In the early 2000s, my wife and I had moved into a new condo and were excited to try out the diner directly across the street from the building. On the Saturday morning after moving in, we were tired of unpacking and decided to go there for breakfast. The food was pretty good, the coffee was decent, and the server was fine. All in all, not the best dining experience, but you couldn’t beat it for convenience.

Everything was fine until it was time to pay. The server dropped off the check, then disappeared. We waited about five minutes before I flagged down another server who was walking by. I asked:

Me: “Do you know where our server went? She dropped the check and hasn’t been back.”

Other Server: “Oh, she’s out back, taking a smoke break.”

Okay, a little weird and unprofessional to drop the check and then leave.

Me: “Could you cash us out?”

Other Server: “I can’t, but you can go to the register where the manager will take care of it.”

We did so, leaving a decent tip, and talked to the manager for a couple minutes, letting him know we had just moved in across the street and would love to come back.

We left, walked across the street, and were reading a historical marker in front of an old church when we heard someone yelling:

Voice: “Hey! Heeeyyyy!”

Turning around, we could see it was our original server, standing in the doorway of the diner. When she saw we were looking at her, she screamed:

Server: “You didn’t pay! Come back or I’m calling the cops!”

My wife and I looked at each other, then started walking over to her. When we got back to the diner, she had her arms folded and was tapping her foot angrily, looking like we were kids she had caught with hands in the cookie jar.

Me: “You dropped off the check and disappeared. We paid at the register when you didn’t come back after five minutes.”

She looked confused for a moment, then doubled down like a toddler.

Server: “No, you didn’t!”

To counter that stellar argument, my wife opened her purse and pulled out the receipt, with the tip marked. The server looked at it, glared at us, then stomped back into the restaurant without an apology.

Despite the convenient location, that experience was bad enough that we never went back to the diner. It closed about eight months later, and a great Chinese restaurant opened in its place, which we went to many times until we moved four years later.

In my previous job, I was a mid-level manager, and I was assigned a small team to lead. This team was composed of four members; three of them were very hard workers who always finished their jobs and tried to learn as much as possible.

The fourth one… well, she had to be asked continuously to finish her job, often tried to make others do her job, was late more often than not, would spend hours talking to others, not doing her job, and disrupting others. I often asked my boss permission to fire her, but he pitied her because she’s a single mother.

She is, as in she’s not married nor dating her kid’s father, but the father and his parents live next to her and her parents, and are all very much involved in the kid’s life.

My boss also forbade me from ever reprimanding her.

Eventually, I was offered a better-paying job and left the company. After a few months, I was offered a promotion that required me to assemble a team to lead. I could either choose from the company or bring new people. 

I decided to contact the hard-working members of my old team and offer them the new job. It was a no-brainer for them: much better pay, much more benefits, better working conditions, and the possibility of WFH most days. They were happy about landing a better job together, and I was happy to have my old team back.

A couple of days later, the fourth member of my old team called me.

Former Coworker: “I can’t believe you didn’t offer me the job! You know that as a mother, I could use the benefits and working hours!”

Me: “No. Your work ethic and performance are terrible, and hiring you would be worse for me.”

There were so many more things I wanted to say, but I bit my tongue. She called me some names and hung up.

Later that day, I received the weirdest and most stupid call of my career. The HR manager from my former company called me (this has to be the most incompetent HR manager I’ve met; I have so many stories of her incompetence).

HR Manager: “You upset her. That was unfair treatment. You need to either offer her a job in your new company or apologize.”

Me: *Laughing.* “No.”

I argued with her for a bit and then hung up.

Years ago, I worked in a small retail store in a large shopping centre. The staff were me, a good colleague, and the store manager. Also frequently visiting was the store manager’s boss, the district manager.

When [Colleague] and I started, [Store Manager] told us almost word-for-word:

Store Manager: “I was the top salesman in the company. That’s how I got promoted to management. I get to sit back and relax now because it’s your turn to do all the work.”

And true to his word, [Store Manager] slacked off and let us do all the work. We served the customers, managed the inventory, and even did all the paperwork and banking for him. While he kept turning up, he would spend his day roaming the shopping centre, sitting at the coffee shop, flirting with female employees in other stores, or playing games at the arcade game centre. 

To make matters worse, [Store Manager] would “borrow” brand new mobile phones from the stock and “borrow” money from the till for his own personal use.

[Colleague] and I were unimpressed, of course, and after deciding we’d had enough of his crap, we decided to help him with his own downfall. 

1. We stopped tidying up after him. As long as they weren’t in our way, we didn’t touch his leftover food and drinks.
2. Every time he disappeared, we tidied and reorganised the store a little.
3. We were brutally honest whenever the district manager visited:

District Manager: “Where’s [Store Manager]?”

Us: “He’s at the arcade game centre, sir!”

Us: “He’s chatting to the girls upstairs, sir!”

District Manager: “Why is this mobile phone box empty?”

Us: “Store manager said he was borrowing the phone, sir!”

Within a couple of months, the store had been completely reorganised. [Store Manager] had no idea where anything was located anymore. He missed all the memos from head office and didn’t know about new products or procedures. He also had to dispose of mouldy plates and cups on quite a few occasions. [Colleague] and I were running the store more efficiently than ever, and [Store Manager] was completely redundant by that stage.

[District Manager] had figured out what was going on and had probably begun the process of having [Store Manager] terminated (there were procedures to follow, so this would take a while).

Then one day, [Store Manager] turned up to work early (surprising!) and told us that he had resigned. He probably figured that he was about to be fired and preferred to leave on his own terms. [District Manager] arrived soon after to give [Store Manager] an exit interview at his favourite coffee shop. 

[Colleague] and I wasted no time preparing the final insult. Before the exit interview was even finished, we had already packed all of [Store Manager]’s personal belongings into a box, ready for him to pick up and leave.

Bye, [Store Manager]!

Years ago, I was part of a programming team. One of the senior team members had been promoted beyond her abilities, due to work she’d done some years before on a suite of software tools that everyone in the company was forced to use, despite them being much clumsier to use than most equivalent third-party applications.

But that was her claim to fame: getting promoted for her contribution to mediocrity. She somehow felt that this entitled her to sit in her office with her feet on her desk, reading paperback novels all day, while the rest of us engaged in various programming projects. 

The company eventually went into a tailspin, and there were multiple rounds of layoffs. Our whole division got wiped out, eventually. 

Some years later, I’m happily employed elsewhere… Ring-ring goes the telephone.

Me: “Hello, this is Mr. [My Name].”

Human Resources Guy: “Good afternoon, Mr. [My Name]. I’m [HR Guy], with [Company]. One of your former coworkers, Ms. [Novel Reader], has applied for a programming position with us and said you could give her a reference.”

Me: “Oh, did she now? Fascinating. What would you like to know?”

Human Resources Guy: “How long were you and she in the same department?”

Me: “About five years.”

Human Resources Guy: “Great! What can you tell me about Ms. [Novel Reader ]’s work during that time?”

Me: “Well, nothing, I’m afraid; I never actually saw any.”

Human Resources Guy: “You were in the same department for five years and never saw any of her work?”

Me: “In five years, I never saw any work from her.”

Long pause.

Human Resources Guy: “Does that mean what it sounded like?”

Me: “Absolutely.”

Human Resources Guy: “Thank you for your time.”

Me: “Don’t mention it.”

Many years ago, I worked in customer service for a company that managed a Medicare Part D drug plan. The annual enrollment period rolled around, and during that time, it got chaotic! On top of the usual caring for customers, answering their questions, fixing problems, we had to enroll people into our plans. 

It was a bit of a process. There were questions that needed to be asked and answered, information that had to be imparted, and at the end of it all, a long spiel explaining our responsibilities and the customer’s responsibilities, and important information that the customer had to verbally consent to. 

So, in the midst of this, I get a woman who is angry she has to do this and is angry at how much time the whole process is taking. I explain to her that I am trying to get her through this all as quickly as possible.

Then we get to the end, and I explain that I have to read her the terms of service, and I need her to verbally confirm “yes” to it all.

Customer: “I just don’t have the time to listen to it.”

Me: “I am legally required to read this to you.”

Customer: “I don’t want to hear it, just sign me up.”

Me: “To complete the sign-up process, I have to read this to you, and you need to acknowledge it.”

Customer: “Let’s just say I agree to it, and you can sign me up.”

Me: “No, I can’t. I can read through it quickly; however, you still need to hear it and say yes.”

Customer: “I don’t want to.”

By this time, I’m thinking, “Lady, if you had just let me read this instead of arguing with me, we could have been done by now”, which I couldn’t say.

Instead, I inform her:

Me: “I have to read this agreement to you, and you need to verbally agree to it. If you don’t, I will not be able to sign you up for Medicare Part D; you will not have a Part D plan; you will not be able to enroll in a plan until next year’s enrollment period; and you will have to pay a fine for not having a plan this year.”

Customer: “Just sign me up.” *Hangs up.*

Of course, I don’t sign her up. And I write down the whole incident in the call log, which I explained several times that I needed to go over the agreement and get her consent, the penalties to her if she didn’t, that she refused, and that I did not sign her up. 

Several weeks after the new year, a coworker sitting near me gets a call from a woman who is furious that when she went to get a prescription filled, the pharmacy wasn’t able to run the insurance on it. When they checked, they saw she didn’t have a Part D drug plan.

Co-worker: “Can I have your name, please?”

Caller: *Gives name.*

Co-worker: “I’m sorry, but you don’t have a plan with us.”

It was the same woman. And worse for her, we could not enroll her since she had missed the enrollment period.

Imagine how much easier things would have gone for everyone if that woman had just let me do my job, let me read the service agreement, and just said yes to it.