People Are Sharing Their Wildest "Why I Was Fired" Stories, And They Range From "I Made Them Too Much Money" To "I Wouldn't Take Shots With The Owner's Wife"
I asked the BuzzFeed Community to share the absolute worst, stupidest reasons they were fired from their jobs. As always, they certainly delivered. Here are 21 of the wildest answers:
1."I was fired after my third night of bartender training because the customers liked me too much."
"It was a small-town bar, so the boss also bartended. By my third night of training, her regulars were already requesting me. At the end of the night, she fired me, using some bullshit excuse of me being 'rude to the customers,' which never happened."
2."I was told to wash the red truck in the lot before I closed. There were no red trucks. He had a fit that it didn’t get done the next day, and I was fired. I guess I was supposed to know the boss was red/green colorblind."
—Anonymous
3."I was fired because I needed to 'smile more' after my dog died."
"My dog was terminally ill, and I received the news 30 minutes prior to a shift at my bartending job. I did my best to put on a happy face and get through the night. The owners (an insufferable hipster couple who have more money than sense or taste) came in that night to drink. While completely intoxicated, the male owner told me I needed to smile more. I explained I was doing my best, but I received bad news right before work. He fired me two days before Christmas because the customers want to see pretty smiley girls behind the bar. Fucking barf."
—Anonymous
4."The store owner fired me for being five minutes late with his grandma's food."
"I was working in a family drug store as a stock clerk when I was 16. One evening, the owner asked me to get his grandma (who was working the cash register) a hamburger from the fast-food place located just across the street. Apparently, she had to eat exactly at 7, so I left at 6:45. Upon my return, I was knocked over by a bicyclist who lost control of his bike while trying to light a cigarette. He knocked the food out of my hand, and it got run over by a car. So, I headed back to the burger joint and bought another burger and made it back by 7:05. The owner fired me for being five minutes late. I left there and ate the burger on the way home."
—Anonymous
5."I was fired for 'being a tempter' and a 'corrupter' of the manager's daughter."
"My first job was at a BBQ restaurant. The owner’s daughter was super cute, so I asked her out to dinner and a movie. Because her dad was a strict Southern Baptist, I made sure to ask her when she was due home. She said midnight, but I got her home at 11 p.m. just to be safe. Apparently she was supposed to be back by 9 p.m., and I was fired the next day."
—Anonymous
6."My boss fired me for 'trying to do drugs' when I asked to go get Benadryl."
"I had an allergic reaction at work and asked to go to my car to get my Benadryl. My boss said he didn't 'see the reaction' and fired me for 'trying to do drugs.' If my throat weren't swelling shut, I would have told him off."
—Anonymous
7."I got fired because I had grown a mustache."
"I worked at a residence home for teenage boys who were either delinquent or homeless. I came back from a week-long vacation and was fired because I had grown a mustache. I was told that the boys would lose respect for me. Total bullshit!"
—Anonymous
8."I was suspended for allowing my staff to have leftover produce."
"I worked for a nonprofit for almost 15 years. In order to lower our food expenses, I got another local nonprofit that 'rescues' food from grocery stores to deliver to my agency twice a month. They delivered so much that not only did my facility have more than it needed, so did two other facilities the agency owned in the area. I allowed the staff to take what was left AFTER the programs were taken care of. The staff were underpaid and could not afford organic produce and healthy meats, bread, etc. They were very grateful. The agency leadership found out about me giving the produce away and suspended me for 'stealing.' The deputy executive director told me I should have thrown it out instead of give it to the staff. I was fired after my three-day suspension was up."
—Anonymous
9."I was fired because i went to the bathroom too much while on my period."
—Anonymous
NBC
10."I got fired for getting tipped as a bartender."
"I was working at a trendy shop in Austin that wanted to be very European in that we were not allowed to accept tips. I was running a wine tasting one night and was tipped $20 by the owner of the building we were renting. I politely declined and explained that we could not accept tips, but she insisted and left the $20 on the bar. I wrote my boss an email explaining the situation but didn't think much more about it. When I came into work the next morning, I was promptly called into the office and fired. I didn't even get a chance to explain that I didn't take the $20. I rolled it into the wine costs of my tasting, so it actually just increased profits for the event."
11."One time I was fired because of MY HAT."
"My hat was a nice and simple baseball cap. I work at a local supermarket. Everything was going alright until the last hour of my shift, when my boss came to check up on us. Everyone else has a beanie, a cap, or a winter hat, but my boss took one quick look at my hat and called me into to her office. Then she told me I was fired, because the symbol on my hat was 'too edgy.' The symbol was a schooner. I cried that day when I left the store."
—Anonymous
12."I was fired for hosting a Christmas party for my coworkers."
"It was a small, 40-person company, and nothing was ever done to celebrate. So, I hosted a potluck. Everyone came except the boss. She felt it was not appropriate to socialize with the 'help.' She fired me the day after."
—Anonymous
13."I was once fired from managing a small coffee shop for making the company too much money."
"It was owned by a husband and wife who had several other successful companies in their portfolio, and the coffee shop was a place to have meetings and impress their friends whilst also receiving a tax write-off for their ‘losses.’ Once the monthly profits hit a certain consistent plateau, I was let go for ‘being too zealous for their corporate vision.'"
—Anonymous
TV Land
14."My manager fired me because I cared about people wearing their masks in a pandemic."
"I worked at a coffee shop during the height of the pandemic. I would ask people to put on their masks, but apparently I wasn’t nice enough about it. This place REALLY cared about reviews — like, would monitor them and shove them in our face. The final straw, according to them, was when a girl at work brought a guy (who didn’t have a mask) his drink outside, and the guy complained in a review. They fired me instead of her. The manager didn’t even check the cameras to see who did it — just assumed it was me."
15."I was fired because my voice didn’t sound masculine. Of course not — I’m a woman and was when he hired me."
—Anonymous
16."I was fired because someone else called CPS."
"I overheard my boss’s adult daughter say she was putting her son — who was 4 — out in the front yard, and that someone better come get him. Turns out she had really done that (multiple times), and someone called CPS. I was in the car with my boss all day without a cellphone, and the call to CPS was made about 15 minutes after the child was put outside. We picked him up ASAP, and continued working until about 11 p.m. When I came in the next morning, I was told I took it upon myself 'to get involved in family matters that are out of concern of job duties.' I was fired, and all of my clients were told I was stealing from the company and was immediately released."
—Anonymous
17."I was once fired because I 'asked too many questions.'
"I'm the type of person who understands things much better when I understand the process. Well, my company hired a new person who changed our whole process. When she was training me, I asked her too many questions. It made her feel like I didn’t trust her, so she got me fired."
—Anonymous
Apple TV
18."I was called into the office and told my children were sick too often."
"I’m a teen mom who went to college and worked full time. I was at a new job as a receptionist for a veterinary practice right in the middle of sick season. My kids and I had been taking turns being sick, and as a result, I had to call in several times during my six-month tenure. While I was still working there, they posted my job on Indeed and had someone come in to interview for my position WHILE I WAS ON SHIFT AT THE FRONT DESK. I had no idea and had to call back stating someone was there for a receptionist interview. After the interview, I was called in, and they explained why."
—Anonymous
19."I was fired on the spot for 'showing that I was extremely unreliable by having a personal emergency at such an inconvenient time.'"
"I will preface with this: I had a lot of mental health issues in high school. I spoke with the psychiatrist on site twice a week, and the last time she asked me how I was feeling, I (thinking I was being funny) said, 'Well I haven’t killed myself yet, so I guess I’m doing alright.' Thirty minutes later there were police officers and crisis counselors in the office, and my phone was confiscated. I was living with my father at the time, and he was out of town for work, so my mom had to leave her job and drive 45 minutes to pick me up so I wouldn’t be brought to the hospital. Having no phone and obviously being a little preoccupied with other things, I had one of the police officers call my work and explain that I would not be in for my shift that evening. The next day, after walking 40 minutes in -15-degree weather, I was fired on the spot."
—Anonymous
20."My husband was recently fired for social distancing himself at the office, sanitizing, wearing a mask, and getting his COVID-19 vaccines."
"Everyone else in the office ignored basic health protocols. They got COVID — as did their immediate and extended family members. He remained healthy throughout."
—Anonymous
21."I was fired from a bartending job once because I refused to take shots with the owner's wife, who was also our manager."
"She got so mad, even though I tried several times to tell her that I drove to work and couldn’t drink. She’d respond with, 'Why don’t you like to drink with me?'"
—Anonymous
Have you ever been fired for a wild, stupid reason like these? If so, tell us about them in the comments below or via this anonymous form.
Note: Submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.
