I was working in a call center. During one of our “slow periods”, my coworker was talking about her oil painting hobby. Because art is an interest of mine, I later said to her:

Me: “I would love to see your paintings. Do you have pictures of them?”

She looked at me like I had just asked her for a date in front of her husband.

Coworker: “Say that again?”

Me: “Do you have pictures of your paintings?”

The woman turned her head with a “Can you believe the nerve of him?” look on her face. Thinking that she was upset about me listening in on her conversation about her hobby, I felt myself turn red as I quietly returned to my desk and mentally berated myself for not minding my own business.

The following morning, I received an email requesting me to report immediately to the human resource manager’s office. I’d actually had a very good working relationship with her over the previous seven years, and at one point, she had helped me get transferred to another project when I had expressed a growing amount of dissatisfaction with the one I was on. I had no worries at all about being summoned to her office.

The HR manager greeted me with a warm smile and asked me to take a seat. Then, she produced what I recognized as a complaint form for employees.

Manager: “Yesterday, you approached [Coworker] and asked her a question. Could you clarify for the record what that was?”

Me: *Seriously confused* “She was talking to someone about her painting hobby, and I asked her if I could see her paintings sometime. I asked if she had any pictures of them—”

Manager: “UGH!” *Tosses her pen on her desk* “Thank you. That’s all.”

Me: “Okay?” *Slowly getting up*

Manager: “You’re good. You can go back to work. Thanks for coming in.”

As I was walking down the hall, I heard her yell, “He said PAINTINGS, not PANTIES, you idiot!” followed by the sound of a phone receiver slamming down.

I worked for a call center that serviced a direct-mail program for mass-market romance novels — you know, the kind that you usually see near supermarket checkouts. The publisher would take out ads in magazines for a free month’s subscription with three to six books, depending on the series, with a gift — most often trinket boxes or cheap glassware you might find at a dollar store. Most callers were paying invoices in those days before e-commerce was the thing it is now; very often, we’d get complaints about service or content.

A little old lady called one day asking to talk to someone about her free month of books within a certain series that included graphic sexual scenes. It was nothing illegal or kinky, just sex within the typical romance formula. I braced myself for the onslaught; I fully expected an uptight old church lady to ream me out for peddling smut. I was pleasantly surprised when she said she would like to continue her subscription.

Lady: “I’m seventy-eight years old, and every month I go to the seniors’ dance at the VFW hall. I like to take home a nice gentleman, and we read the books together and act them out.”

And she proceeded to give me, in excruciating detail, an account of her last night out where she picked up a retired fireman and what she did to his “little helmet.” And because I knew my boss would hand my tuchas to me if I laughed or showed any emotion, I was a captive audience for live granny smut.

I went home and got smashed. Granny had a better sex life than I did.

I was working for a large regional bank’s call center. This caller was screeching on and on about how there was some document or other (I honestly don’t remember) he needed us to send him. He was also hurling personal insults at me that were really unacceptable; think everything from my family tree to my sexual preferences. By that point, I’d worked in call centers long enough that I really didn’t give a d***.

Then, he started in on another tirade.

Caller: “It takes so long to get anything from you that you must still be using the Pony Express to send out mail!”

At that point, I’d had enough. I actually interrupted the guy, confirmed his mailing address, and told him:

Me: “As soon as I get off the phone, I’ll go downstairs to the stables, pick out the fastest pony we have, and personally ride the document down to you in Florida. Is there anything else I can do for you?”

Caller: *Mumbling* “No…”

Me: “Thank you for calling, sir.”

I disconnected the call. I did send the document out to him, of course — using a slightly faster delivery method — and then went about the rest of the day.

I was just waiting for the tap on my shoulder for someone to tell me to go to Human Resources. I mean, that was a seriously fireable call. It was SO wrong that I still can’t believe I said it. I had never popped off on a customer like that before, nor have I since.

I spent an entire week on edge just waiting to be called to HR, but I never was. I don’t know if I just got lucky and nobody ever listened to the call, or if someone did and just had a sense of humor and thought the jerk deserved it.

When I worked in a call centre, the supervisor was weird. She insisted on having the window wide open at all times, even in the middle of winter!

She’d also go on and on about auditioning for Pop Idol. After she overheard me humming to myself before my shift started, she forced me to sing in front of everyone.

Ultimately, she ended up getting fired for fraud.

This is my favorite funny workplace story. I used to sit opposite a colleague who was very polite and always friendly and proper. One time, she was in a call with the on-site technician of some location, discussing getting in contact with one of their users, a lady of Asian descent, to check if she still had some issue.

The lady in question was called [User] Fu. But, hearing only my colleague’s end of the call (and not paying particular attention, anyway, as I had other stuff to do,) I did not know that. What I DID hear was that this always polite colleague of mine told someone on the phone, in a conversational tone:

Colleague: “So, then, eff you.”

Maybe you can imagine my shock at hearing this colleague, apparently, swear at someone on the phone. From the incredulous look I shot her, she realized in an instant what her spelling of the end user’s last name sounded like, and two things happened.

She became redder than a lobster, and she started laughing so hard that she actually had to mute the phone (somehow managing to tell the user she needed to “update her notes for a moment” without bursting).

This was not helped by the fact that, realizing the actual situation and seeing her shade of red, I myself couldn’t stop giggling.

This story got told to new colleagues several times during the time we worked together.