Every worker has their breaking point. You can only put up with so much and these workers have been through the wringer. They dealt with bully bosses, unacceptable working conditions, and outright abuse in their line of work. Now they've finally had enough and said, "Forget this, I'm DONE!"
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She Turned Her Down So Her Manager Made her Life A Nightmare
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“When I was 16, I had my first job at a chain restaurant. My manager, who was in her late 20s, was a lesbian and she asked me on a date. I told her that I wasn’t interested and she proceeded to make work a nightmare for me. She never said that’s why she turned sour on me, but prior to hitting on her underage employee, she was treating me like her pet.
I had a vacation approved and planned for a while. My hotel was paid for. The day before I was supposed to leave, she told me she changed the schedule and put me on a double in the middle of the week and I would also be fired if I took my vacation.
Nah, I’m done.”
She Was Getting Beat Up Daily By Her Students, But The Admins Didn’t Care
“I worked with Special Needs kids in the high needs/extreme behavior class. I would get the crap kicked out of me daily. My husband stopped taking me out anywhere because people thought he was beating me. I requested several times to be moved to a different class for a year. They refused to accommodate me. One day I got called into a meeting and was told I seemed stressed. I explained that yes, it was a physically and emotionally draining job and I was stressed.
They told me I had six weeks to become less stressed or they would let me go. After five years of dedicated work for them.
I quit two weeks later.”
That’s Not What He Thought Engineering Interns Did
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“I got hired by an engineering firm as a summer intern. I showed up to the office on my first day of work and they said I was supposed to report to someone at the warehouse a few miles down the road. So, I drove over to the warehouse and they started to go over what I would be doing all summer.
Essentially, they used the title ‘engineering intern’ to attract hard working and career oriented people and have them do manual labor for stupid cheap. The first day of work, all I did was pick up trash around the warehouse, clean out a supply closest, and clean up behind the mechanics who were absolutely terrible.
I quit after one day. Forget that noise.”
Jodie Pulled A Switcheroo On Him
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“‘Jodi, can I get these days off in December? I’m not going to be in town, so I need them off.’
‘It’s only October. You have to wait until November to book them off.’
‘OK. Cool.’
November first arrives.
‘Jodi, I need to book these days off in December.’
‘Sorry, a whole bunch of people already booked it off. I can’t give you the days.’
It was the first day of the month and it was 9 am. I was literally the first person to talk to her, how the heck did people book days off?!
‘Oh, I took bookings last week because it was almost November.’
‘Oh. OK. Hey Jodi? I quit. Eff you.'”
She Got Rid Of The Queue The Best Way She Knew How
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“I used to work in an IT support call center and had the worst middle manager ever. The company had started getting stingy on warranties, not honoring the labor component, so we had to walk customers through replacing computer parts like motherboards over the phone. Then he started to tell us we’re spending too much time on calls. Ugh.
One day, there was a big queue and he sent a typical, jerk email to all call center staff saying, ‘There’s a queue, come on guys get rid of it.’
Nope, I’m done with this. I just took all the calls and hung up on all them, flushing all 40 people from the queue in about a minute. I replied all on the email and said, ‘The queue is gone.’ I was escorted from the premises five minutes later. No regrets, not even that I didn’t get an exit interview. Success.”
Her Register Kept Coming Up Short, But She Had No Idea Why
“I worked at a grocery store in a small town after leaving my ex and moving states. Within a month, I got called into the manager’s office and was scolded for ‘stealing’ money from the register, even though I knew I hadn’t done it. Two weeks later, I got called back in and got a second warning for ‘stealing’ from the register.
I talked to my supervisor and she started looking through receipts, etc and found that my drawer was completely balanced, maybe short or over by a few pennies here and there. Worth knowing: you could charge things to be taken out of your paycheck and I had done it once with a pack of smokes. Now, I only smoke menthol and when I started looking through the tickets, I found out that packs had been charged that definitely didn’t belong to me.
My supervisor got to digging and found charges had been made on ALL employee accounts, some as much as several hundred dollars that had been taken out of their checks weekly. The only person who could do something like that on that big of a scale was the manager, the same manager that had accused me of stealing. The manager caught wind of what my supervisor was doing and fired her immediately. I was brought in once again and this time I couldn’t hold my temper, so I told the manager that I knew she was stealing and blaming it on everyone else. She fired me on the spot for ‘harassing her’ and told me to pick up my paycheck at the end of the week.
I went to pick up my check and the manager had forged my signature, cashed my check in the store and took around $250 out, leaving me with $57.
I called every number you could think of about it and that store was shut down less than a month later.”
She’d Given Them Her All, But They Didn’t Appreciate Her
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“I worked for a snack food company in Colorado. On my last employee review, I received great accolades from the owner and he stated that since I was the only buyer and the company was growing, they would hire someone to help and I would be the manager. Six months later, the owner pulled me aside on a Wednesday and told me they hired someone that was starting on Monday and that I would be reporting to that person.
I gave my notice on the spot. Later, I looked at that persons Linkedin and she had one year and four months of experience… I have 20 plus.”
His Little Power Trip Didn’t Turn Out The Way He Thought It Would
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“I was about 17 at my first decent part-time job. It was a small franchise/chain store in my hometown. I’d been there for about a year, which made me (laughably) one of the more senior part-timers on staff.
Over a long holiday weekend, I was working (alone) for a full day shift. I had a list of tasks to complete, several of which I’d done before, which my supervisor figured would take me all day. I was being paid time-and-a-half since it was a holiday and the store’s owners were very conscious of this.
I managed to get everything done by mid-day and proceeded to do more busywork. Stacking, folding, taking out garbage, inventory, labeling, everything I could imagine would be useful.
My next shift was the following weekend. When I arrived, the owners asked to speak with me in the office. I came in and one of the owners asked me to sit. He was a very short, stout, Italian chap who had a reputation for power trips. The chair was on its lowest seating position. I was berated for being ‘lazy’ on my last shift.
Apparently, one of the other supervisors caught me reading papers (my list of tasks) and standing around (labeling) or simply sweeping (cleaning), instead of ‘doing any real work.’ The owner railed on me, telling me this was unacceptable. His speech ended with a typical, ‘This is not the kind of attitude you should have if you want to keep working here.’
Forget this, I thought. Then it came to me in a flash. The words I’d wanted to utter throughout his tirade. And so I said it: ‘Well, I don’t anymore.’
The owner’s eyes bugged out. He ordered me to repeat myself. I did and said I’d have my two weeks’ notice in by the end of my shift. He told me to leave, now. I got up, stood in front of him and smiled, handed him my passkey, and strolled out to the parking lot. The drive home that day was one of the sweetest feelings I’ve ever experienced in my entire life.”
“I Hit The Body Fluid Trifecta In Half An Hour”
“As a corrections deputy and an EMT, I hit the body fluid trifecta in about a half an hour.
First, I responded to an inmate having a grand mal seizure. I kept his head from bouncing off the concrete until EMS got there. He’d puked twice but we could hear it coming so we were able to roll him over to ensure he didn’t aspirate. The third time, we didn’t hear any warning, just boom! Vomit all over my face, up my nose and in my mouth. Swapped out head-staying detail with a nurse and scrubbed my face ASAP while trying not to puke myself.
About ten minutes after I finished cleaning myself up enough that I didn’t want to blow chunks, I got a call to check the vitals of a wasted guy who’d just been brought in to see if he needed to go to the hospital or if he was alright to stay in jail. And he was cranky and bleeding.
I showed up and he was already yelling at anyone who will listen. I got him to calm down enough to take his vitals but really he just wanted me to get close enough to hit. While I was checking his blood pressure, he took a swing at me and the fight was on. I got his blood all over me in the quick scuffle and in the end, I got him wrapped up on the ground. I heard him start laughing hysterically and I noticed it felt warm all over my right side, which was laying on the ground. He was peeing. And I was covered in it. In an adrenaline surge, I stood us both up while still keeping his arms locked and got him into a cell.
I told the sergeant that a nurse could make a call from the window because forget it, I’m going home and drinking for the rest of the day. He replied, ‘Your shift isn’t over yet!’ I told him if I stayed here, I was gonna give him a hug so he could enjoy being covered in someone else’s pee, vomit, and blood. He didn’t say a word and I dropped the mic on my way out.”
He’d Been On Active Duty For Almost Two Decades, But One Day Broke Him
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“I had been on active duty in the Army for 21 years and thought I’d stay for 23. My previous four years had been on recruiting duty, which was a nice change of pace. The Army then decided to send me to Fort Drum, New York.
My family and I arrived at Drum in mid-October and there was already about two feet of snow on the ground. That’s pretty normal for that area. As the next few months progressed, I got used to shoveling pretty hefty overnight snowfalls in order to get to work the next day. It was not a big deal.
One day in particular though, a blast of Arctic air descended on the region and sent temperatures down to -22F. We got an early morning phone call from our leadership saying to report to physical fitness training as normal. So, we went out that morning, with snow everywhere and a wind chill of -44F, and ran for four miles.
I told my supervisor that I was retiring in the next six months and would fill out the paperwork over the weekend. He laughed at me and didn’t take it seriously.
That packet was completely filled out and on his desk at 0530 that Monday.
Nope. I’m done.”
She Was Losing Interest Anyway, But Her Boss’s Words Were The Last Straw
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“I gave up on my decade-long career as a civil/structural engineer about six months ago. It’d been a long time coming as my interest in the work itself had dwindled over the 10 years I’d been doing it. But my last job was particularly bad – chronically understaffed, 60+ hour weeks, required to work weekends, and an owner who was a monstrous jerk.
The last straw was when in an all-staff meeting, he told me, ‘You’re the consultant, do your effing job!’ I’d only been there for about three months at that point and was still familiarizing myself with port/marine engineering, as that wasn’t what I’d done at my previous job.
I don’t even remember anything else that happened in that meeting, all I could think of was that I needed to talk to my husband about how I was going to be unemployed for a while. That night when I told him, he said, ‘If you’re still there at 3 pm tomorrow, I’m going to be very upset.’
I quit the next day.”
He Was Thinking Of Going Back, But This Interaction Changed Everything
“I quit my job as a barista when I was offered a gig that paid better, had a more flexible schedule, and aligned with my degree really well. The manager at the new job had told me I could give notice at my old job (the cafe) and come work for them full time, so I did. That manager decided to eff me over and hire someone else, so I was considering asking for my job at the cafe back.
Then, literally the next day, the first customer I dealt with told me, ‘Your Chai’s are too watery,’ which is bull because we don’t put water in that, which I told her. Obviously, she wouldn’t listen, so I asked if she wanted new drinks or a refund. She said yes to the refund, so I went through the process of finding her order from several hours ago and getting the refund ready. I asked how she paid, she said debt, so I told her to put her card back in the machine. Oh, she didn’t bring her card (‘I don’t know how your refunds work here!’ Like everywhere else on the planet maybe?). So I was like fine, my patience was running out, so I just gave her the cash and moved on. Ten minutes later, she was back and asking where her drinks were. When I explained that she had asked for the refund, not the drinks, she said, ‘I don’t care about the refund, I want my drinks!’
That exact moment, I remember it as clear as day, was the moment I thought, ‘I will never work in a cafe again for as long as I live,’ while staring this woman down. Then I handed her two empty cups, said, ‘You didn’t pay for them, so make them yourself,’ and walked away.”
She Was Always Doing This To Him, But Never Gave Him Credit
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“My boss waited until the week before a proposal was due to start on it. She had received it two months prior and at that point, I offered to help and received no response from her. Then, the week before the due date, she came to me in a PANIC, asking for my help. This was the third time she had done this crap to me. I forwarded her all of my research and files and stayed late every night helping her to put it together. As I was reviewing the final draft of the said proposal, I realized my research was 80% of the content, but I was not listed on the team. Nope, I’m done.
I accepted another job offer two days later and I haven’t looked back since.
She owned the company, so there was no ‘going to her superiors.’ Also, justice/karma, another employee quit the same day as I did. It was a small company and it almost put her out of business. Hopefully, it was a wakeup call.”
It Wasn’t The Customers’ Rudeness That Got To him, But His Manager’s
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“I was working a crappy, minimum wage college job at my local zoo one summer and it’d been in the high 90’s all month. Our managers wouldn’t provide fans for us, so all we got was an umbrella for shade. During lunchtime, the line would easily get to 50 people deep and sometimes 100 if it was a holiday weekend. Needless to say, times were a bit stressful. The worst part was how we would always be out of stock for almost every item. When the ICEE machine would break, it took weeks to get it fixed. It just seemed like upper management didn’t give a crap, so why should I, right? Heck, at least the reindeer get a fan.
Anyway, it was a particularly warm day and we were out of everything. Cotton candy, popcorn, burgers, chicken, you name it. The soda machine was down and the ICEE machine wasn’t getting cold enough. People were literally cursing me out. I remember one lady saying, ‘WELL, WHAT THE EFF DO YOU HAVE?’ By that point, I was used to people complaining and I didn’t ever let the customers get to me too much. It was the management that did it in for me. I was ticked that nobody out of the ten other people working that day would restock any of the items while I was running the register and retrieving items, so I quickly ran inside into the manager’s office to tell him I needed help. When I arrived, I overheard him and another worker talking crap about me, saying that I try too hard and I need to get my overachieving butt out of there.
If the boss doesn’t want a good business, then I don’t want to work for them. I peeked my head in and said, ‘Maybe that’s why you’re 35 and flip burgers at a zoo,’ and left. I just got my degree in the spring and hope to go back to the zoo to give that loser one last flip of the bird before moving.”
When He Couldn’t Live Up To His Boss’s Ridiculous Standards, Things Got Tense
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“I used to work in pizza delivery. I worked for a while for this sleazeball owner who regularly bent and broke the rules to benefit himself. When Pepsi products went on sale at our local grocery store for cheaper than our distributor sold them for, he would tell his manager to load up his truck with as much Pepsi and Mountain Dew she could buy from the store. He also would have me take deliveries well outside of our delivery area by ringing them up as pickups and writing down the address.
Anyway, I was often the only driver scheduled in the morning. Usually, it wasn’t a problem, but one day it became a huge issue. My boss first had me take a delivery a good 15-20 miles outside our delivery area. We got slammed right after I left. Rather than call another driver in, he let the deliveries wait and got ticked off at me for taking around an hour on the out-of-area delivery. I said whatever and loaded up my car with all five deliveries that happened to be all across our actual delivery area. The last guy was really angry at us for taking so long, so he cussed me out, shorted me $10, and slammed the door in my face.
When I got back, my boss started cussing me out about taking so long that day. I guess the customer who was mad called the store to complain that I asked him not to speak to me like that when he was cussing me out. That got me a ‘the customer is always right, work harder,’ speech. I went outside, took the sign off my car, and left. I ended up calling our corporate office on him the next day.
To make things even better, when I went in to pick up my last check, he threatened to jump across the counter to fight me and started calling me a pansy when I wouldn’t agree to a fight. He often carried a weapon on him. I wasn’t about to get shot over a pizza job. I also found out that he ended up messing up my taxes hard that year after he and many others in the upper management of that chain got busted for tax fraud.”