Since I work from home, my bosses and coworkers and I all communicate mostly via email, instant message, or Voice over Internet Protocol phone calls. This takes place over IM. I’m just coming back from being off for a minor illness after a few days. A month before that happened, I was out due to a badly sprained wrist that left me unable to type. All the spelling errors I’ve left in this story are intentional as they are exactly as I typed them to my boss.

Boss: “Hey, [My Name], are you doing okay? I saw you’ve put in for most of your sick leave all at once. You never use your leave, so I just wanted to check in.”

Me: “Well, the PTO for yesgerday and today is because I dislocated my ankle and am on very strong painfkilsers.”

Boss: “OUCH! Take the time you need. Just wanted to make sure you’re doing okay. At least you don’t have the flu anymore! How’s your wrist, by the way?”

Me: “The sick leave next week is for my surgical thing.”

Boss: “Oh, my gosh, you need surgery on your ankle? Or wait, your wrist?”

Me: “No tis’ unrelation.”

I then fell asleep for several hours and woke up to clarify.

Me: “Next week, I’m having jaw surgery. Not ankle related.”

Boss: “[My Name], I am going to wrap you in bubble wrap.”

Me: “You’re not the first person to suggest that.”

A few days after my surgery, a care package from my boss arrived. It was bubble wrap!

A lady comes in five minutes before closing time at the fabric store I work in.

Customer: “I want twenty-seven cut lengths of this net curtain material.”

Me: “That is going to take over an hour, so we can’t do that so close to closing.”

Customer: “Manager.”

She spoke to my manager, and the manager gave me a written warning. I’ve never forgotten that feeling of injustice.

I am working for an eCommerce company that sells online courses. One of our USPs [Unique Selling Points] is the fact that we offer a one-hour free tutor service if you purchase a course. One day, my boss came to me.

Boss: “Please create a page for this category and list these products.”

Before I started to create the page, I noticed that the company didn’t have any tutors for this specific category.

Me: “We’re not gonna offer the Mentor service, right? Since we don’t have any tutors for this category at the moment.”

Boss: “No, we are going to advertise with the service even if we don’t have a tutor at the moment.”

Me: “You do know that we can be sued by a client, right?”

Boss: “What’s the problem?”

Guess it’s time for me to find a new job.

I was working in retail during flu season. One day, in particular, I was sick as a dog, my nose running like a tap. When I was not working, I managed that symptom by keeping my head tilted slightly up so everything could drain backward. But that’s not an option when you’re looking down to pack bags and make change every few seconds. Even with tissues and sanitiser, I was serving very slowly because I’d have to stop myself from snotting on the customer’s produce.

I thought a sensible thing to do was to put up my closed sign so people would queue elsewhere and probably get served faster. I’d then call over one person at a time so I was still working the whole time but we’d have fewer annoyed customers.

I got reamed out for closing my register without asking, in front of the customer I was serving at the time.

The reason I didn’t go home? I’d asked, but they’d already let someone else go home (who was far less sick) and they didn’t want to be down another cashier.

A few years ago, I was in the boardroom of an earthmoving company, talking to the CEO about how we (my company) could assist with their maintenance cost. Before the meeting, I got all my facts from our guys on the ground.

CEO: “You are costing us too much to maintain our equipment.”

Me: “You are in the middle of nowhere. It’s in the middle of a desert. Travel costs are significant, but we can manage if we plan repairs and maintenance to minimise the travel costs.”

CEO: “Well, how about that $10,000 bill to change a broken light last month? Why would you guys charge us and not plan it when the machine was back in range?”

I knew this one was coming, so I repeated what my guys had told me. The owner had decided to put his son through the works to take charge of the company. The CEO decided to send Junior to the middle of nowhere to keep him at bay. Junior decided to use his leverage and ordered a minor repair — which was not critical — to be carried out. However, the machine was 2,000 km out, so it was a two-day trip to change a light.

My guys asked to confirm whether that was real and whether the company wanted to send them to do such a small task. They were told in no uncertain terms that they were the client and could do as they wanted. A purchase order was provided and the rest was history. I think Junior wanted to give the CEO a taste of how things would be. My guys maliciously complied. I mean, they would be paid overtime, and because it was in the desert, two guys had to go, they needed satellite navigation, the works.

Me: “We did request confirmation and were told you’re the client, and you provided us with a purchase order to proceed. So we did.”

CEO: “You shouldn’t have proceeded. This is ridiculous.”

Me: “Your company provided a valid request and refused to listen when told it would prohibitive. We did warn you about the cost, but the decision is ultimately yours. We can’t control your staff.”

CEO: “Who did authorise this work?”

Me: “I can send you a copy of the purchase order.”

I could see the veins on his head throbbing.

I heard Junior was moved back to the head office shortly after.