I work at an animal rescue that happens to be connected to a mall. We’re technically retail as we have an animal supply and food store at the front of our space. We’re not part of the mall, but when they have a fire alarm go off, we have to evacuate also.

I’ve just started working here, and I am still going through some training. The manager and supervisor have stepped out for a moment to deal with something, and it’s just another trainee and me staffing the place for a few minutes.

Suddenly, in the worst timing ever, the fire alarm goes off, and we need to evacuate.

Me: “Oh, no! What do we do?”

Trainee: “We need to evacuate, right?”

Me: “But… the animals?”

We currently have fourteen dogs, nine cats, two hamsters, and a parrot (not a rescue, he just lives here) in the store.

Trainee: “I haven’t been trained on how to evacuate them!”

Me: “Me, neither!”

A customer is in the store area and has heard us talking.

Customer: “I have an idea! I left my shopping outside!”

He runs out, and we wonder what he meant by that. Then, we see him take his full shopping cart and tip EVERYTHING onto the sidewalk. He then rushes in with the now-empty cart and shouts:

Customer: “Let’s get as many as we can in here!”

Between some of the bigger dogs that we can walk separately, we are able to fit all of the animals into the large cart — thank goodness they all get along! — with the exception of one nervous cat we can carry in its case.

Thanks to the customer, we are out of there in roughly two minutes!

This is about as much time as it takes to see the manager and supervisor rushing over as quickly as possible.

Manager: “Oh, thank God! We heard the alarm and came running back!”

They both take stock of the situation: all the animals either sitting in the shopping cart, with my coworker and me carrying or holding a bunch more, with a crap-ton of grocery shopping all over the ground and another customer comforting a nervous puppy.

Supervisor: “How did you get all the animals out?”

We point to the customer who helped us and explain what happened. The fire alarm ends, and thankfully, we can get all the animals back inside.

Manager: *To my coworker and me* “Okay, ladies, we’re going to train you on what to do in a fire emergency right now!” *To the customer* “But not before we get this man free dog food for life!”

Customer: *Still holding the nervous puppy* “That will come in handy, as I don’t think I can explain to my wife why all our groceries ended up on the floor without coming home with this little guy as evidence!”

He took home the rescue puppy and lots of puppy food, and we helped him salvage as much of his groceries as we could and carry them into his truck! He’s been a regular ever since!

This story is part of the Best-Feel-Good-Stories Of-2023 roundup!

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My most entitled jerk was my (former) Call Center Director. Less than a week after she came into our call center for [TV Channel Distributor], she decided that her position made her one step below God, and you had better NOT be an atheist — i.e., if you think she’s wrong, expect a smiting.

She posted computer-typed signs all over the center that read:

Sign: “No drinks permitted on the floor unless you have a doctor’s note for water. If you have a doctor’s note, water is the only thing permitted. No personal items are allowed at your stations. The first time will be a warning; the second will be a write-up. Thank you, [Director].”

The first pushback came from the staff with diabetes. They needed juice or a sweet drink in case their sugar got low. Previously, the policy was that if you had a sealable container or a juice box, that was fine. Microphones could be muted at strategic times, and employees could take necessary drinks as long as there were no loud gulping noises in a customer’s ear. Perfectly reasonable.

Nope. Not anymore! We were subject to a rant that was… impressive in its horribleness.

Director: “The diabetics are welcome to ask permission to leave their station to get their juice — if their current call has been completed. What’s that? Some calls can take over an hour? Well, I guess you’re just going to have to power through, then, aren’t you? I didn’t ask for your opinions, and I don’t care about your excuses. You have ten seconds to get over it. Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one. There. You are over it. No more complaining. Don’t you ever bring it up again in my presence! It has been decided, and it is now set in stone!”

I’m sure you can imagine how well that went over; the company’s Human Resources got a formal complaint from every single staff member with diabetes before the day was even out. The signs disappeared, and [Director] seethed for weeks after.

Now, our call center was in central Oklahoma; tornadoes were our natural disaster of choice. Because the center was for a TV channel distributor, we had screens on the walls with various channels quietly or mutely playing in the background. Cell phones were to be on vibrate but could be kept at hand if emergency alerts had to come in; our emergency alert system would send alerts to every single cell phone in the state if need be. 

So, of course, [Director]’s second pushback was over personal items being banned. Again, we received a berating rant that culminated in her closing the curtains and turning the TVs off. We had to lock our cell phones in lockers.

Director: “Staff should be working, not staring out the windows, watching the screens, or playing with their phones!”

Go figure: the only way the employees knew there was a tornado headed toward them was from a customer.

Customer: “I hope you aren’t in [City]. There is a tornado on the ground and heading straight for it!”

Coworker: “Oh, God… I am! I’m sorry, but I gotta hang up!”

Everyone basically ignored [Director]’s yelling at us to get back to work.

Director: “The tornado isn’t going to be that bad! The likelihood of it hitting us is minimal! How dare you?!”

Rant, rant, rant.

The alarm was set off to alert everyone in the building, which thankfully drowned her out for the most part.

Everyone followed the drill procedure and sheltered. Well, it turned out that we were indeed at ground zero.

[Director] shut up when the tornado ripped part of the roof off of the building and we could hear the roaring of the wind through the door of our shelter. When the shell-shocked staff came out, I saw water pouring in from the torn roof. A piece of wood shaped like a spear had actually punched through an outer wall, through one of the TVs, and halfway through the wall behind it. I’m sure you can imagine what could have happened to a person if we had obeyed [Director] and stayed where we were.

Because of a busted gas line, we had to be evacuated out the back of the building without our phones and could not retrieve them for over a day. We spent hours shuttling workers home, all of whom had no way to call their loved ones. My wife was working at one place, my eldest daughter at another, and we still had three younger kids at home. None of my family had any way of knowing how or where I was for about three hours. I had no way of knowing if they were safe or not, either. Thankfully, the tornado missed their workplaces but by less than half a mile. Our house was safe, as were our little ones.

Rumor has it that the blow-up at [Director] was epic. I would have paid big money to be a fly on the wall for the teardown, but sadly, I can’t report details of what happened. It’s no secret that she was fired, as she disappeared rather abruptly and silently, and someone else got things back up and running. Her “rules” were erased from existence by a very public announcement to all returning staff that the previous rules about drinks and personal items like phones were back in effect.

I have vowed that my phone will be with me whether a company likes it or not, and I will die on this hill.

CONTENT WARNING: Injury

I work at an outdoor/camping/adventure store.

Customer: “I want to buy a knife.”

Me: “This is our selection here.”

She grabs a knife before I can start explaining them.

Customer: “Are you sure these are sharp? They don’t look sharp!”

As she’s asking, she runs her finger down the blade. Confirming if the knife is sharp is not needed as blood starts to run out from her finger.

Customer: *Angry* “You should warn people that they’re sharp! People will want to test them!”

My manager responds before I can.

Manager: “All I can say, ma’am, is that it’s a good thing you didn’t want to buy a gun!”

I’m a lifeguard at a community pool. I see an adult jump into the deep end, and immediately, he looks like he’s in trouble. I rush over and assist him to the edge of the pool. After he has caught his breath, he’s angry.

Swimmer: “Your pool is a death trap! Why doesn’t it say how deep it is?!”

Me: “It does! It’s written on the sides, clear as day!”

I point to the clear signs painted on the side of the pool: “4 ft”, “6 ft”, and then “8 ft”. The swimmer sees them, squints, and then looks embarrassed.

Swimmer: “Oh, I thought those meant age restrictions, not how deep the pool went…”

I work as a service engineer for laser cutting machines. (I previously submitted this story.) We got a call from one of our clients who owned a very old machine, saying that one of the hydraulic motors of the machine had stopped working and they needed our help.

When I arrived, I learned that the full story was that the motor started leaking, and the team operating the machine tried disassembling it to find the cause, couldn’t, and then reassembled it incorrectly. It took me a while to figure out how to assemble it correctly (as no schematics were available for years) and to find the leaking gasket that needed replacement. This gasket was something they could manufacture and install on their own once they got a sheet of the proper rubber — which they didn’t have at that moment so it could not be done on the spot — since it didn’t actually require the full disassembly they unsuccessfully tried earlier.

I then went to the production manager to inform him of my findings. As I was on my way out of his office, I overheard him calling the manufacturing team about an incoming work order for the laser cutter. I turned back in.

Me: “I’m sorry, but are you planning to continue using the machine before that gasket is replaced?”

Manager: “Of course.”

Me: “You can’t.”

Manager: “What?! Why?! I thought you said you repaired the motor, other than the leak!”

Me: “I did, but it’s still leaking. You can’t work like that.”

Manager: “What do you mean? We worked with that leak for weeks before we tried to sort it out, just topping off the hydraulic fluid once in a while! And nothing happened; as you can see, the motor runs fine!”

Me: “You… worked like that for weeks?”

Manager: “Sure. Without issue.”

Me: “Without issue with the motor maybe, but have you noticed the puddle underneath the machine?”

Manager: “So what? The guys just mop it up now and then. It’s not like it could damage anything.”

Me: “The machine cuts by means of a laser beam that heats metal enough to vaporize it, with white-hot metal droplets ejected downward, right?”

Manager: “So?”

Me: “And for several weeks you figured it’s a good idea to let it do it next to a large puddle of flammable hydraulic fluid?”

It took him a moment to realize that only by sheer luck did they not set the whole machine on fire.

From that call onward, I made certain to always make it perfectly clear to the clients, in cases where their machines can PHYSICALLY work despite certain issues, that doing so may result in catastrophic damage — even when the risk should be very obvious to anyone with a basic understanding of the machinery.

Related:
A Forklift Load Of Attitude