People Are Sharing The Reason They Got Fired, And I'll Admit I Laughed At A Few Of These
Getting fired is nothing to be ashamed of — it happens to everyone, really. And sometimes the story of how you got fired is actually worth telling.
Redditor u/Sweetlo123 recently asked the people of Reddit, "What did you get fired for?" Remember, this is a judgment-free zone:
1."Our store was going out of business and I was 'too negative' about the store closing."
2."We were told we get overtime for night work. The new 'company manager' let it slip that we don't actually get overtime for night work, so when I was scheduled for five nights in a row working on a transmission line cell site, I mentioned that I expected that everyone working from our company on-site would get overtime. Once it was said that we wouldn't get overtime and it wasn't an actual policy (even though it was written in the employee handbook), I forwarded the email chain to the entire company as well as the leadership. I was canned, but now everyone gets overtime, my life is better, and I got my people what they deserve."
3."Aggressively squeezing breakfast muffins. I was a few days into working at this restaurant, and someone complained that I gave them a muffin that was too hard — they bake them at like 3 a.m. and then they sit in a warmer all day. So my manager told me to squeeze them before I hand them out, and being a dumb teenager, I squeezed the shit out of these muffins and got another complaint. They stopped scheduling me."
4."The company's time clock software ran off of the computer's time, so when I was late, I would just close the software, change the time back to before my shift started, and clock in and change it back. The supervisor who showed me the trick fired me after I told him to stop being a bitch and fire me."
5."I just stopped working and began attending only meetings. I lasted almost nine months before they let me go."
6."I caught the boss stealing, so he fired me. It was his word against mine, and it didn't go my way."
7."I had tickets to Yes's Close to the Edge tour back in the '70s. I had the request approved for time off, and then they changed their mind at the last minute. I left anyway and was genuinely surprised when I got back on Monday and they informed me that I was fired."
8."I got fired for slacking off and underperforming at work by taking my legally required lunch break."
9."My boss was talking shit about me to the employees, and I confronted her by saying, 'How would you expect the people below me to respect me when you show them that you don’t?' She didn’t like it and literally went crying to the owners, who then fired me for 'causing problems.' Clearly I was better off not working there."
10."The owner of our restaurant was smoking too much heroin and thought we were all stealing. We showed up to work that day to find he had changed the locks and put a 'Now Hiring' sign up in the door."
11."I don't know why. I thought everything was fine. I was there over five years, then one morning they offered me a month's pay — or I could get a lawyer if I wanted to know why, and we could take it from there. We didn't have money for a lawyer and my husband was still in college, so I walked away with a bit of cash. It bugs me to this day."
12."I worked in HVAC (heating, ventilating, and air conditioning), and my buddy and I were assigned to a paper plant. He did installs, I did service and maintenance. Refrigerant is closely monitored by the Environmental Protection Agency, with savage repercussions for misusing it — so I'd only use a couple of pounds here and there for topping off units. I recorded everything I used. My buddy was using three or four jugs at a time because he was installing units, and he never recorded what he used. My bosses decided to fire me for not recording my refrigerant usage. I threw my pocket notebook on the desk: 'It's all right there, everything I used.' Their eyes bugged a little because they got caught lying. But the other guy was related to someone high up in the company, unlike me. The company is going down and they're letting tons of people go, so they made up lies to fire me. I don't hold it against my buddy — he didn't fire me."
13."I took two days off to put down and grieve my family dog, who was 16 years old. I came back on Monday and they said they 'no longer trusted' me even though I'd opened and closed the shop for six months."
14."I worked at a gas station and was a sucker for the free soda. I would drink a few glasses of Dr Pepper per shift and had to piss relatively frequently. I usually worked with the same woman every shift, and every shift, my drawer came up short. One day, my usual coworker was off and I worked with another woman, who warned me to watch my drawer around the other one, because hers had been short when she was around. The next shift with the usual woman, I stuck some receipt paper into the lip of the bottom of my drawer and hit the head. When I came back, the paper was on the floor. My drawer was short $20 at shift change and my boss fired me. I told her of my findings and asked her to review the security tape. She told me to fuck right off and said the other woman had been there for years. I left, heartbroken, and rented some VHS tapes to indulge in and recover. One of the movies was Casino, and man, is that a good movie."
15."I put too many toppings on people’s sandwiches."
16."I got fired — then, luckily, rehired, thanks to my union — because my manager confronted a shoplifter and the guy started to beat her. I and other coworkers intervened, pinning him to the ground until cops arrived. The next day, store reps came in and told me I shouldn’t have intervened, and they let me go."
17."I worked at Sears. I walked in for my shift and the store manager asked why the department was a mess. How the fuck should I know? I just walked in. That led to an exchange of words on the sales floor. I probably shouldn’t have said, 'Go choke on a glittery dildo.' Just a little backstory: The store manager was a lesbian, as am I — and she automatically thought that meant we were buddies. To this day, I flip her off when I see her driving. Fuck you, Lisa."
18."I went on a company business trip and accidentally found out that my two immediate managers were having an affair. I never said a word, but one of them then did his best to get me fired, including making up lies about me stealing time, which I was able to prove were lies. I went on early maternity leave, and both of them were fired within two weeks. I came back from maternity leave to a very hostile work environment, despite the affair and the firings having nothing to do with me. After I'd been back for a month, they ended up firing me because 'it wasn't working out,' despite stellar reviews from those I worked with as well as my clients."
19."I worked at a crafts store as a manager in my mid-20s. I was fired when they found out I was gay. They said it didn’t fit with their 'family values.'"
And finally...
20."I was fired after a month into my first job at a local pizza joint when I was 16. They called me during the Super Bowl and said I had to come in. I told them I was out of state without a car, so there was no way I could make it. They said I should’ve known this was one of the busiest days of the year and I should’ve stayed in the area. I came in to work my next shift, and they just gave me my paycheck and said they had to let me go for not being a team player."
Have your own story to tell? See you in the comments!
Note: Some of these entries have been edited for length and/or clarity.
