We’ve all been told to clear our desks. We are moving to “hotdesks,” which means that you book any desk available and sit in a different one each day. While a lot of people don’t like it, I don’t mind at all. Frankly, I don’t particularly like the people who sit next to me. [Coworker] in particular always “borrows” things and never gives them back.

I’m clearing out my desk. I get most of it done then move on to the top drawer. It contains many dried-up pens, some miscellaneous stationery, and a big pack of sweets that went out of date months ago. I grab the odd nicer pen from the drawer and commit the rest to a pile on my desk.

I go to look for some bin bags and return to see my desk clear. I guess that someone must be collecting rubbish, as many of the bins have been emptied, too. I put it down to an over-enthusiastic cleaner. Good job I wasn’t keeping anything!

Before I leave for the day, I’m making sure I get my “borrowed” stuff back from [Coworker]. He can find someone else to steal from, from now on.

Me: “Hey, [Coworker], I need my calculator back.”

Coworker: “I don’t think I have it.”

Me: “Top drawer, left-hand side, can’t miss it. It has my name on it.”

Coworker: “Oh, so it is. How did that get there?!”

Me: “Yeah, okay, thanks. I’m packed up so I won’t be sitting over there anymore.”

Coworker: “That’s a shame; I will miss you. Want a sweet?”

Me: “Oh, my favourites. Thanks.”

I look down and it’s the same packet that I was going to throw away — the same ones that are at least seven months out of date. He has eaten half of them, and they look sticky and discoloured.

Me: “You know what? I’ll give it a miss, thanks.”

Thankfully, I have sat far from [Coworker] since. I won’t miss his kleptomaniac ways.

There are two things you should know about [Coworker]. One, he enjoys ruining other people’s vacations by texting and calling them constantly for sheer and utter nonsense like talking about his workday; and two, he likes to blame all of his shortcomings on me.

We have a grand total of five new interns starting on June first. I sent [Coworker] a budget report back in early March for interns at the insistence of his boss because he wasn’t showing any progress toward making one himself. Really, he didn’t know how and didn’t want to admit it.

In this report, I included the price for an external network license per person. I also laid out how many licenses we already had and who had each of these licenses to justify this expenditure. Several times, [Coworker] said he read it and it was “good stuff” but then asked me questions that were laid out clearly in charts and tables in the report.

I explained to him several times through March and April that he needed to send in a purchase order for every person he wished to hire, but I wasn’t about to hound him for it as these were not my interns and, therefore, not my problem. 

He decided to go on vacation the week that they started thrusting all their training and hiring paperwork onto me. No problem; we got it all sorted out and it was no issue… until we tried to start running the software that is essential to our company. That external software that he was supposed to buy seats for. None of them could do anything.

It felt so good sending him an email and a text message informing him that in the future he needed to purchase a new license for every person. And you bet that I copied his boss on both.

Finance has given everyone a talking down to about how they treat the company credit cards. People have been buying non-work-related items, repeatedly losing the cards, and not signing the back of the cards, which can lead to more fraud and losses.

Someone from finance has come around to make sure they are all signed. [Coworker], who sits next to me, huffs and puffs about getting her card; clearly, she didn’t sign it.

Coworker: “I don’t see what the big deal is.”

Finance Rep: “If you don’t sign it, someone could find it and sign their own signature, meaning they could use it to buy whatever they wanted.”

Coworker: “But how likely is that?”

Finance Rep: “This is, what, your fifth card due to loss?! I would say it is pretty likely.”

Coworker: “Fine! Look! I’m signing it. See?!”

[Coworker] signs her card in block capitals, making it so easy to forge.

Finance Rep: “I’m going to have to have a word with my boss.”

[Coworker] got her card revoked, meaning she had to make a claim for everything she bought, which is a massive pain of paperwork. She moaned and wailed about how the finance team “didn’t understand money,” all while putting through things she shouldn’t be claiming for in the first place.

I was working on quality control for a small company. I noticed that we were getting a lot of unusual claims and complaints from customers. Some were on parts that I know I checked and were okay.

I asked my boss if I could photograph the parts after I checked them. He agreed, but funding was tight and he couldn’t buy anything on company money; there was a blanket ban.

Rather than use the slow company camera, I found a very cheap, used camera online and started to make a little catalogue of everything I checked as okay.

Sure enough, the customer was caught lying, and the company thanked me and wanted to put my process in place.

Sometime later:

Coworker: “I need to use the camera.”

Me: “Sorry, what?”

Coworker: “The camera, I need it.”

Me: “Oh, sorry. I’m using it at the moment.”

Coworker: *Sighs* “Fine!”

She stormed out, only to return a few moments later.

Coworker: “[Manager] said you need to give me the camera.”

Me: “I’m pretty sure [Manager] is on holiday.”

Coworker: “I asked [Other Boss].”

Me: “Well, you tell him that he can ask me himself.”

Coworker: *Smirking* “Fine, I will!”

[Other Boss] came over looking angry.

Other Boss: “What’s going on, [My Name]?”

Me: “[Coworker] is trying to force me to hand over my personal property, demanding I hand it over, and she said you told her I had to.”

Other Boss: “Oh, for f***’s sake. I told her to ask if there was a company one, and if not, to ask you nicely to borrow yours.”

Me: “Look, I—”

He held up his hand to stop me.

Other Boss: “No, it’s fine. We appreciate what you’re doing and we will get some proper equipment in soon. I will talk to [Coworker].”

He left, and then I could see him desperately trying to explain something to [Coworker]. After a few minutes, she walked over.

Coworker: *Sarcastically* “May I please borrow your camera, if it is not too much bother, sir?”

Me: “Sure, but one thing.”

Coworker: “What?”

Me: “I’m using it right now.”

She swore at me and left. I genuinely did need to use it and didn’t trust her to bring it back or not delete my photos. I heard that she then refused to do her work, even though she could have taken the photos later on or even the next day.

The company did eventually win a few more big orders and bought a suite of cameras. I was asked to “look after them” and keep them locked up and safe. Every Monday, [Coworker] has to ask me for a camera. She hasn’t figured out that she gets the old broken one when she doesn’t ask nicely.

[Coworker #1] had to take early retirement suddenly, due to health issues. This left the company racing around to try to fill everything he did. [Coworker #1], being the guy he was, would help anyone and everyone, so we kept finding things after he left that were not getting done. It was always, “Oh, yeah, [Coworker #1] used to do that.” It was remarkable how much that man could do.

Eventually, we had a few new starters join to help get things back on track. I was asked to look after [Coworker #2] while she got used to the role and company.

[Coworker #2], however, knew that I wasn’t her boss and quickly stopped doing anything I asked her to do. I had to get her boss to tell her, to her face, to follow my instructions as his own. This worked for a while, until [Coworker #2] realised she could “forget,” “run out of time,” or just create excuses and not do it.

Me: “Oh, [Coworker #2], I see the meeting room hasn’t been restocked. Could you do that, please? There is a major customer meeting in a few hours.”

Coworker #2: *Smugly* “Can’t.”

Me: “You can’t? Why not?”

Coworker #2: “The storeroom is out of coffee.”

Me: “You’re the only one that uses that storeroom, [Coworker #2]. When you use the last of something, there is a big sign that asks you to let finance know.”

Coworker #2: “Well, that’s not my job.”

Me: “Please, can you ask finance for the petty cash and go grab some more coffee from the shops?”

Coworker #2: “That’s not my job, either.”

Me: “Fine, I will do it, then… Not like I don’t have far more important stuff to do.”

I grabbed some petty cash, apologised on [Coworker #2]’s behalf, and managed to buy some supplies for the meeting room.

I decided I’d had enough and let [Coworker #2]’s boss know that I would not be managing her anymore and why. She lied and told him I was bullying and picking on her. However, she could provide no evidence, and no one else in the official backed her up. She was fired the next day. She screamed the building down on her way out that they were losing their best employee. Truly delusional.

They ended up hiring a single mom on a part-time contract. She works twice as hard as [Coworker #2] did, in half the time.