff was a pretty eclectic bunch.
Being a kind of touristy coastal town (our population only ever reached a peak during winter when the “Snowbirds” came south), we had a mix of regulars and one-timers as customers. There was one regular, let’s call him Bob, who would come in every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night after getting cut off by the bar next door. Bob was a jerk. He would comment about the “bad quality” of our food (but would eat it all and come back time after time) and would harass the female staff in a casual “Did he just really just say that?” way that we mostly just shrugged off.
His favorite thing to do would be to say something vulgar and then immediately follow with “Redacted!” and he thought that was so freaking funny. It was irritating. Pop would give him “warnings” and he’d simmer down, but would always be back to his antics the next day.
One day Bob comes in while we’re training a new waiter. Bob was slightly more intoxicated than normal and must have really had a bad day because he was constantly complaining the whole time.
His drink was watered down, his appetizer was cold, it was too hot in the restaurant, the waiter was too slow, etc. When Bob’s entree was served (rib-eye steak with fries), he took one look at it and screamed at our trainee, “I asked for MEDIUM-RARE. Can you do anything right, you FREAKING IDIOT?”
That did not go over well. Remember how egalitarian our bosses were? The new trainee was a kid with Down Syndrome.
It was at this point, that Pop yelled, “I’ve had about enough of your nonsense!” and came storming from behind the bar, went straight to Bob, picked up the plate of steak, and promptly smooshed it into Bob’s face. The fight was on at that point, and we all had to jump in to pull them apart while Mom called the cops.
When the cops arrived they separated us and got the story from us individually.
Bob was pretty angry and wanted to “press charges” against Pop for “assaulting” him. One of the cops who showed up said, and I quote, “Seems like mutual combat to me,” and they promptly escorted Bob out of the restaurant, but not before issuing Bob a trespass warning (which was this paper that stated Bob couldn’t return to the restaurant for a year or he’d get arrested).
As Bob was being led out he was yelling at Pop, saying he’d be back the next day and would expect an apology. Bob didn’t pay his ticket, but no one complained.
The next day, sure enough, Bob showed up predictably intoxicated and went directly to Pop at the bar. He immediately started going at it again, demanding an apology for the mess Pop had made, for how much he embarrassed him, etc.
Meanwhile, our greeter had already called the cops and they showed up a couple of minutes later. One cop was the same from the night before. No words were exchanged, that cop just went right up to Bob, held him against the counter, and cuffed him right there for violating the trespass warning. The other customers were watching us with these vaguely horrified looks, but the rest of us were pretty darn pleased about it.
We didn’t see Bob for months later, and even then it was only when he was at the next door bar.
I only worked at that cafe for three summers before I graduated and moved on to college and that was years ago. But my mom tells me that, to this day, Pop dutifully goes to the police department every year to renew that trespass warning. It’s become a kind of town joke.
And Bob hasn’t been seen in the cafe since.”
Another User Comments:
“I want to say ESH. The other bar, your boss, and Bob. Why was he being served after being cut off? That’s your first indicator that he’s trouble 1) getting cut off and 2) making his way to your place to keep going. Of course someone is going to cause problems when they’ve been overserved. This has trouble written all over it. Mom and Pop should know that and should have given him a warning. Bob is a piece of work but this,(I think, I hope) was his rock bottom. He needed this slap across the face because what he really needs, even more, is help with his addiction.” Reddit User
Another User Comments:
“ITR. Bob, you suck. Go home. Stop causing problems for people.” BigTibby22
6. AIW For Walking Out?
“I never quit a job in my whole life without giving suitable notice… But not this time. My encounter with one of the worst managers I have ever had the misfortune to work for.
My family was not rich, and I needed to get as much money as possible after I turned legally able to work to pay for my school tuition.
I worked for a temp agency specialized in logistic and transport jobs.
I took as many jobs as possible: day jobs, 2 hours paid only jobs, weekly jobs, and always made my employer satisfied. They trusted me even for the toughest jobs you can imagine.
I have one simple rule: Treat me with respect, and I will respectfully work for you. Even doing sometimes overtime is fine by me as long as the employer is nice.
This is the story about me working for a new warehouse dealing with shipments.
We were about 10 young men, all university students, and would have to work from 3 am to 8 am from Monday to Friday.
No overtime, no extra pay on night shifts… Just the basic minimum wage and nothing else. No coin for food, nor gas money.
Our job was to dispatch all kinds of parcels into different trucks.
It was summer, so it was freaking hot. So hot you could grill a steak on the pavement. And of course, no aircon. But that makes sense as doors were always kept open.
Not only was the job tough, but the warehouse managers barely respected safety rules.
For example, parcels that exceed 55 pounds are not allowed to be carried alone.
When one of us dares to tell the main manager that it was way too heavy to lift alone, he would just say “Don’t be a wimp!” Everyone here is doing the same job! If they can lift it, you can do it! And if you are not happy about it, just leave! You’re not irreplaceable!”
He kept yelling the same things over and over in that small warehouse.
We were all assigned to a different gate, therefore we were all working alone but not too far from each other.
Days were always busy, and we could only have a 5-minute break for a quick shot in the toilets or a quick smoke.
The worst was for the people assigned at the bottom end of the warehouse. They literally had to run the whole way if they wanted to take a trip to the washroom.
Worst thing? The manager barely helped anyone on the floor. He just spent his time walking around and yelling, “Don’t forget, you’re not irreplaceable! There are plenty of people begging for a job outside willing to take your place!” And the one I hated the most was, “If you’re not happy, then leave!”
The job was already painful enough, so why did he need to make it more annoying?
Sometimes parcels could barely fit inside a truck as it was getting fully loaded.
The manager would usually yell at us for being incompetent and would literally kick parcels, smashing the content to make it fit inside the truck, and proudly says, “You see?! How can this be that complicated?!”
The icing on the cake was, one night, we arrived as always at 2:45 am, all of us nearly falling asleep and no one to open the gate for us. We waited until 3:30 until the manager arrived and straight away yelled at us: “What are you doing here?”
“Well, we are here to work…”
“The trucks have been delayed; no need for you to be here! Get back home!”
“Are we still going to be paid? We showed up.
No one told us not to come!”
He smugged.
“Why would you be paid? You are not working! Now get back home, and no need to come unless we call you!”
We were stunned. And quite furious.
As the manager left, we all agreed on a few things.
Here is where the revenge starts.
No one showed at work the next day.
I received a call from an angry manager at 3:30.
“Where are you?! There is work to be done.”
“You told us not to come unless you’d call us.”
“Then what do you think I’m doing right now?! Get up and get here!”
“I’m sorry, manager, but you are not my employer.
I’m employed by (temp agency name); therefore, all shifts must be confirmed by my employer before allowing me to go on site. The office opens at 8:30, so please call them, and they will call me.”
I hung up.
At around 9 am, I received a call from my temp agency asking why all of us did not show up.
I gently explained everything and the agency asked me if I could go there now.
I explained that I could not, as I have to attend some classes.
After a short conversation about the working conditions we had, the agency asked me if I could go there the day after. I told them that I could probably finish the week (it was a weekly contract), but I would not be interested to stay longer. They understood.
We all showed up the day after, and sure enough, the manager was POed.
He starting yelling at us as always stating we were a spoiled generation that knows nothing about hard work and takes everything for granted…
Etc., and we all got back to work.
Again he started the same thing, not helping but just yelling around. “If you’re not happy, then quit! You’re not irreplaceable!”
I stopped putting parcels in the truck and said: “You’re totally right, Manager! I’m not happy! So I quit!”
“What are you talking about! Get back to work!”
“You just told me that if I was not happy, I could quit.
Then you’re right! I quit!”
“Get back to work, or I’ll…”
“Or you’ll what?” I asked gently.
“The manager is right. I quit too.” Said another staff.
And within a few minutes, the 10 of us left the warehouse, as the manager kept screaming he’ll get our butts. It was 5:30 am, and there was a ton of work to do, but only the manager and some management staff in the office were there.
Left with a ton of work to do.
I received another call from my temp agency who asked what happened. How can 10 people decide to leave their job on the spot like that?
I explained that I simply did what the manager told me.
I’m not happy. So I quit.
And then I added all safety procedures that were not respected at work. No safety gloves were provided. No earplugs provided, carrying heavy goods without any help, etc.
They told me they would have a meeting with the person in charge but to please never do something like this again.
And yeah, I still worked from time to time for this temp agency after that.
My conclusion and what I learned from that?
Treat people with respect, and they will respect you.
Treat them like trash, and karma will simply hit you.”
Another User Comments:
“ITR. Personally, if I would need money and work in a job like that, I would definitely try to report all that crap to superiors on day one, and if that wouldn’t work, then it’s an easy report straight to “national work inspection” and how stupid that sounds its the correct translation. They wouldn’t close a warehouse over something like that, so no need to be afraid about innocent people losing job there, but they would definitely get heavy penalties and regular inspections, which hopefully would solve the problem.” VertoSan
Another User Comments:
“Very similar thing happened here at work recently.
We were bought out about 2 years ago and they got rid of most the managers, gave a few people the opportunity to take on that role instead of hiring more.
Recently we saw an advertisement for a post here but one guy is already doing that role so he got mad about it and went to the boss to complain.
Boss says: “If you don’t like it, go somewhere else”.
Less than 2 hours later he phones back and says “ok, I’ve got another job, I’ll be resigning end of the month”.
“Can we match the offer?” “No”
“Can we talk about it?” “No”
Yesterday was his last day here.
Also, what they don’t know is there is another company opening a new location that does specifically what we do and is hiring in a month’s time. A few of us(Essential to the company) have applied and are probably going to get it. They are going to poop themselves when half their essential staff quit. And it’s not like we can get replaced easily(highly specialized work).
Looking forward to that conversation.” Pagan-za
5. AIW For Sending My Ex To Jail?
“I was seeing a woman for 3 years. Let’s call her Lisa. We lived together. Grew apart. I thought the breakup went fairly smoothly. I agreed to pay for the apartment for the remainder of the lease (about a month and a half), and I went to stay with my bandmates.
I came back a few days later to grab some of my things, and the whole apartment was wrecked.
She ripped all of the pages out of my textbooks, burned them in a trash can, and scattered the ashes all over the couch. All of my DVDs were shattered and placed neatly back inside their cases and on the shelf. She wrote vulgarities all over my paintings, slashed them, emptied my paint tubes on the floor, and cut the bristles off of my brushes. I didn’t deceive or lie.
The others are up for debate.
She took a hammer to my gaming PC, the fat gray Gameboy I’ve had since I was 8, my NES and SNES, all of my toys, some flower pots that once housed some really nice shrubberies, and both of my cameras. My comic book collection was ripped to shreds. My clothes were cut into ribbons. My N64 and Wii and all of the games were missing (likely pawned).
She smashed my glass desk. The cats went unfed, and she left a turd in the toilet.
The cops came and told me that there was nothing they could do for me. Because we had lived together for so long, they were her things too, and she was certainly allowed to destroy her own property.
The landlord was next. He changed the locks and struck her name off of the lease.
All of her things were already moved out, so we both assumed she wasn’t coming back. My brother came over the next day to help me move the rest of my things. Bed, furniture, washer/dryer, etc. We were nearly done when Lisa shows back up screaming obscenities. She put a few dents in my brother’s truck while telling him how much of a jerk my mother is for giving birth to us.
Then, she tried to get inside to get some more of her things (nothing she owned was in there anymore) and further lost it when her key didn’t work. She punched me in the face and started hitting me with her incredibly dense purse.
My brother called the cops and let her know that they were on the way. Cops arrived, and she was gone. Their immediate reaction to the domestic dispute call was that I was the bad guy, so I ended up in cuffs while they looked for Lisa.
After they realized that I was hurt and Lisa was nowhere to be seen, they started listening to my brother and me. He showed them the dents in his truck. I showed them my still wrecked apartment. One of them got a good laugh out of the situation. They took pictures and a statement and left.
Fast forward a couple of weeks later. It’s the last day of my lease.
I’m sleeping on a mat on the floor. The only things left in my apartment are a few lamps, a TV, a microwave, a backpack full of some clothes I bought over the last few weeks, and my cats. It’s 2 AM when I start getting intoxicated texts from Lisa. ‘I love you! Let’s get back together’…The usual. I ignore all of them and try to get some sleep.
At 3 AM, I get a knock on the door.
‘Hey, open up. This is my apartment too.’ I tell her to screw off. Then I hear a much, much deeper voice. ‘Open the door or I’ll kick it in.’ Before I get a chance to respond, the dude is already trying to kick in my door. I grab my backpack and jet out the back. I called the cops as I left, but I didn’t stick around to see what happened.
When I return the next day, there are a few giant footprints in the front door (it’s one of those big steel ones), and the door frame is broken. She has smashed all of my lamps and the TV, peed on my pillow and mat, dumped all of my food out on the floor, spread kitty litter throughout the apartment, and smeared cat poop on the walls.
She also let out or stole all of the cats.
I got a call from her mother a few days later pleading with me to not press charges. I told her it was out of my hands. The cops had taken pictures and Lisa was going to be arrested and charged whether or not I wanted it to happen. I did. Last I heard, she spent a month in jail, paid a $5,000 fine, and had to sit through anger management classes for 6 months.
Good riddance.”
Another User Comments:
“Oh, hon! Did you ever find the cats?” Reddit user
Reply:
“Of the 4 cats, I got one back. It just happened to be the one she didn’t like, so I’m fairly sure she took the rest. That’s what I like to tell myself at least. The alternatives are a huge bummer to think about.” Reddit user
Another User Comments:
“Man, what you did was self-protection. ITR man! You had to take care of yourself from that crazy lady. That’s so crap that she felt she could come in and totally mess with your stuff. She peed on your pillows? Dents in your bro’s truck? Then her calling you back saying “I love you, let’s get back together?” Dude, that’s LOW. She’s scum. I don’t think 6 months of anger management class is gonna do jack crap to this one.” Reddit User
4. AIW For Taking My Ex To Small Claims After She Took Eveything?
“I was with a girl for about four years, let’s call her Brandy. We were best friends before we starting seeing each other, then we saw each other for about four years. She was awesome. I loved her very dearly. As far as I knew we were awesome together and great as friends and as lovers. We rarely ever fought. We got along great. We got engaged and had plans to get married.
As far as I knew, everything was perfect. In fact, I still doubt I will ever find another partner that I am THAT compatible with.
I spoiled her too. Maybe that was my biggest fault. I always let her go shopping whenever wherever she wanted, I kept her fed from a golden spoon and wrapped in the finest linens. Even if she didn’t ask, I typically enjoyed spoiling her.
That’s just how I am.
She had recently gotten a part-time job as a funeral directors assistant, paying $10 an hour, and I had subsequently gotten her a new cellphone line for her as a work line, as a celebratory gesture, because she had been wanting a Note 5 and wasn’t due for an upgrade. She said she would pay for the balance on the old phone with her first check.
Then one autumn day our only car got repoed.
She called the bank, the bank said I was three months behind on my payments. I knew that wasn’t right. That’s when she told me it wasn’t working out. She said she was tired of being broke and struggling financially. She wanted something better out of life than being broke all the time. The interesting thing to note here is that she hadn’t worked in a couple of years and had been living off of my paycheck.
I’m a network engineer, live comfortably in a fairly nice house with lots of the latest toys and gadgets and everything, but my newest car is paid for. I would hardly call that struggling.
But it appears, it wasn’t good enough for her.
So she left after the car got repoed. I was upset about it and went to my mother’s house for the day while she packed her stuff.
While I was at my mom’s I paid the repo fees and the past due balance for the amount the bank told me that was owed. Turns out, the balance was for a different account, the bank had repoed the wrong vehicle and given me the wrong account number to pay. So I paid somebody else’s account. They fixed it, applied the balance to my (not past due) account, and promptly gave me my car back
I came back that evening with some friends and she had taken EVERYTHING.
She took all of the furniture, except a couch and my bed and my kids’ beds. She took collectibles, decorations, food, basically everything that wasn’t nailed down.
Also when she left, she took her two cellphones that I have been paying for on a payment plan. So I still had to deal with my cell phone bill being $300/mo for three phones, when I only use one of them.
I still owe $1200 for those two phones. Then there was a matter of a $2,000 loan she had taken out with my mom, that she had agreed, in writing, to pay back.
I sent her an email a few days later asking for my stuff back and for what she owed and she responded that I was harassing her and that if I ever contacted her again, she would call the cops.
So I suspended her lines and didn’t say anything.
She called me from a borrowed phone the next day to ask me if I was going to tell her before I turned her phone off. I said I didn’t feel like I need to, since they were my phones and the account was in my name.
Since then she has tried to have my electricity turned off, which didn’t happen, because they called me to confirm.
She has tried to sell my car without having it in her possession, which failed.
She has tried to call the police on me for harassment, dumped trash in my yard and called the homeowners association, and broken into my house and left things, and taken other things, on several different occasions.
I have changed my locks and set up security cameras since then.
So enough of the backstory. Here’s where my revenge comes in. I took her to small claims court for $9,500 for property and damages and everything she owed and I won. Granted I have to pay to have that enforced, and honestly, I don’t even care to enforce it. But I won. Revenge is mine.
I also got a promotion at my job since she left, was recently given a raise and a big fat bonus, just got a $1,000 voucher from Delta since they screwed up my flight, and things are generally better than they had been before she left, tenfold.
She lives with her mom in a tiny room with no air conditioner, and no heater, can’t get a car (my buddy owns a car lot, she tried to buy from him because everybody else had turned her down – he turned her down on principal) or a cell phone because of her credit, and relies on friends and family to drive her to her 2 day a week job and school.
She also owes $40,000 for school loans for her first couple of years, and she’s got four more years left to go. But I guess that’s better than struggling, right?”
Another User Comments:
“Was there no signs that she was complete and utter human garbage? You never saw any indication that her soul was made of trash and her brain was made of urine?
ITR, OP!
These posts are the most terrifying because they always start with, “I dated my wife/husband/SO for X years and everything was perfect and we never fought.
Then one day they turned out to be the worst person in the world and dangerously vindictive, psychotic and completely lacking in empathy or compassion.”
So scary to think any one of us could unwittingly spend a huge chunk of our lives with a vampire of poop who hides who they really are. I guess be glad you weren’t married to her or had her kids or spent 20 years with her.
Also, your revenge was amazing.” OceanRacoon
Another User Comments:
“In the right, but you still need to send a collection agency after her, for good measure. Doesn’t cost much, once I had a bill ready to be enforced I found a company that would do it free of charge, but would keep 30% in commissions on the collected amount.
I declined because this guy (former landlord who kept the deposit) was highly liquid and just an asshole, but in your case with the questionable income of the ex, that would be perfect.” godless-life
Another User Comments:
“Sounds like a weird, knee-jerk reaction from someone who has no experience handling finances.
She didn’t even ask OP about it before breaking out the life raft and abandoning the ship. This suggests that she’s either not very bright or she was only staying with OP at that point for the comfortable lifestyle.
I guess in her mind he was on the edge of bankruptcy so she stole all his crap and sold it to benefit herself. Nothing but love there…” DeadMachinestds
3. AIW For Getting Everyone To Quit At The Same Time?
If one of us goes, we all go.
“This happened about several years ago, so I don’t remember every detail as it happened, but this is accurate to the best of my recollection.
I (at the time 21M) used to work for a company that sold phone cases and did phone and tablet repairs. The shop was this little kiosk inside a mall, and the manager was this guy we will call “Manny” (27M) whom I quickly became close friends with.
We were quite good at our jobs; I was the lead repair technician and acting assistant manager, and Manny was so efficient as a salesman that he could have sold water to a drowning man. We had two employees working for us, whom we will simply call “Employee #1” and “Employee #2.” They were only around for the last few months I worked at this location, but we all became (and remain to this day) great friends thanks to the incident I will be describing.
The four of us ran a very tight ship.
Our store always looked flawless, despite the fact that it was literally the size of a walk-in closet. Our Google and Yelp pages, though, only recently created, were flooded with good reviews, and word of mouth was spreading that we were one of the best phone repair shops in the mall, which earned us lots of repeat customers and lots of glowing recommendations. Our kiosk became one of the company’s best-performing stores in the region, and our performance didn’t go unnoticed by corporate higher-ups, either.
So when the company decided to sell the kiosk, they successfully enticed Manny and me into continuing to work for them by offering us both promotions and pay increases if we relocated to other areas and opened up new stores. Employee #1 (19F) and Employee #2 (22M) declined to be relocated, but they agreed to remain on until Manny and I were finally transferred out. However, corporate informed us that it would be at least a month before all of the appropriate paperwork was filed (hooray for red tape!), and for construction to begin on these new stores, the four of us would continue working for the new owner and receive our pay from him.
On the day we all met New Owner (42M), it was immediately clear that the transition was going to be rough.
He began changing our work practices immediately, and we quickly become acquainted with his pushy sales tactics, shady business practices, and other strange behaviors (such as contradicting us in front of customers about policies he admitted to not being familiar with); we jokingly took bets on how long it would be before the kiosk became a dumpster fire.
None of us anticipated the fire catching as quickly as it did.
First, he raised the prices on everything.
All of our products (cases, chargers, screen protectors, etc.) went up by an average of about $10-$20 each, well above what they were worth. He would add absurd fees to repair costs, haggled with customers over prices like it was a market stall, and kicked our return policy out the window. He refused to honor our customer’s repair warranties, something which caused him to constantly butt heads with Manny.
Our previously flawless Google and Yelp ratings tanked within three days of New Owner taking over, and that was just the beginning.
Once he had firmly ruined our established relationship with our customer base, New Owner started to gut his employees. He began by cutting the hours of both Manny and Employee #2 (our second-best repair tech), as New Owner wanted to get some “hands-on” experience with the customers and the repairs.
But since he had no repair training, this meant he was constantly keeping me well beyond my typical hours (often from open until close) despite the fact that all of us were sufficiently skilled in the same repairs. I don’t normally mind extra hours but not at the expense of my friends and co-workers. In any event, it had become clear that New Owner not only wanted to force both Manny and Employee #2 to quit by cutting their hours but also buy my loyalty by giving me and Employee #1 those same hours.
Additionally, New Owner was constantly scheduling Employee #1 (again, just barely nineteen and the only female on our crew) to work alone with him.
While Employee #1 made it clear that New Owner never overtly did anything inappropriate, we took it upon ourselves to make sure that they were never alone together. Fortunately, Manny’s best friend at the time was the head of mall security, and we’d also made friends with the managers and employees of other nearby shops, so thankfully, someone was always watching.
But the biggest issue was our pay! I was supposed to be paid a handsome hourly plus a 10% commission on all my repairs and sales.
However, when I asked for my paycheck, New Owner said that he hadn’t received them yet and would let me know when they came in. That was the largest red flag yet; our checks had always been delivered on the first and fifteenth of the month, but none of us received our checks that week, even the pittance that Manny and Employee #2 were expecting thanks to their cut hours.
And we knew he was making coin; he was constantly bragging about how his other businesses were “much more profitable.”
This scheduling/pay issues went on for two weeks, with Manny and Employee #2 barely making any hours and no paychecks forthcoming. At this point, Manny and I had gotten our transfer paperwork filed and were preparing to pack up and move out of our respective apartments; he was going to Phoenix while I was moving to Norman, Oklahoma.
However, since I’d basically been opening and closing the shop nearly every single day, I’d not had the time to pack anything, and the Norman shop was scheduled to open in just two weeks. I also needed to be there a few days early to help set everything up and get new employees trained as I was also getting a promotion with this transfer to assistant store manager.
I needed time off to pack and move.
When I explained this to New Owner, however, he insisted that he needed me here to help with repairs. I argued that Employee #2 was quite skilled with the repairs, since I had trained him myself, but New Owner insisted that he wanted my experience. It wasn’t until I reiterated that I had a set day that I had to be in Norman that he finally said, “Let me go make the schedule and see what I can do,” and then left for lunch.
He came back an hour later with the schedule for the next two weeks; surprise-surprise, New Owner has me working twelve out of the next fourteen days! The only days off he had given me were the next Sunday (which was greyed-out with “requested off”) and the last day before I was scheduled to be in Norman, for which he had me listed as “on call.”
Later, as I was leaving for the day, New Owner (much to my shock) literally handed me $3,000 and asked me to give everyone their pay.
$1,000 was mine, $1,500 was Manny’s, and I was told to split the remaining $500 between Employee #1 and Employee #2 “however I saw fit.” Honestly, that $3,000 didn’t even cover what I alone was owed, but by that point, we were all behind on our bills and moving expenses, and something (anything) was better than nothing. I then called Manny, Employee #1, and Employee #2, and we convened at Manny’s apartment for a small celebration that consisted of legal and less-than-legal substances as we discussed our friendship and how awful of a boss New Owner had been.
During our revelry, the conversation turned into a fantasy about how we were going to get back at New Owner, and it wasn’t long before we came up with a plan that we thought was halfway decent.
Our ultimate solution was a “suicide pact,” meaning we would all quit on the same day. Since my final day was coming up first, we chose that as “the date,” with the caveat that if someone got fired before that deadline, we’d all jump-ship THAT day instead. It was a great plan, but I felt that it wasn’t nearly enough. When I left for home that night, I messaged my soon-to-be boss from the new store (we shall call him “Jay”) about what was going on with New Owner.
He said that because New Owner was a franchisee and not a corporate employee, they were limited with the actions they could take. However, he assured me that “action would be taken.”
We wound up putting our plan into effect barely two days later; Employee #2 called me at seven in the morning and told me that he had woken up to a voicemail New Owner had left him at 3 AM to tell him that he was letting him go.
I passed the message along to Manny and Employee #1; the time had come, and neither of them would be showing up for their next shifts. I, however, would be going in for my shift to open, as Jay had given me a last-minute assignment the night before…
After a brief stop at Wal-Mart, I arrived at the kiosk at 7:45, well before New Owner had arrived, and quickly cleaned out all of the repair parts and tools which had been purchased by our corporate office, as well as all of the collegiate- and pro-sports licensed cases, the bejeweled phone cases that we sold for a premium, the marketing displays, and the special packaging we used for gifting.
Any product or accessory that had the company logo in it was removed from the kiosk. I then wrapped all of these items in bubble wrap, placed them inside the two shipping boxes I got from Wal-Mart and waited for UPS to arrive. When they did, I was handed a padded envelope from our corporate office with two shipping labels (one addressed to the Norman store, the other to the Arizona store) and two so-called “asset reallocation forms” which Jay had instructed me to fill out with the items in each box before placing and sealing it inside, then fix the shipping labels to the outside of each box.
Once this was done, the UPS guy kindly took both boxes with him.
Side-note: I am reasonably confident that these were not legitimate company documents and were instead something Jay or another corporate manager had manufactured for the ruse because I had never seen them before and never saw them again.
Anyway, as the morning progressed, I told all of our neighbors and returning customers about the situation and advised all of them to steer clear of New Owner and the kiosk after that day.
Some of them asked me to fix their phones one last time and then thanked me graciously by “tipping” the full amount of the repair. As my shift ended, I said my goodbyes to all the friends I’d made at the mall, and when New Owner finally came in to take over for the day, I thanked him kindly and told him that I would see him tomorrow.
I never saw him again.
Over the next week and a half, New Owner tried calling me numerous times from different numbers, but I ignored them all. He left desperate voicemails begging to get somebody to come in and cover for him, and I began hearing through the grapevine that New Owner had been getting into shouting matches with his customers and other managers within the mall, further driving people away as word got around that the “cell phone guys” everybody liked were no longer there.
Eventually, New Owner got in contact with Manny and asked him to try and get some of us to come in, including the guy he fired at 3 AM. Manny responded by saying that he would have us come in if New Owner paid us what he owed us. He never paid us, and we never went back.
Sadly, that’s where our part in the revenge came to an end, but karma ultimately finished the job.
New Owner did eventually try to retaliate and complained to corporate that I had stolen “his” merchandise.
By then, however, corporate was very familiar with our side of the story, and the forms I filled out proved that the merchandise in question had in fact been “reallocated to other locations,” which saved the company “thousands of dollars” in expenses on the new stores. To add insult to injury, New Owner would have to repurchase all of that merchandise with his own coin.
I placed New Owner out of my mind and eventually left that company for greener pastures about a year later but not before learning what had happened to New Owner.
He apparently ran it for less than six months, couldn’t keep employees longer than a few weeks (again, the pay issues), and was $50,000 in debt by the time he sold the location; turns out that those other businesses weren’t doing as well as he boasted. Nobody in that mall ever saw him again after that.
The shop is still there under new owners (by my understanding, the kiosk has changed hands a few times over the years), and while all four of us have moved on to different places in our lives, every once in a while, we’ll all get on XBOX and reminisce about our experiences there.
Our collective lottery fantasy is to eventually buy the kiosk back and run it like we did in the “good ol’ days.””
Another User Comments:
“Since you didn’t get your final paycheck, you should have reported him to the local Labor Bureau. There is a maximum period after an employee quits or is fired that all outstanding payments have to be made.” DevCatOTA
Another User Comments:
“IN THE RIGHT. Don’t mess with people’s salary. Something similar happened with my brother. However, when their paycheck wasn’t there on the agreed pay date, no one worked. The place only made the mistake once.” Cusslerfan
2. AIW For Taking A Customer's iPad When He Tried To Dine And Dash?
What a loon.
“I serve at a higher-end pizza shop in Minneapolis — local, organic ingredients, big ol’ compost bin, run on wind power- that whole deal. The very first table of my shift on this rainy Tuesday was a big ‘n’ tall dude in his late 20’s/early 30’s, sipping a drink and chowing down on pizza. My boss transferred him over to me, saying that he probably wasn’t going to order anymore and was almost done.
I go over and introduce myself, let him know I’ll be taking over his service, and that I applied happy hour to his tab, so if he needs more drinks/appetizers, they’ll be discounted. He thanked me, and I continued with my starting side work.
By the end of Happy Hour, his tab contained five drinks, two appetizers, a small salad, and TWO 10″ pizzas. While alarms should’ve been sounding in my brain, I was too busy being impressed with the sheer volume this dude could take in to worry about him walking out.
I checked in toward the end of every drink to see if he wanted to tab out, and every time he’d look at his fancy Apple watch, shrug, and order another drink. I encouraged him to keep drinking water, shared that I was nursing a hangover and wanted to do what I could to help him avoid the same fate, and generally did my best to connect with him because I care about my darn tables.
Over the next two hours, the restaurant filled and emptied. Tables turned, and he added four more drinks to his tab. All of my tables other than him were closed out, a few of them just hanging out, avoiding braving the rain (it was slow at this point, so it was no problem). He was cozy in a booth with his computer and a full drink, so I figured I was good to go on a quick break.
After about three minutes of glorious sitting, my super-server senses started tingling. Something was not right. I popped into the dining room to see my closed-out two-top hanging out and chatting, and my $90+, small salad, 9 drinks, two pizzas, and two appetizer table FREAKING GONE. There was a practically full drink at the table, plus half a small pizza and the box that he’d had for the last two hours.
I checked in with my lingering two-top, and they said that he had come up to the front, looked around, packed up his things, and left. They were shocked that he hadn’t paid.
I was shaking with frustration. Having just spent four hours serving this jerk, making sure he was drinking plenty of water to go with his 8 finished drinks, offering to call him a cab if he needed it, I felt personally taken advantage of.
Our mid-shift cook that night (a service industry vet who suffers no fools) happened to get off his shift just after Belly McAllTheFood (let’s call him BM for short) ditched, and because he’s the best, went out into the neighborhood looking for him. About 30 minutes had passed when our dear cook called the restaurant to let us know that he found BM at a bar two blocks away.
Ten minutes after, in walked BM, accompanied by my coworker. He let us know that BM’s cards were getting declined down the street and that we should be prepared to call the cops. He came to the counter, and I told him I’d prepare his tab for him.
He started to walk away, saying, “I’ll be right back.”
“Where are you going?”
He pointed to his bag sitting in the booth, grabbed it, and came up to the counter.
He smiled apologetically and let me know with a light laugh that– it’s funny– but his cards hadn’t been working! Totally weird. Such a surprise to him. I told him we’d give it a shot anyway.
BIG SHOCKER, his cards were declined. He could tell my patience was wearing thin. He did not have any ca-ching ching on him. I stared him down, trying to figure out how to proceed, while he tried to lighten the mood with excuses, presumably so I wouldn’t get his dumb butt arrested.
“Yeah, it’s funny, I just… I realized my cards kept getting declined.”
“Without us running them.”
“…Yeah!”
With a deep breath and the smile of someone about to lose their freaking mind, I said, “So, just to be clear: you ordered over $90 of food and drinks, and then you left without even TRYING to pay your tab… because you realized that your cards–that we never attempted to run–were getting declined?”
“Yeah! It’s weird, right?!” he said, with a “pfft” sound at the end, as if I were on the same page as him.
At this point my manager had come up front, both of us thinking “ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME? NO, IT IS NOT WEIRD. WHO EVEN ARE YOU,” and we both responded with, “No. It’s just nonsense.”
He asked if we could take down his information so he could pay at a later date. My manager took the lead from here.
“Can I have your ID?”
He nervously dug into his bag and then offered her his passport to hold as collateral.
“This is expired.”
“Oh, uh… yeah… I, uh, I just ordered a new ID. I have a new one coming in the mail soon.”
“This is useless to us. Do you have something that isn’t expired? Like a driver’s license?”
With a smile and a shrug, he said, “I biked.”
Because he wasn’t going to budge on this, he didn’t have valid identification, and he was being a smug piece of trash, I went to the back to call the cops.
When I came back up front, my baddie manager had his iPad behind the counter and was writing him a note explaining where it was and how to get it back (he seemed functional, but he was still 8+ drinks deep).
He said, “Please take care of it” before going back to his abandoned table, boxing up his last slices of pizza, and leaving.
So once he pays his $90 tab, he can have his $500+ iPad back.
We canceled his police escort. Here’s hoping that he pays and leaves me a fat tip for the four hours I gave his stupid butt excellent service.”
Another User Comments:
“ITR. I’ve had to deal with too many guys like this when I was a bartender for the better part of a decade. It’s these kinds of people who make service workers dread going into work. The whole point of working in a bar or restaurant is to make money, not have to foot someone’s bill when they decide to pull a fast one. My blood is actually boiling as I write this. I truly hope you do get that big fat tip for the four hours of excellent service you gave him. What a tool.” Reddit User
Another User Comments:
“Ugh, this story makes me feel really annoyed. ITR, op. You keep that iPad forever if you have to!” SnakeyEyez2
1. AIW For Letting The Boss' Daughter Design A Horrible-Looking Website?
“So, back when I was a university student, I got hired for a summer vacation position at a dog training school to design and maintain their website. It was kind of one of those scammy sorts of certifications that would never land anyone a job anywhere, but it was a thing and the school was actually fairly popular.
Now, this was back in the day before MySpace, where GeoCities websites were our own little touch on the Internet.
If you are young enough to never have had the pleasure of visiting a GeoCities site, here are a few of the common themes:
-
Like the Dawson’s Creek theme? Not for long! Because your inner ear canal is going to be eviscerated on half the ones you visit with So open up your morning light being shouted at you.
-
All the fonts. All of them. From Comic Sans to Times New Roman, you’re going to see them all.
-
Wait, all those fonts are visually appalling.
Better make a giant slurry of colors in the background to balance it out.
-
And let’s top all of that off with some low-res low-FPS GIFs. Utter perfection.
Anyway, I was actually a competent web designer, and it was clear that their official website was made by a not-so-competent web designer. It was basically a GeoCities site, hosted off GeoCities, which somehow made it worse. That’s kind of why they hired me.
A lot of their graduating customers in the final survey called the homepage a total mess.
The daughter of the owner of the company had designed it, and she was not happy that people disapproved of her work. You see, I was the poor dude in the position of cleaning up her mess, and I really did make a valiant effort to be civil about my job essentially boiling down to undoing her job.
You have to understand here that at the end of the GeoCities era, people were beginning to realize that visitors to our websites didn’t want to have seizures upon opening them, and the web in itself was gradually moving more towards simplicity. Dropdown menus were all the buzz, especially because high-speed cable was not yet popularized, and nobody wanted to load an abomination that reminded them of that god-awful teeny drama with kids who had thesauruses in their back pockets.
The owner’s sweet baby girl had also apparently caught wind of what they were paying me, which she thought was far too inflated.
Their course salespeople were making half the hourly that I was making, so why did they need me when they had her? The witch drove a brand-new Volkswagen New Beetle, so obviously, she wasn’t hurting for coin, but I digress.
During our first meeting, they asked me about my plans for the website. I went over how the current website’s bones were good (which they most assuredly were not), but it could use a more modern touch.
I proposed simplifying it, with dropdown menus, and so on. During this meeting, the owner’s daughter gradually transformed her smug smile into a sneer and later on into a full-out scowl. Eventually, she interrupted me saying that I wasn’t there to redesign the site (the purpose for which I was explicitly hired) but to do the tech stuff with her doing the design stuff. In general, people agreed with her.
Maybe “art director” was hidden somewhere in her nonsense consultant title, but whatever.
I realized then that my tenure there wasn’t going to last long. To milk out every penny from my paycheck, I suggested that she handle the design side, and I build the site.
Without exaggeration, everything she suggested was bordering on malicious stupidity. I did it all anyway. Does barking sound good on clicking links? You got it.
Wait, you want me to put how many success story pictures on one page? Well, you’re the designer. Yes, I’m fairly sure that “disipline” is the correct spelling after all. No, I’m sure people’s 56k internet connections will handle this just fine.
A month and a half later, our abomination was complete. She was strangely satisfied, and to this day, I wonder if the entire thing was a ploy to get back at Daddy for something.
You could legitimately build a better site in the GeoCities Web Wizard tool. If the job mattered at all to me, I probably would have vomited in disgust. When it was unveiled, everyone in the company unanimously hated it, and all I could say was that I was just the tech guy. I was soon thereafter let go for “unrelated” reasons, and a month later when I visited their site, I noticed they had gone back to the old one.
Out of curiosity, all these years later, I just looked up the school, and apparently, they still do exist.
My act of malicious compliance obviously didn’t do any lasting damage to them as their new website is about what you would expect from one in 2021. But gosh, I am still proud of myself.”
Another User Comments:
“ITR. If the boss wanted the site fixed he would’ve removed his daughter from the entire process. You did what you were hired to do.” CoderJoe
Another User Comments:
“I had a client who has his daughter as the “accountant”, and she loses paperwork, finds billing from a year ago that didn’t get done, and is late on simple things like rent all the time.
I can safely say a half million is lost every year to sheer incompetence, but they won’t remove her because they are worried she will go back to amateur adult work.
Other team members and departments are constantly blamed for her errors and if confronted she goes straight to daddy.
Never underestimate a father’s failure with his kid’s ability to ruin a company.” Doriantalus
Another User Comments:
“Whatever dude, sometimes you just gotta maliciously comply to get your point across, and especially when you don’t care about the work. Clearly, you tried your darndest and then when she woudln’t stop intervening, you checked out. I don’t blame you. ITR, bro!” Reddit User
Metaspoon Slow or Crashing?
If Metaspoon is causing your browser to crash or run slowly, please try viewing the article in Lite Mode and it should run more smoothly!