What's the most abusive thing you've seen an employer do?

[Mizmoon]

I knew one supervisor who managed a group of CSRs. Even though it wasn't necessary, she wouldn't let them use the bathroom unless it was their break time. If they needed to go in between breaks, they'd have to grovel for her permission.

I was a manager so I started asking around if this was actually legal and to my horror it turns out it was.

[XanaDUer]

1. Deny a person who had cancer

time off for chemo (even though the person had lots of vacation time) because her time off for treatment would interfere with daily schedules.

This is among some stuff I have seen, and I have seen it all.

[Modem Butterfly]

4. BTW, that may have been illegal

Under both the ADA and FMLA.

[XanaDUer]

6. Probably

but the managers learned that, if they terrorized and harassed the staff enough, they could pretty much do what they wanted. It only changed because a few of us overheard it and went over the bitch's head and shamed the other boss into forcing them to let her have her earned time.

This is a right-to-work, work-at-will state (good old Florida), so who knows. I have since learned to my shock what employers are allowed to do if they want, and it's pretty disgusting.

[hobbit709]

21. Sounds like here in Texas

If you go to the Texas Workforce Commission website, they have about 10 pages of EMPLOYER rights and under EMPLOYEE rights it says you have the right to get time and a half for over 40 hours per week.

[Horse with no Name]

38. Oh aint that the truth

When I went to work for a certain hospital in Dallas, I told the recruiter that I had an immune deficiency and that I would miss more than the normal amount of work days because I was averaging several hospitalizations a year at that time.
She said they could work with that because they were aware.
I then interviewed with the department head and I told her the same thing. I asked them not to hire me unless that was acceptable because I already had a job that worked within those boundaries.
Again, I was told it was no problem. The manager was also immunocompromised from a kidney transplant. She understood too well that these things were the norm.
For several years, this was fine. Then, we got a new manager.
This man had no floor experience as a nurse. He had been an oilfield hand that went to nursing school when we had the bust. He had only been a nurse for a couple of years, but he had a higher degree. Not much experience however.
The first week he got there he started riding me about it. I explained that I had cleared this all before I ever came to work there.
He advised me--and made me sign--the attendance policy and told me I would be held to it.
I became well acquainted with FMLA and became very acquainted with my company's attendance policies and how they related to FMLA.
I knew I was within guidelines on absences, however, he said I had exceeded them.
I had the dates, etc. and was able to prove it.
I had CMV pneumonia and was hospitalized for two weeks then went home on intravenous antibiotics. I couldn't stay out of bed longer than an hour at a time. I received a certified letter at my house while I was sick advising me that I had exceeded the absences. Our company policy was based on occurrences.
You could be absent 20 days in a row and it would be considered one absence. What he did was begin a new occurrence at the beginning of each week I was out which was not within company policy.
But they terminated me. I went to an attorney and they told me that the company was within their rights to let me go for any reason they deemed necessary.
Workers really have no rights in Texas.:shrug:

[elehhhhna]

61. Hubs got stiffed for 15K in bonus $ in TX, and the local DOL Wage claim

people shrugged and said "oh well". They would not request ONE written record form the employer--who has a long history of doing this, we've since found out.

The shit that flies in Texas would NEVER fly in Illinois.

[Horse with no Name]

77. It won't fly in most civilized places

:shrug:

[elehhhhna]

90. Righto!...Or Blue states in general!

[tavalon]

171. But Texas isn't civilized

It's a "right to work" state which is Orwellian speak for "we can fire you without cause". I spend half of my life in Texas which is about half of my life too much.

[Bunny]

91. It would never fly in PA either.

Some of the stories on this thread are just incredible. I couldn't imaging behaving that way on the job, or being made to tolerate that behavior. It's unacceptable, and should never be permitted.

[raccoon]

106. Same in South Carolina

another "right-to-work," "at-will" state.

A lot of sh!t flies there too.

"worker's rights" is a joke. So is workman's comp.

[conflictgirl]

161. The rights for workers in Texas are TERRIBLE

I worked for a company in Dallas doing data entry. We had extremely high production quotas and I, like many others, developed carpal tunnel syndrome as a result. My doctor and physical therapist told me I'd have to be on "light duty", so my employer fired me since I couldn't perform the work they wanted me to do.

[Horse with no Name]

19. Not true

FMLA has requirements that she may not have met. Maybe she hadn't been on the job a year or worked enough hours the previous year.
Maybe she didn't fill out her paperwork for it.
Lot's of reasons FMLA may not have applied in this situation.
Also, the company may have been too small for it to have been a factor.

[Modem Butterfly]

24. Which is why I said "may"

But even if FMLA didn't apply, ADA might have.

[XanaDUer]

51. Right. You did not know the whole set of circumstances.

This government agency was notoriously nasty to its employees.

[elehhhhna]

63. Yep. ADA would cover it. Cancer is considered a disease.

[XanaDUer]

49. Well,

She had worked for a looooong time for a county agency in Florida. That is something else that is pretty freaking sick-this was not a private company but a government agency that got federal and state monies.

I think it was just that she was a sort of nice person who was easily bullied (her boss, whom I did not answer to, thank god, was a bitch on wheels).

She got her time after some of us went batsoid and went over her head. It was sick/vacation time that she had earned and had accrued. The whole thing was sick beyond belief. I no longer work there. That was just one story.

[Horse with no Name]

Well Florida government

Enough said,lol.

[mnmod]

120. Not may have been...

It was, if a manager tried that crap with me (intimdation) I would have asked for her denial in writing and slapped the crap out of the company with a lawsuit the next day..

[lonestarnot]

53. CANNOT DENY THIS TIME UNDER FMLA

[elehhhhna]

64. Can so if you don't qualify.

[lonestarnot]

76. First day on job?

[elehhhhna]

81. FMLA requires that

Your co employs at least 50 people.
You have been full-time for one year, and worked a certain # of hours in the past year (1,500 IIRC)
You are not an HCE (Highly compensated employee--typically a critical management position) that may be NEEDED by the business in order to whatever. HCE's can be denied FMLA.

Other details but these are the biggies.

[peace frog]

2. Sounds familiar

Ten years ago I worked in a call center where our time off the phone was militantly micro-managed. One fine day I needed a potty break, put the phone on hold and trotted off to the ladies room... only to be followed by my supervisor, who stood outside the stall door admonishing me to get back on the phone because "we have calls in queue!!"

[Gormy Cuss]

34. That's not a call center, that's a boiler room!

Phone banks do seem to bring out the bathroom control freaks. I managed one and we militantly accounted for activity too, except we assumed that adults could be trusted to take bathroom breaks in between scheduled breaks. There were very few abuses. At the end of the shift if you had the best production numbers in spite of 15 breaks, why on Earth should it matter to me? The competitors who were potty obsessed trained some of our best workers. :evilgrin:

[Mizmoon]

98. l like your attitude

performance - THAT'S what counts. Amen.

[hobbit709]

40. If you gotta go

go in the trash can

[goddess40]

3. I had an employer throw me up against a wall and scream at me

I was 15 and it was really a voluntary job at a riding stable/farm. We got assigned a horse we could ride and show at fairs in exchange for working on the farm.
My crime was that I brought out only one horse from a pair - even though there was only one more rider and there were four other girls bringing out horses.
I guess there is the time that I fractured a couple of small bones in my wrist and sprained it and not only wouldn't she let me call my mother or take me to the doctor she left me in charge of the riding stable for the week-end with the help of three younger girls. (Saddling horses with a sprained wrist isn't easy.)

edit: When I was a correctional officer we had a supervisor who thought that we shouldn't be allowed to use the bathroom except on break, which we often didn't get. When the facts of life were explained to him about sometimes women don't have a choice, he begrudingly backed down.

[Mizmoon]

5. I love the "no bathroom" thing

where these people get their nerve is beyond me.

[LibDemAlways]

7. Deny an empoyee whose 6 month old baby

died of cancer paid time off to attend the funeral. The reasoning was that the man had already used up his time off at the hospital being with his terminally ill child.

The people who ran that place - a now defunct insurance company - were cold-hearted bastards. They also denied employees time off at Christmas, while taking ski vacations themselves.

[NewJeffCT]

39. wow, how sad. that is even worse than what I saw

A workaholic woman I worked with (well, indirectly worked for, as she was an Assistant VP) had her teenage son get hit by a drunk driver. He was in a coma & not expected to make it. when she asked to take some time to be with her son, she was told that it was okay as long as it didn't interfere with her responsibilities at work.

[LibDemAlways]

93. It's shocking how those in charge can so easily

lose their humanity. In the case of the guy with the sick baby, his supervisor repeatedly "wrote him up" for his absence so that in case they fired him, they'd have "proof" of poor attendance.

The boss you cite who told the woman her responsibilities at work came before her injured son would be the first one to take off and not even bother to call in if it were a member of his or her family. It's always been my experience that the rules that apply to the employees don't apply to the brass.

[demnan]

8. May they all rot in hell

Fortunately I've never been denied a bathroom break, however I did work for one racist scum low life who timed the black ladies' bathroom breaks.

One of the black ladies quit and was going to sue them for racial discrimination. I was just hoping they would call me as a witness. I had a lot to tell.

[woodsprite]

9. My current employer has "stalked" an employee.

He's rather nuts around attractive women and then there is the control freak issue. The employee was off for a foot injury and he drove to her house and peered thru the pines at her. We know this because he described her sitting on her screened in porch with her foot propped. He also made comments about it to her. She quit, said she couldn't work with someone like that. I'm still pi$$ed that she didn't report him, but her mom works here in a rather high-up position and is actually somewhat friends with this guy. She didn't feel comfortable bringing anything up against him.

[CottonBear]

10. A former boss screamed at me that I should've finished a project on Friday

The problem was that I didn't start work with the firm until that Monday morning. I hadn't even met this guy (one of the three owners) yet. I'd interviewed with another employee (my current boss!) and one of the owners of the firm. He stalked back to his office and slammed the door. That's when I started crying.

I had just been laid off from another firm (office closed after 13 weeks of employment with that firm. (The bastards hired me knowing that they would close the satellite office.) I was also trying to leave an abusive marriage at the time. I broke down in tears. My co-workers (bless their hearts) helped me finish my first ever project with the firm.

[Mizmoon]

11. That story makes me want to hug you

:pals:

I hope that meanie got a nasty splinter or something as his karmic payback!

[CottonBear]

41. Thank you mizmoon! I can always use a hug.

:hug: :hi:
Long story short: I hung in there (needed a job to leave husband), left husband, long divorce, stalking, survived, quit job, went out west and to Europe and the UK for about 6 months, came back and got a job w/ same firm, boss still mean. my friend (current boss) yelled at him and quit, one of the owners quit (he didn't like meanie either), I quit after telling off the other boss (I told him that there was a specail place in hell for the meanie!) and demanding a good letter of reference (which I got), then my friend who quit hired me at his new firm where I've been for 9 happy years!

All's well that ends well. Plus I got remarried. :)

I love my job and I'm very happy with life now!

PS I saw the meanie the other day. We had a nice conversation. We are colleagues now not employer/employee. He's mellowed some but hhe's still an ass some of the time. I think he learned to be nicer after everyone started jumping ship and they went through 10 secretaries and the temp agency wouldn't send more because meanie yelled at them.

[Jokerman]

12. I saw a radio station owner slap his wife.

Verbally abused her for several minutes and when she responded, he slapped her face. It took every ounce of self control I had not to deck the SOB right then and there. I told the jackass off and quit on the spot. Two other employees walked out with me.

[Mizmoon]

20. You're a good man

You did the right thing.

[BlueIris]

25. What IS it about radio station owners?

Or managers, or executives? Okay, I know they are not ALL evil, but the worst stories I have ever heard about abusive bosses were all from the radio broadcasting industry. And they are HARSH. Was anyone physically injured? No. Were people psychologically scarred? Yup. Those are frightening stories, people. Frightening.

And yes, good for you for quitting.

[lonestarnot]

55. And did you report the abuse?

[elehhhhna]

65. Should have called the cops, too, imho.

Then sue for a hostile work enviro.

[Jokerman]

126. You're Right.

This happened more than twenty years ago in a small town so I doubt the local police would have done anything but you are right, it should have been reported. Especially when I think about how this jackass may have treated his wife in private.

The good news is that he went bankrupt the next year and lost the station.

[wakeme2008]

13. Just because you are a "Blue" company doesn't mean

you are good to work for. ie Progressive Insurance. The have an online app that you trigger for bathroom/lunch/normal breaks. I knew a girl with a bladder problem and they were always telling her she took to many bathroom breaks........ Not that she took too long in the br but just too many

[lonestarnot]

56. Disability? Maybe qualifies as discrimination....Disabled are protected

class

[Imagine My Surprise]

14. My former boss...

at a "non profit healthcare organization in Los Angeles" made my life a living hell. In Kafka-esque fashion, he was the compliance officer. Go figure. He once called me in the hospital hours before I was to have kidney stone surgery to ask where a catering request was.
(I was later written up for lack of efficiency.)

Matters progressively got worse. The Peter Principle is alive and well. I was eventually fired, and an attempt was made to block my unemployment insurance payments. However, I appealed to an administrative judge, and won.

I'm sure there are thousands of people who've experienced hateful dickhead bosses like this jerk.

PS -- I was the only "coordinator" (that was my title) in the company who did not actually make the same salary grade as other coordinators. I was paid a secretary's salary.

PPS -- Oh, by the way, I'm a gay male. And when I was fired, he replaced me with another gay male, and downgraded the job description big time. This was done, I'm sure, in an effort to avoid a discrimination lawsuit.

I have found "non profits" to be, in many way, more cut throat than "for profits" -- at least the for profits cards are on the table.

[lonestarnot]

58. Are you over 40 and replaced by a less qualified gay male is the question

[seabeyond]

15. the most challenging for me with the democratic party

is the attitude to the employer.

why, would any employer who pays fair wage, pays insurance......just trying to survive in this fucked up economy want to be a democrat.

i have not ever heard a positive thing about a business on this board. ever. this is the attitude of employees we hire also. why would i want an employee that abhors business. how helpful is that employee to me.

i am trying to be on yawls side, seeing how i have been poor and working class most of my life. doing the minumum wage, working middle management 14 hour days paying people minimum wage, yet making outrage demands from them in labor.

but really attitude of employees sucks

i also understand why, with corporation fucking the nation. not hire because of credit, smoking, drinking, fuck,.....drugs. no ones business. i opposed a decade ago insurance taking my blood. not many listened.

i keep saying, for the grace of god, there go i....over and over.

the hypocrisy of the party to chose what we allow to lose at rights, then on other hand demand, be outraged when a right is taken from us

well, i say.......
fuck...........

just a little rant. feeling better.

[Mizmoon]

26. After the creepy and horrific credit check thread

DUers needed a thread to rant against the machine.

[BlueIris]

29. I can't even bring myself to go into that thread.

Even though I think it could be educational and I've got a (relatively) thick skin about these things, (how thick? Well, honestly, I feel bad for the people here who were subject to abuse from employers, but nothing in it truly shocks me) I can't do it. I don't want to know.

[seabeyond]

44. it isnt a healing thread.......

as i say, i literally had a poster tell me because i own a business i could not communicate with working class and just to keep my mouth shut. the audacity of me to think i should have a perspective. this is not just a ranting from credit card. because if it was, one may identify with the employer.

we have a fourty something year old female doing our books. no education. she has been trained to do all this. she is paid well. she is given health insurance, regardless of the hikes last three years that is raping our company. she is salary, guarenteed hours and has called in sick, or sick with child working on three weeks now since january. she does college homework, and tests thru internet at her desk. on paid vacation this week.

she is an addictive spender. her life is a mess and this is a way she brings comfort to herself. stuff piled high from purchases off internet. hiding it from new husband. hiding she doesnt have a savings account anymore either. (two tyical acts that put a person into desperation). on a regular basis she will borrow up to a thousand off her paycheck, and then spend months paying it off.

her attitude is what i owe her.

wtf do i owe her.

she has exactly the attitude i hear on this board, over and over and over.

tell husband, screw employees, let them all go, downsize business into basement, and what a life we would have

she also really really needs the paycheck to survive.

this is one employee in 6.

[Mizmoon]

50. Whoever told you that crap about "the working class"

is a moron. I've got an advanced degree and am highly educated. I own my own house in a working class neighborhood. We all get along. I understand them just fine and they understand me. Whoever said that is looking for a class battle and that's moronic.

Maybe you should hire people you respect. Then you will like them better, and they will like you better. I wouldn't like the person you're describing very much either. She sounds awful.

I've hired people and been their manager before. I know what it's like to sort through and try to find the right person for the job you need done. I have made some damn good hires - people who I liked to work with and who liked to work with me. They do exist. Keep looking and don't assume they're all the same. They really aren't. Trust me.

[seabeyond]

79. that isnt the answer, and i like her fine

i have been doing business a long long time. i too was in college for business. my father has owned small business since i was 12. i have worked for large corporations (coca cola we are now boycotting) and small business. coca cola was excellent to the employee. there was also racism in local areas with coke, i fought to corporation, decades ago.

yes the guy that said that to me was a jerk. well not even that. he was a tired hard working dude trying to feed his family, and in this econic enviroment, and the employer is the enemy mentality.

not a hard one to see

i am not the enemy. is what i am suggesting. we really want my company to be productive and survive and be healthy. to pay those wages. that is not even thought about on this board. certainly not said out loud.

i am advocating workers in amarillo union up. you know how much that can hurt me. i suggest minimum wage go up to a working wage. do you know how that will hurt father and his small businesses.

no, no one does know. that brings it to a working relationship/understanding for a win win. not the battle of winner/loser

i am willing to make sacrifice for the health of nation. for the good will of a family able to survive on one income, to also be able to raise and be a part of family.

i would like democrats to rally with me, not against me. be against me, so be it. who am i to say. i will do what is needed without support.

it is an overall attitude of us against them. and it is not healthy or good for any of us.

[BlueIris]

52. Yikes. Probably better that I stay out then.

And if you care, I have quite a bit of sympathy for business owners/managers/employers who have to deal with employee negligence, irresponsibility, or god forbid more unpleasant or destructive kinds of behavior (violations of crucial company policies or actual laws). As many employees as I've seen be VERY badly treated by their bosses, I've seen a lot of business owners especially get screwed by bad workers. This one coworker I recall from my last job (and office with three support members in it)--don't even get me started. Our boss was not the nicest man to work for but what she did (not illegal, just wrong) was reprehensible and nearly caused the company to go under, which as you may know, can happen easily for a smaller organization. If I ever meet her alone in a dark alley...

[Modem Butterfly]

57. Ultimately, hiring comes down to an act of faith

You try like hell to ensure the person who you're interviewing with is telling the truth and representing themselves accurately, that they're who they say they are and will do the job you ask of them, but in the end it comes down to taking a risk.

Bad hires can be a real nightmare.

[elehhhhna]

71. You NEVER know until they're on board. MB, assume we can

agree on that.

[raccoon]

110. True, and the flip side of that is also true

you hope the employer you're interviewing with is telling the truth.

[davsand]

113. I've been on both sides of it.

Nothing can turn you sour quite like an employee that is just not worth the misery and annoyance they create. My rule of thumb was always that I followed baseball rules: You got three swings at it and if you still weren't hitting it you were out.

NOW, I also took very seriously the philosophy that any employee failure was either a bad hire or else a management issue, in that, I was not doing enough to articulate my expectations and needs clearly.

IF you don't already have a written and signed employee policy that covers missed work, then you need to get one put together and get it signed ASAP. In that policy you need to clearly outline how sick time or vacation time is accrued/earned and under what circumstances it is acceptable to use it. (is it ok to use for immediate family members' illness, is it required that you use vacation time for a sick kid or spouse, etc.)

Some companies simply take the customary vacation time and sick days and holidays and call them all some generic term for time off... I have seen that policy work. I have seen it handled a more traditional way with formal sick days and formal vacation time and paid holidays--and that works fine too. Whatever suits your company and preferences is fine as long as it is uniformly applied.

Once you have had that policy signed and in place, then you can begin to work with her to improve her attendance issues. You will have a concrete policy to point to in your discussions, and so will she.

If she does better, then great--you have cleaned up an issue and saved an employee. IF it doesn't help, well, you have now established what the guidelines are and you can begin the "three strikes" procedure to get rid of her. First step, a verbal warning that is documented by her signature. Second step, a written warning. Third step, she doesn't work she doesn't get paid. Finally, she's gone.

Employees fire themselves, and employers sometimes create bad employees by not communicating with them or shifting standards in the middle of the game.

Just my two cents, and good luck!



Laura

[seabeyond]

117. you are right on all this

we do have policy. my husband took over business 3 and half years ago. she had been working with company 5 years.

before, there was so much to do getting company going, the first couple years we let it slide. allowing employee to be fair, and not babysit them. this one, this year i am keeping track. i tell husband, it is coming to a bottomline. she knows what she needs to do, trained, are you willing to put up with this. as soon as she or any other is challenged, we are saying, we are willing for them to quit, and go thru time and expense of rehiring.

doesnt bother me as much as him. and is his company

Employees fire themselves, and employers sometimes create bad employees by not communicating with them or shifting standards in the middle of the game.

agree

on edit though: from what i see, and the industry husband is in, i am concerned about the workforce now. i think it goes well beyond this one employee

i am talking to my nieces and nephews at 12 and my 10 year old son in terms of employee. when i tell them to do a job. the "i didnt think", or "i forgot" gets a, i would fire your ass if you were an employee. tis your job to think and remember.

we are computer and hire a lot of young. twenties. they are not good employees. they are smart. but i am not impressed. lots of whining going on

[Gormy Cuss]

70. Positive? See my post above

I worked for a phone bank, an environment not known for treating employees well. We couldn't pay significantly higher wages or benefits, but we did offer more workplace dignity -- as I said in the post about bathroom breaks, we treated adults like adults. It was a business decision. We saved a fortune in training costs because our retention rate was so much better than the competitors. How is that not a positive comment on business?

I've worked in companies where management is sneaky or sleazy and didn't care at all about the employee contentment. I've worked in companies where there is an understanding of the cost effectiveness of maintaining a supportive workplace. Anyone with a brain knows that happy employees are more productive, more responsible team members.
Employees may come in with a bad opinion of business based on prior experience.

[seabeyond]

86. kerrys experience and support of small business is what convinced

husband to vote kerry, after a lifetime believing in republican party. kerry got husbands vote because he did talk the hardship with this group of people.

just a reminder

and to be honest, gay issue turned husband too, and iraq, lol and

but husband was let down, that we would have four more years of attack on us, by the government. and no help with things like health insurance, that he believes he has a responsibility adn obligation to provide. and a good wage.

[BlueIris]

89. Seriously? That's great.

Yay!

[seabeyond]

95. what part, lol

that we are being fucked, lol lol

really teasing. i know what you mean. just had a laugh at this. wink

[BlueIris]

99. Well, for the record I mean the part about Kerry's attitude

toward small business being received positively by your husband.

[seabeyond]

100. it was good for him to actually hear

allowed him to see all he had been conditioned to believe of republicans, wasnt necessarily what was happening in the real world. i wonder how many small business owners didnt listen to this. i know during campaign was the big thing i was pushing for kerry, that received so little coverage.

[alarimer]

131. Because employers treat their employees like shit

A lot of the time. I will never, ever work for the private sector after all the horror stories I have read.
Believe me for every good story I have heard (like that guy in Mass who kept his employees on the payroll despite the mill having been burned down) I hear dozens of nasty ones. Until companies (and their managers) learn to treat people as human beings and value them- let's face it, the workers are the only reason anything gets done-not the bosses or the execs- attitudes will continue to be poor. If you work in a place where no one gives a shit about you, you won't give a shit about the company either.

[seabeyond]

144. see, my hubby of mine, respects the adult

he tells them the expectation and just really figures the employee being paid well, and treated well is going to follow thru. i, on the other hand, feel a bit differently.

i feel, especially now a days, it is the odd employee that can handle and have the ability to do as expected without a lot of supervision. that wont screw ya. that wont take the two hour lunch, or leave early or go home and take a nap. that wont buy the extra meal on expense. that will go in and do a thorough job for the client in a kind and respectful manner.

i have found, the majority of employees almost demand the set of rule to follow. they cant seem to get thru life without a whole bunch of rule and policy, not to mention, they have the expectation of employer checking to see follow thru. to prod and encourage along, that things get done. to define and redefine explanation and expectation. and the moment that employee doesnt send the weekly report, to have employer go and let employee know that isnt ok. need that weekly. otherwise,.....employee says cool, i dont have to do after all

we can battle back and forth.

by your post, you chose battle.

i prefer the win win........
for both employee and employer

[alarimer]

152. I simply don't trust the corporate world

I don't even trust, particularly, my own employer. Some of it is not their fault- Texas is an at-will state, meaning any trumped-up excuse they can find they will use. My agency has recently started hiring corporate people to run some of the top jobs, including human resources, and they have completely ruined the morale of the workforce. The HR director informed the whole staff (at 430 pm on a Friday afternoon, via EMAIL- after which time he was out of the office) that there would be a reduction in force. Very, very classless thing to do. I hope at least that the people who were let go (budgetary reasons) were informed in person but I somehow doubt that). I know a lot of people think government employees don't work very hard but you would be wrong in the majority of cases here. I started before sunup today. I often work over 40 hoours (no overtime- just comp time and the pay is low but we are not doing this for money and besides I prefer steady work over not even knowing if I would have a job the next day in the corporate world.

I perhaps was a little harsh in my original post. You are probably one of the good ones (the few and far between) and have probably had to deal with rotten employees. I still think, overall, that if corporations, especially, want good employees, they are going to have to pay for it someone. Better benefits, higher pay whatever. It used to be that a person could work thier whole lives with GM or GE or some other company and make a decent living. Now that is no longer true and I think that accounts for the fact that employees are no longer loyal to their employers. They have to look out for themselves and their families first.

[LibDemAlways]

145. Amen....and

I say that from long and bitter experience. I taught in three schools, each with a nutcase for a principal. One was so paranoid she constantly called the teachers into her office and interrogated them about what they did after school hours. She was convinced the faculty was conspiring against her.

I worked for an insurance company where the bosses treated themselves like kings and the employees as slaves. Then I worked for two different "mom and pop" travel agencies where the owners expected the "help" to put up with all manner of shit, including taking copious verbal abuse from their clients when a problem arose. The second agency owner was a total busybody who listened in on my phone conversations with clients and questioned every judgment call I made.

Twelve years ago I was able to more or less "retire" when my daughter was born. I don't miss dealing with any of those dumbasses.

[seabeyond]

147. employees as slaves.

do tell. cause the employee i have, that has her makeup, curling iron, fingernail polish, and dvds in the drawer thinks she is in a slavish enviroment also

[LibDemAlways]

156. Nowhere did I say that all employers

treat their employees like slaves. I'm sure there are good and generous employers out there just as there are good, hard-working employees. I've just never had the privilege of working for any of them.

[NuttyFluffers]

176. i love how the japanese deal with this problem.

they have hopeless people just as much as any society. but instead of trying to follow america's example (read: neurotic "zero-tolerance" attitudes, using bad examples as justification to blame all employees as bad, etc.) they did the smart thing.

they put them by a window, usually a corner office, and just let them do nothing pretty much, except run menial errands. they don't go higher up in the corporation, they don't get much responsibility, they don't make important decisions, but they are included in all business social functions, and they are still considered part of the "business family."

This has multiple positive effects. It gives a healthy boost to morale by giving people the sense of security that they won't be fired for stupid mistakes, because the "town idiot" isn't fired yet. it gives faith to the employees about the employers wisdom in hiring (and in general), because there *must've* been a reason to hire someone like that and retain them. It encourages people also to *not* be the "town idiot" and so aspire to higher levels of responsibility and decision-making by giving the company good work results. atop all that it is useful to have a person run menial tasks, things that don't matter if screwed up. these people are rendered "useful" by being in charge of getting balloons for parties, getting simple lunches for others, holding the ladder, bringing paperwork from one dept. to another -- simple stuff that would waste other highly productive employee's time.

so people who would normally fall through the system and be "burdensome" now are "productive" members of society. they get a reliable source of income to maintain their lives. it's not going to be a grand life, but it's better than a miserable one. they also utilize this logic for product distribution, hiring lots of couriers. but that's another story.

much better system, i believe. one of the (now many) reasons i aspire to leave USA and work in Japan. they have business models that just make sense -- and work!
:7

[Javaman]

153. I'm a Democrat and work for a repuke...

I haven't gotten a raise since Clinton was in office. However, my repuke boss, who by the way is a FOB, keeps promising us that raises are just around the corner.
Why I'm still here is anyones guess, but I am attending night school to get out of this hole.

[amazona]

163. sheesh get over yourself

Plenty of us here have or in the past have had small businesses.

The Original Poster asked about bad work experiences. Therefore, guess WTF we are posting about our bad work experiences in this thread.

You are perfectly free to post about your POSITIVE work experiences or to start a new thread about "what is your BEST work experience?"

But don't you dare look me in the eye and pretend that you have never had a ****ty work experience or known a power-crazed boss. Don't even pretend you don't know what we're talking about. Because you'd have to be effing delusional, I'm sorry.

Democrats believe we need checks and balances, rules of law and regulations, because a small percentage of the population is effing crazy, and some small number of those effing crazy people are business owners and supervisors, OK?

Doesn't mean we can't have another thread later about terrific bosses and working environments. The world is wide.

[seabeyond]

166. i dare to look you right in the eye

i had no wild eyed crazy off the wall greedy pig employer in my lifetime. i get along with most people, i got along with management. i wasnt given outrageous demands or expectations. i went in and did my job. i wasnt there to be friends and pals with the dudes. i was there to earn a paycheck and get on with my life. i know enough about business to know why i was asked to do certain things, i understood if they needed me for the extraordinary. while one may complain they were being abused asked to work overtime, i didnt feel abused, i understood why i was needed to work overtime, and wasnt a tough one for me. i was single so i didnt have to call in because of kids, i was healthy so i didnt call in. i was a valued employee in every job i had, and i was treated as such.

so no, i have not had any horrible bosses. i have had hard, low paying jobs. but i signed up for that. my choice to take it or not

and if i want to post on this thread that i feel the strong majority on here are unjust to employers and business as a whole, then i will. so you get over yourself. i see a strong leaning on this forum to create all management/owners/boss bad. i dont like it. i challenge it. and it is not healthy or productive for us as a people. it is not how i would chose to have as a working enviroment. i would prefer employee and employer work together. benefit all. win win. what a concept

[NuttyFluffers]

177. i really have an incredibly hard time believing that, unless...

you grew up in a much earlier time than i. you mean, all through the 70s to now you've had nothing but glowing employers, where only the low paying work was the issue? you mean that throughout the milton-friedman-as-prophet management craze crapola, and the rewarded incompetence of us steel/american motors mgt., you've somehow been blessed to have no experience of this? hmmm...

well, perhaps you might.

still doesn't take away from the fact (yeah, after several decades it's a fact by now) from the abyssmal managerial quality that now envelops the vast amount of america. sure, there's good employers, as there are good employees, but there's a serious malais in modern american business, and many on this board are calling it out. and that is as it should be. they are making the bigger decisions and doing a lousy job of it, screwing everyone in the process.

don't like hearing the criticism about bad management? tough -- it isn't directed at *you* and you are actively trying to work for change for the better (as you've previously posted), so why on earth it wraps your panties in a bunch is beyond comprehension. think a broad brush is being painted? sounds like oversensitivity on your part. the topic is about *bad managers*, and since no one is pointing you out as one, and you are actively pointing yourself out as a *good one*, you are losing yourself in some nonsense about labels.

it needs to be talked about, it needs to be vented about, even if no solutions are immediately made. if you feel it's so one-sided you could've made a quick comment saying that it's not the whole story and said you are going to make a new topic about "worst employee/co-worker story you have." there, would that have been so hard? no, all we get is some flack -- is it an attempt to silence disgruntled feelings about this current biz enviro? no? is it an attempt to "add balance"? if so, you could've made another topic, it's not hard (and you would've had plenty of support on this board and a lot of posts).

stop self-isolating yourself. DU is a whole lot of everything; throwing labels around, disregarding other's experience, and misaligning yourself cheapens things. there's an easy solution to your frustration, so go make a new topic already. anymore misappropriated self-victimization is unbecoming.

[seabeyond]

187. they arent glowing or otherwise

my expectation of an employer isnt so high that it has needed to be glowing. they tell me when to work, what to do. i do it. and htey pay me. i was doing payables for a large company. before vacation i ran the checks, except i hit all checks. and sent them out. paid way more than what they wanted to pay, could afford to pay. huge mistake. i got my ass chewed out

i deserved it

i was thankful i still had a job

and they didnt mention it again to hang over my head rest of employment, i was thankful

i am giving you my biggest, and only major mistake in working. but my point is, i took it. i did the error and took it. another person would say how mean the boss was. i didnt think he was mean. it is in perspective.

my suggestion is many people have a piss poor attitude to employers, just talking to me on this thread i hear the piss poor attitude. i wouldnt hire one person that talks about employers like this. they already have attitutde and i havent done a thing yet. it would be an uphill battle all the way proving to them i am not a meanie employer. why,.......do i want to mess with that. i am busy working ass off. trying to keep company going. why would i want to hire a person that is just waiting for me to be in a pissy mood so they can say, see how horrible this person is.

i dont want to hire someone that is walking into the company with a chip on shoulder. it drains the enviroment. nothing done for this employee will be enough. i will always be the bad guy. i will be the one that if i get a day off, see how employee has to work so hard, a slave, while the employer is king, gets to play, does nothing all day.

i will clue you in. a person that owns a business, doesnt even have to work if that is what they can create. they are not there to make sure they work as many hours as employee, that it is fair to employee. if employer never goes in, and pays wages, and pays bill and is productive, .....bully for him. he has fullfilled obligation to employee.

but on this board a person says how unfair that is. that is bullshit.

it is no business of an employee what the boss is doing. it is none of the employees business what the other emplyees are doing. the only business of an employee is the job they are doing.

[seabeyond]

196. it needs to be talked about,

btw, yes it does, what i am doing. but it doesnt need to be blindly supported allowing all to be victim in a society of victims. what i am suggesting, is maybe we have create a world where we see, immediately see a person with power over us as evil. and why not. look at the world we live in.

but it may not be a reality

because we literally are feeling an anamosity to authority, we are creating as much as the employer is. maybe we can stop creating the world of anamosity.

it does need to be talked about. i havent read the rest of the posts in this thread. i have heard all the allegations, correct and false about employers. but i am the only one sharing another perspective. and it is a fair enough question. victimization

i am just not put in that role, ever. that is why i got along with boss. i know i always had the choice to do or not do. ultimately, i never felt they had power over me.

but then i dont experience that as a whole. not in my marriage. not so much as a child even. not because i am female, living around all repug "he man" republicans bullshit. i have never felt, or adopted the role of victim. i just have never been comfortable in that suit.

so, i conclude......yes it is important we talk about it. if next time the boss is pissy, maybe he too is thinking, this is fucked. working ass off. weekends, havent had raise in 7 years, ......am i going to be open tomorrow. am i going to be able to pay employees wage. maybe..........some can stop, when he is walking thru office barking, that maybe.....he is afraid, tired, has the weight of the world on his shoulders too. and we dont have to be so mean to each other. havent we had enough. i have

[NuttyFluffers]

198. you are conflating small biz mgt. w/ all mgt.

and that does you a disservice.

you bring up valid concerns -- but ever heard about "proper time, proper place"? you end up conflating the concerns of small employers with power mad middle mgt. jerks, and disconnected upper mgt. it's really hard to "unthread" your opinions and their connection to abused employee opinions; it just comes off as "i'm being attacked because they attack employers." it's so thoroughly locking yourself in a label and forgetting to empathically view others' viewpoints.

here's the thing, with these two posts you could've *already* started another copycat post about "bad employees." y'know, we've all worked with them (or at least most of us have, perhaps you are a special case here too). it would've been a popular topic. there's a lot about the american worker style that irritates me just as much as the american management style (though i lay more blame on mgt.; they are brought up to higher ranks and paid well to solve harder problems and do better work -- and lately too many have been grossly negligent, a fact beyond denial now.).

but all we are getting from your posts is you side with the bosses because we are all free to do as we please and any abuse was brought upon yourself. that's so... ugh... like blame the victim bullshit for rape. there's posts here about horrendous sexual harassment, physical assault if not battery, life-threatening levels of neglect, and denial of rights in emergency situations. no, america's civil protections do *not* stop at employment, nor they should, and nor should such abuse be condoned or waved away. that's the thing, that's what is being discussed.

*and that's why your posts have such horrific timing*

y'know, i get really upset when people say shallow crap about "stop playing the victim," it's such a RW canard that has been wholly adopted into modern psyche. people don't even question the validity of this non-statement anymore, it's assumed true and seen as some magical conversation show stopper. no, really, there are victims in the world. not everyone is a victim, and not everyone in power is a victimizer, but when those cases do appear -- and oh do they appear -- it is callous or naive to believe that it really didn't happen.

i don't believe we are some milk sop nation of self-victimized delusionals, or any level even close. i believe we are a nation of people willing to work hard (we've done it before, hell we've done it recently -- remember the late 90s?) but have been deliberately shafted by a huge RW ideological movement. and the most cunning trick they played is to pose small business owners (whom they shaft every bloody moment that they get) and lower/mid management with illusions of grandeur against regular employees. there's this foolish sub-conscious whispering in society about "oh they are just complaining like they always do. don't wanna work for anything. playing the victim, again" and people fall for the same old divide and conquer shit, over and over and over again.

i've had good bosses. i've had shitty bosses. i've worked with good employees. i've worked with shitty employees. so what. what matters is major trends in how power is applied. and power has been applied abusively before, and it is still being so. those with power have responsibility and they are shirking that duty in the grab for more power. and along the way they are sowing the seeds of animosity deliberately so no one looks at their malfeasance. it's time to hold them accountable and part of it is breaking down the tactics used to abuse.

you may be speaking of alliances with the small biz, low/mid mgt. groups with the rest of the working class. if so, good. it's a conversation that needs to happen. but part of that is validation of abuse -- from both sides. you want to open the argument about how you feel you are getting unfairly shafted and abused by employees, start a new topic. you'll be surprised how much validation you might find. but don't come here and piss on any validation employees are trying to find here in an effort to find support for you. it does you, and all of us, a disservice. it's a two-way street you want? provide the second half in the proper place -- another topic.

[seabeyond]

201. i dont want a seperate thread. i am comfortable right here

i keep hearing the defending of the right to have this thread and criticize management. i have never stated otherwise. go for it. i am not challenging anyones right to speak out here. you are not the first, to imply this is what i am saying. forming a whole arguement over this non statement i didnt make.

first

second

whining. victim. exageration. i was in slave labor.....at an airconditioned insurance company. what

do tell the slavish condition.

sounds like vicitim to me, but who am i to judge.

as you suggest all the valid and horrid experiences, ok. i am merely pointing out all the what,.....whining too. that is a good thing, if just for a moment someone stops to think, oh silly me. i was exagerating a tad, that is for sure. yet there is a problem with business and the american worker, and our government.

i dont want a thread to pat business on the back. i want business to own the reasons employee are so fucked up (and parents. i really think we are doing children a disservice now a days, teaching how to be an employee). many many problems that companies themselves created for the employee

i equally want the employee to own why the businesses and corporations are fucked up, if maybe there is something that they can contribute in healing.

then maybe we can work together from there, and start creating changes that are a win win

i had i think, every post; the person tells me i MIGHT be the exception

i am suggesting in my business world, the people i know running business, are ethical, a part of community, raising families. i know the business owners in town that fuck the people and the employees, and are the theives and pigs of our community. and when i walk into their businesses and see issue, i get on the phone and make calls. i am not putting up with shit from anyone. i am so after coors dude that ran for senator, right up the street from me.

if the good employees, grab the good bosses.........we will create win win. i come in peace. i want to work together.

[marions ghost]

185. good for you

but yours is not the experience of others. So can you allow for another view of employer/employee relationships?

The horror stories in this thread are not unusual.

[seabeyond]

189. here is an example of what i talk

profit margin minimal in husband business. highly competitive. he was asked to contract labor. 50 an hour. he gave the guys $33. an hour. and expenses paid. that is kick ass pay for this area, maybe most areas. they dont have degrees. young, so little experience. he could have paid them far less, but he has an ethics thing going on with him. we all did well. so i told self, though that isnt how i would have done business, it works for husband, cause he can sleep at night

after a while, job done he hires a dude. we were talking. he says, i saw the check they cut to you all, man, you were raking it in. so were you i said. he pauses, like, that isnt part of the equation, that doesnt count. (not to mention he wasnt suppose to look at the information, knew he wasnt, that it was confidential).

now this employee says, it was my labor that produced that money, they made about 28% off my labor, that isnt fair. it should have gone to me. what he doesnt include in that package is

overhead

insurance, taxes, healthcare, wage, supplies, rent, utilities......yada yada yada

instead what he says about the employer is, that isnt fair. he cheated me, he is mean. greedy. all those repugs are so greedy

it was the time he is talking about having to work a sunday. i didnt know it was an issue. one employee says, its your fault, i told you to say no. what? i say, husband worked that sunday and many others too. what is the deal. thru week you left early to make up that sunday. sittin there whining cause he worked a sunday. was pathetic. i told husband sorry i opened mouth, sometimes i just cant keep shut.

he says, wow......i gave him a hundred to take girlfriend out to dinner (was her bday). i told him he didnt have to work it. i bought his lunch. gathered music for the ride out of town.

but hubby is a meanie.

so yes i can alow for another perspective on employer/employee relationship, but i may not take it as seriously as another.

[NuttyFluffers]

199. i have so much trouble even following this...

perhaps you are getting frazzled by having to reply to our objections -- and so i strongly suggest making copycat topic -- but halfway through the example you were losing me with the spray of pronouns and clipped storytelling.

but from what i could gather, yes, the young employee didn't have a grasp about the other responsibilities required from the business. but that's where you could have mentioned that what he was seeing was a gross, not a real picture of profit. you don't have to spell out the numbers to him, but you can at least let him in on the complexities and expenses in running a business in general. it would've been a good life lesson.

and you might be surprised, that simple, straightforward, factual explanation might've satisfied. it's like when kids feel they are being lied to by parents when they are given fantastical answers, if given an answer at all, when they have questions. sometimes the best way to deal with it is treating them like an adult and give them facts about how the world is, even if it might be too advance for their understanding at the time. people respect being treated as if they can handle the truth.

now about the confidential stuff, yeah it was tactless to bring that up, but so much about life, etiquette, propriety is being lost in society. but the nature of life, including business, is info like this *will* (there's not even a doubt about this, it's just how the universe works) end up from time to time in the wrong hands. can't blame someone for circumstance (unless he broke into locked file cabinets or a locked room -- then that's a different story and you have bigger problems). but what you can do when breaches of etiquette occur is politely excuse and then explain the proper/professional manner to deal with such a situation when it arises again. you can't blame people if they've never been taught the proper manner on how to do things.

a little honest explanation (as in, not your entire account books or tax history) about how things work and a little about how things are civilly done go a long way. you don't need to give gifts, or brow beat people into place, etc. when just a little considerate explanation would do. by letting the dialogue break down between employer/employee is where so many problems arise, which is another reason i prefer the japanese system. kvetching, explaining, and listening, by both parties, is integral to their view of how business should work. everything made secret and stuffing all feelings down just makes problems at work -- which makes the japanese quite a paradox how they can do this in work life and not so much in everyday or family life.

the rest of the example, i just cannot follow. sorry.

[seabeyond]

202. of course i am going to do all those things

and the two females having pissing contests, and the employee that comes in late leaves early, and the employee that just doesnt want to be there, and the employee that thinks all bosses are abusive power hungry son of a bitches, and the two employees that fell into a drunken drug abused relationship, threatening to kill themselves and each other in all this youth drama. yes as employer i will patiently do all these things.

thanks

[seabeyond]

197. all this personal, lets take back to kerry, democratic party

who we are, and what we want to do. my republican husband voted for kerry because, of his experience in small business, to create a good working environment for employees, to be able to provide. to be a part of the community, a contributing part of community, in grace and love and kindness, cause after all this is the world we create for our children.

why did we like kerry's business plan.

because he had the experience of running a small business, and understands our challenges, and our goals. and he was there to help us

amen

back to my life. husband suggested i get off site. for a week. lol. thinking kerry has said impeachment. it starts monday. how.......how do i stay off.

maybe a weekend would do.

also our anniversary today, 11 years. be called, woke me, before my coffeee, wishing me a happy anniversary. walking thru house, (i forgot. always forget anniversary) flowers, and a card, and........chocolat

he feeds me chocolat. in such love. now that is a man, that is not concerned with oldish wife ability to consume chocolat. in all the superficial judging.

both my sons know, to regularly, give wife chocolat just cause you love her. that will always make the woman feel so loved, the calories, the are....not.....hollow. just a melting of pure love

peace

[Solly Mack]

16. Attempted rape

Back in my school days. A manager was forcing himself on a co-worker. I came upon the scene in the walk-in freezer and literally hurled myself at the man, knocking him down. I then stomped on his head a few times, grabbed J and fled. I locked the freezer from the outside and called the police.

The man was fired. He was also convicted of assault...not sexual assault...just assault. I wasn't charged.

Lot more to the story but it's one of those I don't really like to think about kind of things...

[Misunderestimator]

28. Wow! Holy crap.

And Good for you! You must have had a huge amount of adrenaline running through you.

[Solly Mack]

36. I just acted...no thinking.....one of those things.

J was the one who told me I stomped on the jerks head. I didn't know I was doing it...

That was a truly horrible time.

[undergroundpanther]

33. Glad you stomped that pig

Glad you were there!
to stop that assault.and Did not stand by.

[ArkDem]

17. I once completed a six month project for a company that

saved the company 900K yearly. When it came time for a merit review I onlt recieved a 15 percent raise and wasn't promoted to manager. Needless to say, I found another job in a hurry.

[undergroundpanther]

18. every corporation is a little fascist fiefdom

this is why Americans never were free.
Employers hold your life in their hand

People believe a person has the"right" to control resources,
Look at it in this hypothetical scenario
There was a river where everyone could get fish if they were hungry, Nobody OWNED it .Along comes a corporation empire and they chase everyone away from the river,catch all the fish,put them in a box.Now people can't go to the river and just eat.They have to pay the man for a fish that was once free.
The man on the box rations out the fish to the people for a fee,if they do what he wants, The people grovel to the man on the box who has stolen all the fish because they believe he has power and has this right to own all the fish .
A boss is like this man sitting on a box in our country everyone wants a box to sit on there are many men and boxes which in effect means there is no way to escape the system and live.Even homeless have trouble getting food when resentful rich people douse trash with ammonia or other poison to keep homeless people from eating the thrown out food,that is still good.Remember if you plant a seed from 1 fruit you get a tree that will produce tons of fruit for free for years,This is why Monsanto seeks to invent seeds that will not grow without their chemicals to force you to be Dependant on them and obey them to be permitted to eat.It's extortion. Because the majority of people believe people on boxes the right to hoard the stuff in the box which is the stuff that enables you to live like food clean water etc,,.and he is surrounded by people who are loyal and willing to fight for him so you are forced even more into accepting the scam that you have to do what he says to eat.

This is why when masses of people become conditioned in societies that are empire oriented to be obedient to'leaders' and grow Dependant and even addicted true believers on a system of unequal power and grovel to bosses that are encouraged yo steal away peoples time, survival skills,land and hopes . By society letting rich people own all the land as in land LORD is a fiefdom The feudal lord owns your House just like the middle ages land Lords just have limited jurisdictions. Allowing certain people to hoard distribute and profit off the necessities of life the Earth gives us all that was a sustainable ecosystem and giving them control until the point you live life in such a way you cannot exist without paying some man on some box just to eat or have a place to be it's a culture built on coercion and extortion not on human rights and cooperation. A corporation is not a system built on cooperation it might look like that on the surface it's really built on coercion and bribes.. If a boss says you don't like it leave when you cannot survive without being under some corporations rule some self declared master controlling than you are not free,you are a slave.

This belief system empire has made us all real life slaves to a few masters of money games and we do not change this system because we believe there is no other way to exist together,the colonialists killed off or assimilated all the indigenous examples of alternative cultures.. and we refuse to trust each other because we are stuck in beliefs and group fantasies ewe call 'reality; playing the fantasy of dog eat dog and obey your leader,and work work,at the expense of life itself is making us all go off the deep end...

Belief and mass fantasies is the only thing keeping our culture so sick and conflicted.And we are destroying a planet that could have provided for all if we took control of ourselves reasoned with each other made human rights,equality,respect of our home, freedom and cooperation our values. Instead of winner takes all,beat the competition and the puritan work ethic,be fruitful and multiply beyond the carrying capacity of the land, obey your leader and serve him cheap,making profit off another's hunger is OK,war is good for you because it brings jobs ...those kinds of sociopath 'values' are killing us and our planet.

[undergroundpanther]

22. In other words...

[Triana]

30. ugotit undergroundpanther...

...well said and very true. WTF would we eat if we couldn't go to a big supermarket and buy it? What happens when/if they shut down or get shut down? What then?

We're helpless little creatures dependent on national and multinational corporations for every crumb we get. Can't even feed ourselves without having to depend on 'big brother' to bring it. Puh.

[SonofMass]

54. Oh Lord, kumbaya ...

[Horse with no Name]

23. My first job was in a local grocery store

And the manager/owner was a true blue asshole.
His mom was co-owner of the store and came in to cash a check one day and he refused to cash it.
She walked behind the register and opened it herself, took her money and left.
One time, I was cutting the black stuff off of the bananas and the razor blade slipped and I cut my finger across the knuckle.
He made me clock out while I bled,lol.
I was 16 and I just clocked out and went home. I never went back.:shrug:

[BlueIris]

35. He did that to his mom?!

Yikes.

[undergroundpanther]

27. here are some resources about workplace bullies

http://www.successunlimited.co.uk/seminars/index.htm

[BlueIris]

32. Hey, thanks!

Good site. That was a great contribution.

[raccoon]

118. google "workplace bullying"

also, to find resources about the subject.

But the one you posted is probably the best.

[expatriate]

31. My ex-husband was in a horrific auto accident one morning

on his way to work - ran his Yugo head-on into a tractor trailer truck. He had very grave injuries. I left work and went to the hospital where he was, and immediately called his workplace to explain the situation so they would know he would not be at work for a long time. I even detailed the injuries we knew about (shattered left leg, bruised heart, massive facial fractures) and let them know that he would need surgery, extensive rehabilitation and that at the moment, his life was in danger.

Only a few minutes after I got off the phone, his boss called the ER desk back to make sure that he really was in the ER being treated for injuries.

The nurse on the desk just handed the phone to me. By the time I was finished tearing that jackass a new butthole, he probably wanted to go to the ER himself.

During the four weeks the ex was in the hospital, only a few miles from his workplace, not one word was heard from his employer. No card, no flowers, no phone call. Nada.

But once he was home, they called constantly throughout his rehab, demanding to know when he would be back at work. He had to keep explaining that he was in a wheelchair, that he'd had deep vein thrombosis, that he needed further rehab. They hectored and harried him about getting back to work. They demanded constant notes from his doctors asserting that he was completely disabled.

Then, when he finally went back on the job too soon, and had trouble standing for an entire shift, they fired him. Said they didn't need a cripple on the job.

I wanted him to fight them, but he just couldn't face it. I really couldn't blame him - he'd been through a horrendous trauma, and to try to fight these bastards was more than he could do.

It was one of those wonderful fast food companies that hire you for salary and then work you about 120 hours a week.

[Mizmoon]

37. How is he doing now?

Poor thing!

[expatriate]

157. Sorry, didn't catch your reply

As far as I know, he's doing okay (he's my ex, I've had no contact with him in some years now). He had a Brooker Wells nail installed to hold his thighbone together - it's a metal rod that rests in the marrow channel of the femur. He was a big strong guy, and his recovery was eventually close to complete. He got a little nuttier after the head injury though. Increased certain behavioral things about him that made him my ex!

[maveric]

173. They actually said ,"didn't need a cripple on the job."? Thats cold!

You should talk to a lawyer.

[expatriate]

179. This was in 1989. Too late for a lawyer

The Mister didn't want to pursue the matter. He should have, but considering the trauma he'd been through, he didn't have the stomach for it. It was easier for him to go get another job. He always did want to take the easiest way out of things!

That's why I haven't been in touch with him for seven years now.

Thanks for the concern. It was horrific treatment from an employer, and it was very typical of the attitude in fast food management at that time - and probably is now. The overall theory seemed to be that there were always plenty more people willing to take the job if you didn't want it. The workplace abuses and overwork were terrible.

[slackmaster]

42. Engineer the firing of a brilliant programmer who has a disabled child

I intercepted some email traffic in which bosses literally conspired to set the man, who was in his early 50s, up for failure by promoting him to "manager" then giving him impossible objectives. After 21 years of glowing performance reviews, suddenly the man was faced with loss of his job and all his benefits (including the most important one - Health insurance for his family). He was given 6 months of "job search" and his "position was terminated".

I printed out several of the emails for the man so he could give them to his attorney. It was amazing how naive the bosses were. Conversations that should have happened in privacy with no written record were done via Lotus Notes, which at the time had basically no security (especially from system admins).

Bottom line - the guy ended up collecting 18 months of full pay of severence as a settlement thanks to my actions. What I did was a violation of the trust the company had put in me with regards to confidentiality and information security, but it was the right thing to do.

[Mizmoon]

46. good for you

justice doesn't happen by itself.

[BlueIris]

59. Yes, good that you did that.

Jesus Christ. I'm not sure what's worse--their actions, or their stupidity.

[Ignis]

139. Righteous.

White fucking hat, baby! ;)

[dogday]

43. They do this at my child's school-If you don't go at the desginated

times, you don't go.... I don't like it.

[lonestarnot]

60. If the kid ever urinates or defacates in his/her pants I hope you're on

the case bigtime!

[Tracer]

45. The VP at my previous company was a psychotic control freak.

His management method was throwing apopleptic screaming fits at employees until they broke down crying (men included!)

When in a "good mood", he'd talk to female employees while fingering their hair.

One day, while talking to me in his "good mood", he started to poke me in the stomach with a pencil that he was holding. I backed up with a shocked look on my face and he suddenly woke up to what he was doing.

While screaming at people, he'd clamp his hands down on employees shoulders so they couldnt get away. One day, he tried this tactic with me and I flipped his arms off my shoulders and angrily said "Don't you do that!". He stalked away, but never did it to me again.

[lonestarnot]

62. Employer not allowed to touch employees!

[Touchdown]

67. We call those SEAGULL managers.

They fly in, make a lot of noise, shit on everything, and fly out.

[Touchdown]

47. An SSG...who did this to me in Basic.

I had to piss. It was one of those times where we were hurrying up and waiting (the Army does that a lot). So I went off to some bushes, unbuttoned and let it go. It was the DESERT in New Mexico for Christ's sake! This sorry-ass saw me pissing in "his" desert (once they get the big head with a rank, they all take possession of shit, even though it's taxpayer property. The Army sucks!).

He made me take my little shovel (entrenching tool), scoop up the wet sand, and load my rucksack with it...on top of my clothes. He told me to tell my Drill SGT what I did. So SFC Haynes (my DS) heard me out, looked shocked and went off to find the guy. I didn't see what happened, but Haynes was a real mean MOFO, so I could only imagine. I didn't see the guy for the rest of the field trip, so something happened.

[lonestarnot]

66. EWWWWW! I hated those days...I told one to fuck off and was nearly

court martialed (sp?)!

[BlueIris]

68. Yikers. Just out of curiosity, how long ago did you finish Basic?

Did this happen within the last five years?

[Touchdown]

85. Nah'. 1984.

I've been out since before Desert Storm.

[BlueIris]

94. Yeah, that's what I thought; I mean, I'm sure Basic now is no picnic,

but the stories I've heard from people who trained before about 2000 or so are soooo much harsher than people I've met who've just recently completed BT and other training.

[converted_democrat]

48. I was working as a waitress in college, and

the restaurant owner got mad at another waitress because she would accidentally get the trash bin and the food scrap bin confused when she was in a hurry. He took her by the ponytail and put her face in each repeating which one was which over and over again.

[bleedingheart]

69. My boss asked me what I was going to do about my sick child

he had been hospitalized for over a week for breathing problems and I had the vacation time...so I used it to be with my baby.

She confronted me about it ...almost implying I should either quit or give him up for adoption...I stood my ground...searched for a bit and found a great new job.

[BlueIris]

78. "Quit or give him up for adoption"?

AAAAUUUGGGHHH! That is insane!

[DoctorMyEyes]

72. Hard to choose - I have a couple...

Rotten boss #1

About 5 minutes before my shift ended my boss took a call from my hysterical babysitter, informing her that my third-grader had been hit by a car on his way home from school. (THANKFULLY, he was only scared and bruised! But, we didn't know it at the time) My boss relayed the message, saying I could go right away (duh!) and docked my pay for 15 minutes - because payroll is done in 15 minute increments!

One day as we were all leaving work a co-worker was struck and killed, right in front of about a dozen employees, including her best friend. When the coroner arrived at the scene he asked all of us to return to our plant and wait for him to finish up at the scene, and that he wanted to interview each of us. While we waited in the lounge someone made a pot of coffee. I don't know who, we were all just so numb from shock and quite somber - but the same boss from the first story came into the lounge and had a shit fit about someone making coffee after hours, and was it really necessary!?!?

Oh, and she also deducted the cost of a work smock from the dead woman's best friends paycheck. Lillian had still been wearing her lab coat style smock when her friend was killed and she took it off to cover Gloria's smashed body. The coroners office didn't return it, I guess...

Bad boss #2 - was in his fifties and employed his older brother (in his 70's with a bad hip) in a crappy low wage position. The brother in his 70's needed to work to support their 100 year old father, in a nursing home. The younger brother who was the boss and owner paid nothing for his fathers upkeep and was filthy rotten ostentatious rich. When the father finally passed away he didn't want to pay his brother the three days bereavement (even though it was less than the price on one of his lunches) and spent a whole day ranting about the unfairness of the state of New Jersey - FORCING him to pay bereavement!

The same boss - I was cutting payroll checks one day and he asked to see one of the mechanics checks. This mechanic had been with the company for years (ever since graduating high school) and his dad had worked for the company for years before that, so he was a "second generation" employee. Well, there was a sick day on the check, and the boss questioned whether or not he actually been sick on that date. The boss knew that the mechanic's wife had delivered their first child early that morning, after a full night of labor. He made me redo the paycheck, deducting the eight hour sick pay because - and I quote "He wasn't sick. We don't pay baby days."

I remember asking - do you think people are going to take advantage of "baby days"?!? That if one guy gets a "baby day", we'll all start having babies to get a free day off?

[Bunny]

88. I have read this whole thread, and I think you win.

Those are two awful bosses. Wow. Getting pissy over a pot of coffee and a lab smock? That's practically inhuman.

[dbt]

73. Saw a radio station manager chase the chief engineer

out of the building with a chair. Even for an industry crawling with psychos, this was a bit much.

:evilgrin:

BTW, there are two people in any station with whom you do not fuck, because they can take you down anytime they want to. The other one is the Business Manager.

[otohara]

119. Was it Randy Michaels?

My boss at radio station asked me over and over to get him coffee, water, soda - I walk w/ a brace and cane, he did not.

Business Manager was a real bitch and once said to me "Why don't you go on disability"? and "It's not my fault you had polio".

[dbt]

125. Nah. I've never been that high up in the Food Chain.

That B.M. of yours MUST have been a bitch to go that low! Most of 'em that I've come in contact with are Real Humans.

:hi: to a Radio Sister!

[Catma]

74. not so much abusive

as insulting. I worked at a movie theater for my first job and was part of the usher staff(cleaning theaters and helping people get to their theaters) and I had several managers which always varied from shift to shift. The theater hired this new manager(apparently a former teacher) and he begun working. I told him my name 5 or 6 times and he still got it wrong. My name is Greg he called me Tim, unfortunately I am a scrawny white kid and Tim was a built African American college student. No one figured this one out. Then he started picking on the girls of the usher staff, over all treating them like crap, telling them they couldn't do certain things because it wasn't in their "job" description. I moved departments shortly after that and never dealt with him again thank god.

[livetohike]

75. I had a manager watch a worker writhing around in pain on the floor

and would not call an ambulance because "he was a temporary worker - not one of "ours". I was the immediate supervisor and called an ambulance and got written up for insubordination.

The company is still in existance and there are many other stories I could tell, but this is one of the worst.

[elehhhhna]

80. On the morning of 9/11, in a building that housed the local Israeli

Counsulate (in TX),. the FBI told our Sr. management (and all tenants) to evacuate the bldg, ASAP.

Sr.Management neglected to tell us.

Being the only Manager on the floor, I was quite surprised when the maint. man came up & said "We told everyone to get out an hour ago!"

I called Sr. Mgmt. They said "Those guys just want a day off." I said "I'm sending them all home now. Goodbye."

They never mentioned it again.

Took me 2 weeks to really process that & then I quit immediately.

Their company is now failing. BOO YA!

[BlueIris]

82. Oh. My. God. That is insane.

Good for you for getting out because--ACK. That is...way beyond.

[elehhhhna]

84. Thank you. No way I'd have the deaths of all those people (about 15)

on MY hands.

[TalkingDog]

83. Library director told his staff he could get trained monkeys...

to do their jobs.

He was an all around evil bastard.

I got him fired.
(not sure how it affected my karma, but I'm still glad I did it.)


I also had the: ask permission to go the bathroom control freak manager.

I would stand at my station, legs crossed, hand stuffed in crotch, the other arm waving in the air until he came over...which could sometimes take a few minutes. Meanwhile other folks on the floor would stop and watch me and giggle because they knew I was, pardon the pun, taking the piss out of him.

When he would get to me, I'd tilt my head and say in my sweetest little girl voice: "May I go pee-pee?"

After he figured out it was hurting productivity more for me to stand there for 7-10 minutes doing nothing than taking 3-5 minutes to run to the head, he dropped the whole thing.

God they can be such jerks!

[elehhhhna]

87. I wasn't Promo'd to President of my division because

"Well, you were PREGNANT!"

I was told this at my exit interview, by a WOMAN!, after I'd secured a better job. The fact that it was my second child & hubby was already a stay at home Dad to our 2 year old apparently didn't factor in. Did they think I ws going to just quit and go on welfare?

Dang,. I LOVED that job & that company before it was sold to the above ref'd idiots. They've crashed it, BTW.

[raccoon]

116. Seem to me there are lots of library directors

who are bullies and/or psychos---but then, I guess that's true of any profession/job.

I'm glad you got him fired.

[StayOutTheBushes]

122. You must be tactful when speaking truth to power.

[StayOutTheBushes]

92. I had an employer ask me if I wanted to play the piccillo.

I said, "No".

[moondust]

96. Sign out to go to the bathroom. Steal software.

Sign in when returning. Tee hee.

A major university hospital hacked into some word processing macros I had written at home in my spare time for use at work and they went right on using them after I left by removing their expiration date and time. They even played a phony little game the day I left asking me if I would give them the password (which I refused) when they had obviously been hacking into them for months. Later the hospital attorney wrote me a letter to inform me that they had removed the password protection and were assuming ownership because I had not marked them with a copyright symbol and the year. He had apparently never heard of the 1976 Copyright Act which did away with that requirement.

I'll assume you are not including the military as an employer.

[progressivebydesign]

97. My first employer told me I was too stupid to work.

Said she was surprised that a high school even let me out. She also threw cats that were boarded at her facility into their cages and was a general bitch all the way around. I quit immediately.

[BlueIris]

101. Threw cats?

::whimpers:: Yikes.

[Lone_Wolf]

102. Knowingly had a janitor clean up some old tile that was sitting in the...

Knowingly had a janitor clean up some old tile that was sitting in the company's basement. The tile probably contained asbestos and the janitor picked it up without any personal protective equipment.

[BlueIris]

105. Ladies and gents, we may have a new leader.

That's right up there with the most shocking of them (not telling employees of F.B.I. order to leave their workplace ON SEPTEMBER 11, 2001, "we don't pay baby days," attempted rape and throwing cats). HOLY SHIT. As someone who has lost an immediate family member to advanced asbestosis--that's unacceptable.

[saltpoint]

103. I witnessed a former Cabinet member of the federal government --

-- who was enroute to a holiday celebration in a large eastern city STEAL a cheese plate from the staff lounge, presumably because he was too lazy to order one on his own.

It goes without saying that this person was a Republican.

[Mizmoon]

114. But but but ...

he's MUCh more important than everyone else, dammit

:P

[saltpoint]

167. : )

[LibDemAlways]

104. This one didn't affect me personally but

it sure pissed a lot of people off. Last year a first grade teacher at my daughter's elementary school went on maternity leave and was replaced mid-year by a longterm sub. The kids warmed up to the substitute right away and all was going well until the principal decided she wasn't a "team player" and fired her two weeks before the end of the school year. It was the manner of the firing that was abusive - and not just to the teacher but to an entire class of small children. In the middle of the school day the principal sent the class to the library, called the teacher in, and fired her on the spot. Told her to take down her bulletin boards, remove her belongings, and leave. Which she did. The kids were then brought back into the classroom and the principal told them the teacher had left because the class was bad and she didn't want to teach them anymore!

Talk about a power hungry whack-o. Parents complained bitterly to the school board and superintendent, but to no avail. The brass in this district all protect each other's backsides.

[BlueIris]

108. Disgusting. Another reason I'm glad I'm not a parent.

I don't even know WHAT I would do if that happened at my non-existant kid's school.

[tblue37]

107. My 59-yr-old sister, a nurse,

was just fired for taking "too much time off" because she had pneumonia!

Which state? Texas, of course.

[Serial Mom]

154. makes sense when there is a shortage of nurses!

Duh!

:wtf:

[bunny planet]

109. An ex employer of mine used to chuck large heavy objects at his employees

heads when he was having a hissy fit. We did a lot of ducking.

[undergroundpanther]

111. A vote for greatest page and Kick

Kick!

[BlueIris]

115. Kick.

[elehhhhna]

112. I saw an owner throw a huge glass ashtray at a salesman's head once,

[bunny planet]

129. probably the same guy I'm talking about.

[elehhhhna]

133. Was it Chuck the 5 foot tall bleach blonde fake ex-Marine?

[bicentennial_baby]

128. Mine too!

I was the shipping manager at a steel stamp factory, and my nutcase, ex-military boss would chuck whopping hunks of steel at people, especially during company meetings. Last I heard, he was in court-ordered anger management classes...

[Blue Diadem]

121. One boss I had mocked the disabled people

One woman had CP. She was a mom, grand mom and was from Germany still had a heavy accent. She could drive. The boss and a few others, referred to her as retarded. I explained Cerebral Palsy to them my first week there. I become aware of what else was going on when I saw the boss/plant manager bragging about what he had done. He laughed, twirled and jerked around in a circle, saying he'd set the machine really fast just to watch her "do her dance" as he called it. I told him he was an awful person and what he did wasn't funny.

Later he refused to authorize a special curved cutting blade for her to do hand trimming. Then, when she sliced her finger and had to go to the ER, he got angry. Within a few weeks, she was "laid off".

My immediate supervisor told me the plant manager wouldn't allow one brain damaged young man to go to the bathroom. The guy pooped his pants and ended up getting teased.

AND..this boss has a disabled child. It didn't surprise us when his wife finally booted his ass out. He was abusive to the rest of us too, throwing things, slamming things, screaming and hollering. We were scared of him. He slept at the plant after his family troubles and he claimed he kept a gun there. After his family split, it became a regular occurrence to open our lunchroom fridge and find alcohol.

I did have the pleasure of telling him exactly what I thought of him when I quit.

[Godhumor]

123. Personal experiences

I've actually been around DU for a very long time--since the first Conservative Idiot list--but I rarely post. Anyway, this thread has brought me out of my undisclosed location.

I can not compete with any of these stories, and I am glad I don't have to. However, there have been times that have left me jaded and bitter.

I worked on the JET Program--a, well, program that brought native English speakers to work in Japanese schools. Now, many people have a thoroughly enjoyable time, but there are some who ended up in horrible conditions. I fell somewhere in the middle.

3 months after beginning work, an anonymous letter arrived at the superintendent's office accusing me of being a bad example for the students and was horrendous to work with. Furthermore, it questioned my moral responsibility since I pulled a few "Tokyo all-nighters" on the weekends and accused me of always being seen with Japanese women (In actuality it was one woman, my future wife.). My reaction to this letter was that the author couldn't be bothered to identify him or herself then I shouldn't have to answer to points made about my private life. Of course, I got in trouble anyway.

The second incident happened at the school that I suspect the letter came from. The school was having an eight-hour outdoors practice session for the dodge ball tournament. I have a severe problem with sunburn and was trying to watch the practice through a window or from the porch. In the end, the vice principal attempted to escort me outside, but I flat out refused to go.

Nothing was said of this incident until the festival that weekend. I was competing in the teacher & PTA vs. students tug-o-war after officiating the discus throw and running in the relay. An overzealous parent swung the very heavy rope sideways directly into my torso, cracking my floating rib. Needless to say, while I was rolling around on the ground, my supervisor walked over to have a "talk" with me about listening to the vice-principal. I was at the hospital one hour later and refused to sign my renewal contract soon after.

However, nothing I said compares to what happened to one of my friends. While in Japan his father became terminally ill and was fading rapidly. My friend's supervisor refused to let him go home and actually read him the part of his contract saying he could go home for a week AFTER his father died and that was all. My friend, of course, went home and, the day after his father died, was sent a notice that the supervisor was suing to recover initial travel and training costs. That was pure heartlessness.

[Cleita]

124. When I was a long distance operator, the supervisors were

pretty abusive by today's standards, but what they did was company policy, so evidently it was legal.

The worst thing that happened to me, at another job, was when my supervisor, an old bat, ready for retirement, grabbed my hands while I was trying to do payroll on the then new PC computer in the office, when I asked her a question about something I wasn't sure about. Only she and I knew how to do it. On this program you couldn't make an error because you had to reverse the whole thing and start over.

This was the early eighties. Since this was the master journal I was on reconciling the whole thing, when she ran my hands over the keyboard, it made sixteen separate payrolls void because I had to void all the checks and reverse everything entry by entry, making the payroll a day late and a lot of angry workers waiting to be paid.

When the boss called me on the carpet about it. I told him what she had done. She lied and said I was lying. I think though that the boss secretly believed me so he told me to be more careful in the future and to try to get along better with Adele because of her age.

So I guess this abuse was legal too.

[MountainLaurel]

127. Editorial manager at a government contractor

1: Once noted in an e-mail to her henchpeople that a staff person needed to be terminated for being "pigmentally challenged" a.k.a., not Causasian. And accidentally cc'd the message to the person being fired.

2: Regularly saved performance reviews on the public drive, so that everyone could see who was being reprimanded for what.

3: Used to confuse the two African-American editors in an office of 30 and call one by the other's name: One was tall, thin, and dark-complected; the other was petite, latte, and at the time was 8 months pregnant. When called on it by one of the women, responded "Who cares."

And of course, now she's a VP of the company.

:grr:

[losdiablosgato]

130. I had to help train the Koreans who were taking my job.

It was being outsourced to Korea and they brought over the suporvisors to train. I was luck and found a new position before the ax fell.

[BlueIris]

168. After I was abruptly told my contract wasn't getting renewed (1 week

before my agreed-to term of employment was to conclude) I had to train my replacement. Who was willing to work for a whole $3,000 less per year than I was and had half my qualifications (if that). Total nightmare. I wasn't surprised when my former boss called me in a panic the next month, "this isn't done! these things are missing! those sheets don't balance!" Amazingly, he's still in business two years later. Don't really know how, the person who replaced me was unbelievably not cut out for that job, in addition to striking me as less-than-brilliant. It sucked. I'd never been that screwed over in an employment situation.

[losdiablosgato]

182. Get used to it

As more and more employers go to a contract work force we have become nothing more then commodities to be trades. That is why they now call it the human resources dept., we all have become just another resource for the corps and the government to exploit.

[catzies]

132. Try to fire pregnant women. More than once.

Don't wanna talk about it. :mad:

[LizW]

150. When I was pregnant with my first child

I had a woman boss who had a reputation for being sort of nuts. She would use our other boss as a threat against us and had all the women terrified of getting pregnant. I had to go throw up one day during a meeting and she guessed that I was pregnant. She called me in and went into this long rambling thing about how I should keep it a secret because the other boss would freak out and fire me if he knew I was pregnant, and I might have a miscarriage anyway and then I would have thrown my job away for nothing.

It was bizarre and I wish I had a tape recording of it.

[yurbud]

134. In Hollywood: "Fetch my tampons"

I went through boot camp and found the military infinitely more tolerable than Hollywood or even most offices. At least the military has clearcut rules on roles and the kind of abuse you can be given.

In Hollywood there are none, because if you complain, they will just say "fine. There's a hundred other people dying to take your job."

I worked for a female producer, and she called me on a Saturday night when I was still working in the office, and told me she left her tampons in a bag under the desk and I had to bring them to her apartment, but only give the bag to the doorman, NOT come up to her door.

I would get in trouble for not answering the phone while I was going to the bathroom too.

I couldn't stay in the field because you're supposed to take all that with a smile, so you learn to be a good phony when you become powerful yourself.

[tinrobot]

135. In Hollywood: Boss got my assistant pregnant, then tried firing her.

... but only after she had the abortion.

No, I'm not telling the name, but you'd know it.

Oh, and I saved her job, only to get fired myself a few months later. I was very relieved to be out of that contract, thank god for pay or play.

Why she continued to stay there, I have no idea. She could have walked away with a very fat check if she had chosen to go after them.

[yurbud]

136. In Hollywood, can you sue boss and get another job if you aren't talent?

[tinrobot]

137. I sure did...

The same boss terminated my contract early when he fired me. I got a lawyer, he made some noise about a suit and they settled. I wasn't talent at that particular place, but I was above the line.

I went on to another job at a slightly higher level with someone else and many years later, I'm still working. After that, I simply refused to work for assholes, and I've still done just fine. There are niches of niceness here.

The woman was a PA, and quite honestly, it would have been better if she had sued. She stayed on at that place for years after and it was hell for her. On top of that, it just made that creep of a boss even more of an asshhole.

[yurbud]

138. that's good to know.

[losdiablosgato]

142. I had on job where there was a control freek

He would literally tell you where to sit in the lunch room. He went off on me once and I just left. I sent an email resigning effective immeditately and walked out. FYI I was the systems admin, and had the only admin login.}(

[unblock]

140. mrs. unblock isn't allowed to go to the bathroom except on official breaks

and, yes, she's a csr/licensed insurance rep. the joys of working the phones.

her breaks are also limited to 5 minutes, which is barely enough time to get to the bathroom and back.

all perfectly legal.

[smiley_glad_hands]

141. My wife overheard her boss

say that he wished all liberals were drowned at birth.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

143. Some not so fond memories of marine boot camp.

It was in the summer of 1961. These are true incidents that I witnessed as a recruit at MCRD San Diego:

Two DIs entered the Quonset Hut. All the boots were standing at attention by their bunks. One DI, walked down the line and slugged each boot in the solar plexus (the favorite spot) which immediately felled them. The reason? To "prove" he wasn't prejudiced.

Two boots, both fair haired, didn't shave because they had nothing to shave except peach fuzz. The DI put buckets over their heads and had them shave each other with double edged razors. Lots of blood was the result.

A boot received a 2lb package of fig newtons from his sister. He was forced to eat them all and drink a canteen of warm water. Then, they had him get his footlocker, lay on his back and do "push ups" with it while on DI helped by periodically stepping on his stomach.

At the rifle range one kid flinched when he pulled the trigger resulting in "unqualified" scores. The DI's beat him with rifle butts resulting in bruises all over his body. For reasons too long to relate, this was reported and one of the DI's was reassigned.

One recruit, (who was in the bunk below mine), woke me and told me that he had a bug crawling around inside his ear. I thought he was nuts, but he persisted. I told him to report it to the DI's. He was terrified of doing so, but finally did. When he did, they beat the hell out of him and sent him back. The next morning they allowed him to go to sick bay. The June-Bug (which was still alive)that had enlodged itself inside his ear was removed surgically.

There were many more incidents just as bad.

Some of the methods used by the DI's were the very same as used at Guantanamo. The "sitting position" against a wall that was cited by Amnesty International was common. As were the "Korean Thinking Position" in which you clasp your hands behind you head and assume a "push up" position on your elbows and toes. Or, try holding an M1 rifle (9.8lbs) on the backs of your hands that are stretched out in front of you. First to collapse from the Sitting, Korean Thinking, or drop the rifle, gets a trip to the Duty Hut for a beating.

Oddly enough, the worst, for me at least, was when they would call us to attention and just walk away to leave us broil in the sun. When enough boots had fainted, or enough had been spied moving and received their beatings, they would march us off. Try it sometime. Stand absolutely rigid, eyes front, for two hours, weighed down with two canteens of water that you can't touch, a helmet, a pack, cartridge belt, in stiff boots, occasionally visited by a sadist who will "deck" you at random for no reason while you stand helpless.

Abuse? Naaaaahhh. They were "building men" as the advertising says.

[arikara]

146. My child was in the hospital in a coma

She had been in a car crash and had been air lifted to a hospital 700 miles from home; and I was with her. I'd just been hired on a contract to teach some courses at our local hospital by the director of nursing. She tracked me down by phone in the hospital at my unconscious daughter's bedside and fully expected me to fly home to teach a 4 hr CPR course.

[Lannes]

148. So many but here is a few.

Try to fix my schedule so I would work overtime regularly but not get paid for it.
Try to deny me health insurance although I qualified.

Left me to handle a major crisis at my job while he stayed at home and while I handled it and saved the company thousands he badgered me about not filing out a laundry slip to have some clothes dry cleaned.The list goes on.

[lateo]

149. Fire someone after a major surgery.

I saw this twice at my last employer. Once for a kidney transplant and another after open heart.

I left shortly afterwards myself.

[Danmel]

151. I had a boss who screamed at a secretary for having a miscarriage

She was almost 18 weeks and she miscarried. She lost a lot of blood and was out for about a week. When she came back, she still was quite weak( and very depressed- as you might imagine). So the boss was in court (this was a law firm- I was a VERY junior associate) and Millie looked like she was gonna pass out. I asked her if she was OK and she told me she felt dizzy and weak. I gave her $20 and told her to take a cab to the doctor's office and to call me when she got home,e. She was scared to leave- she was afraid she'd get fired (she also had a three year old at home) I was single at the time. I told her that I would take responsibility for her and sent her home. (Which of course I had NO authority to do)

The next day the boss was all over me. I told her that Millie was going to pass out and that she had to go to the hospital. The boss cursed at me . So I went into my office and closed the York (which we were NOT ALLOWED TO DO). I picked up the New York Law Journal- called every ad that had a phone number for interviews (this was in the mid 80s- no email) set up an interview for the next day, got an offer on the spot and gave notice the day after that.

Millie kept her job.

[noamnety]

155. two things come to mind

1. Having the male boss track me down in the women's restroom (where the stall doors wouldn't even latch closed because of the foundation settling) to yell at me. "What the hell, do you SEE me here on the toilet?!"

2. (Same boss) When we were ordered to have asbestos removal in our building, he forced us to work shifts in the building during the removal, even though the asbestos guys said we weren't allowed in because we weren't certified and didn't have protective gear. His answer was that we had classified stuff in the building, so the asbestos folks couldn't be in there without us.

No consequences for him either time. He was an LTC in the Army.

[preciousdove]

158. Transport Clearings 1971

Refused to pass the message from a babysitter to a mother that her 7 month old was running a high fever. Mother was a sorting clerk. Child may have gotten brain damage. Woman quit the next day.

The firm was later charged by the ICC with helping trucking companies in some kind of a scam for billing. I accidently blew it open by sending a copy of a list of bill handling rules to a relative who was working in the billing office of a trucking company and was continuely being repremanded and passed over for raises by doing things "wrong" but never able to get in writing instructions about submissions.

Young and naive. I really didn't know any better. I thought people were supposed to want to do their jobs right and would be rewarded for it. Paragraph 1 is why I never felt quilty about it.

[Lisa]

159. call an unscheduled staff meeting at the top of a flight of stairs ...

... in full sight of my co-worker, who was confined to a wheelchair. Everyone knew that this was being done to exclude her, because the supervisor told everyone "come here" -- looked over at my colleague -- then marched up that flight of stairs with almost everyone else trailing obediently behind. Two other people shrugged apologetically and followed them. I stayed down there -- I'd almost decided I was going to quit anyway, for unrelated reasons -- but my colleague nudged me and said, "Go on up ... I'd really like to know what she's planning!"

The second-nastiest thing I've experienced was when a department head (who had convinced almost everyone that he was Mr. Nice Guy) called me into his office and started accusing me of being out to get him, slandering him, and that I wasn't going to get away with it because he'd get me fired and ensure that I'd have to leave town. The filthy, abusive language that came out of him! I was astonished, because he'd always been pleasant to me until then. He said, "Don't act innocent. You know very well what I mean. What you said in that meeting with the ombudsperson on Friday." I reminded him that I had been out of the country for almost two weeks, and had only just gotten back that morning. He was shocked, then frightened ... I think what scared me most was watching the realization cross his face that a) he'd mistaken me for someone else, b) he'd lost control of himself, c) I was now in a position to get him into serious trouble -- and d) I was now a threat to him. I really watched my step for years after, because I wanted to avoid the possibility that he'd try to get rid of me on some pretext ... and I knew that he'd have to really trump something up if he wanted to destroy my credibility enough to do this. By the way, he's since been promoted. I assume that he's decided he's now so high up that he doesn't have to worry about me. (I did take the precaution of telling two respected long-time staff about what happened, just so I would have some support.)

I've been in a supervisory position myself since then, and I'm a total pushover -- let people take off early if they have family stuff or illness, end up working longer than they do during the crunch times -- anything to avoid coming across like that guy did.

[conflictgirl]

160. Oh, that's an easy one to answer

My husband works in a call center, and he got written up when he took a half day off work to be with me during a scheduled C-section. He asked for the time a month in advance, but was denied because it was in his first 90 days of employment and you're not allowed to miss any time in that period.

He's also been written up because they timed the length of his pauses in conversation with customers and they were a few seconds too long.

People he works with have been fired for leaving work because they had stomach viruses. If you try to call in sick in the morning, there's only a certain (small) number of people allowed to be out that day. Most of the time if you call in, they tell you all the allowable absences have been used by others so you have to go in. Puke on the boss's shoes when you get there, no matter - you'll still get written up if you have to go home.

I wish I was exaggerating.

[elehhhhna]

183. I find that barfing directly on the boss's desk rather persuasive.

[amazona]

162. are you serious? try to force sex with me

And this used to be common, routine. Any woman my age or older who had to work has experienced an employer trying to force sex. We call it rape or sexual harassment now. At the time, I couldn't even sue. :-(

The bathroom begging you describe sounds fairly kinky too but I suppose in theory the person demanding the groveling isn't a pervert. It's highly unlikely but at least it is somewhat possible that the person doesn't get a sick, sexual thrill out of knowing that some poor woman has peed on herself. When the creep is out-and-out trying to stick his rhymes-with-stick in, no way he doesn't know he isn't a rapist sicko.

Work sucks, and having to be at the mercy of others to get money to be allowed to eat sucks. It is inevitable that having such power over people's survival leads to vicious abuses.

[maveric]

164. After my brother died my Ma's boss complained that she took days off for

his wake and funeral. She then terrorized her at the office, in front of her co-workers, about not being "focused" on the job. She would walk by her cubicle, in earshot of everyone else and say things like "OK, he's dead, put it behind you and get your work done right" and "You shouldnt let personal problems like this cloud your on the job abilities".
What a fucking witch! She was a partner at a Law firm and coerced other partners and workers to sign a petition stating that Ma was incompetent and that she is dragging the firm down.
Only ONE partner (a friend of our family), came to bat for Ma, who was eventually "let go".
This woman is a Boston-Brahmin who was raised by and has her kid raised entirely by nannies, and often criticized Ma and other ethnic employees for not being pure.

[Kazak]

165. My ex-employer laid me off the same day I discovered that we were pregnant

and then proceded to withhold my accumulated vacation leave. I thought that was pretty cold.

[jayctravis]

169. Require employees to be fitted for false teeth

when they had been hired and employed for years previously.

[Scout1071]

170. Tell a female co-worker who was about 30 lbs overweight

that she could see Ben & Jerry sitting on her ass. Then, she emailed her a coupon that looked like it was from McDonald's, except that it said "Good for one super sized ass."

[BlueIris]

175. GOD.

Evil much? That one's going to get that employer some wicked instant karmic payback.

[Mythsaje]

172. After reading the thread

I feel pretty lucky right now. I'm sticking with my present job SPECIFICALLY because the supervisor's a real good guy. I'm willing to work for a little less if I can work for someone I like and respect.

A co-worker's daughter committed suicide 7 months ago yesterday. Nov 1st, last year. This on top of having her 10 y.o. son develop a severe gastric virus of some kind that damn near killed him. She's had a rough time of it but our boss has always stood by her. It's a big corp (among the 25th largest in the world) but he runs our plant like it's a small company. There are only six of us in the place these days (downsized from 50+ a year ago).

If we need time off for anything, we get it. If we have vacation coming, he'll let us use vacation for any sick days.

A good boss is good for morale, and good morale is good for productivity. We'll go the extra mile for him simply BECAUSE he looks out for us.

It's amazing so many supervisors don't get this. Petty tyrants.

Remember...Power attracts the corruptible.

[high density]

174. My mom was fired because she was pregnant with me

The thing that pisses me off is that my grandparents are still friendly with the asshole that did that.

Thankfully I've never had a crazy employer experience that is anything like what previous posters have brought up. Most of my issues are simply annoyances or pet peeves in comparison.

[Maine-ah]

178. I used to work at a restaurant owned by a married couple who were

different as night and day. The man, who ran the kitchen, I'd work for him again in a heart beat...his wife...that's a different story.

She had a total power-thirst going on. Scream, yell, throw things completely crazy. She'd take you out of the full dining room, tear you a new one for something that could have waited until the end of the shift, bring you to tears, and put you back out in the dining room. The cooks would have a full board, and instead of waiting for them to catch up, she'd pull 'em off the line and do the same thing to them. The really creepy thing she'd do, is get to know you before she started yelling at you. Become what you would consider a friend, and then use anything personal she found out about you, to her advantage.

Some nights I would go home and just have a complete melt down. When my husband had his melt-down, it was then that we decided to get the hell out. When I gave my notice (more than a month's) I was ignored for a WEEK, got no help at my tables, no bus person, no nothing. She didn't even talk to me.


We'd come into our shift wondering what kind of mood she was in, tip-toeing around ect. Even our customers could feel the tension in that place. My husband and I put up with it for five years, and came out of it feeling literally abused. After we had left that place, we'd see customers from the restaurant around town, and all they could say is "the restaurant is not the same since you left, and we'll never go back".

I'm currently doing some consulting work (on top of my regular job) for a new restaurant in town. They also happen to be neighbors to my former boss. Apparently they have been talking to her about me, and even though she gave a great reference, she also told them somethings about me that I wouldn't want most people to know. I could most certainly sue her for the things she has said, but that's not what I'm about.

Both of us still work together, still in the foodservice industry, but at the other end of it, we work for a foodservice distributor. Another small business, only five of us work there including husband/wife owners. Even though they are both great people, we still are paranoid about making the smallest of mistakes. Luckily, our boss worked at a restaurant where the owner did the same thing to her as what was done to us. But even over ten years later, she still feels just as abused as we do.

A couple of weeks ago, I think it was on CNN, they did a piece on emotional abuse at the work place. This is exactly how my husband and I feel. Some of you may be saying, well you could have quit sooner.... circumstances made this impossible, we were in the process of buying our first home and switching jobs would not have looked good at all to any bank, so we stuck it out.

I have daydreamed about "revenge", never gone through with anything though, but the one thing that tops my list, is to let people know that the reason they lost their last restaurant, was because the profits went up their noses. Unfortunately, I hold too much respect for her husband and would not do this to him.

[LibDemAlways]

186. You'll never know more about the

character of an employer than when you give notice. I once took a job working for a former travel agency client. It was a small operation and it took me about a day to realize the guy was an asshole. I stuck it out for a couple of months but decided it was in the best interest of both of us to move on. When I politely told him I was giving notice, he literally threw me out of the office and told me never to come back. To this day I wonder how he got anyone to work for him.

[noamnety]

188. When I gave notice

my boss (the same one I complained about up above) said I was making a "unilateral decision that affected the entire office" and I should have consulted with him first!

I just sat there with my mouth hanging open.

[DiverDave]

180. While I have taken verbal abuse in my lifetime

someone touches me or moves threateningly towards me is going down.
Oh, and if anyone threw something at my head, you better believe they will be dodging it too.
Fuck bullies, if you stand up to them, they back down.

[elehhhhna]

184. I reported to a jealous cReep w/ a Napoleonic complex who

I sold CIRCLES around (he could not stand it).

One day he came up with a new game--pretend to punch me then pull the punch. Ha ha ha.

I was considering stepping INTO a punch just to get him fired.

Hubs suggested I tell bossy-pants that he (hubs--6 feet of ginormous muscle) would be calling him to discuss this behavior soon. UH OH.
End of fake-punching.

Dope quit when i came back from Mat. leave (he thought I'd stay home with the baby--even though we'd announced that Hubs was going to do so.) Dope figured he'd get all my clients. He left & I was promo'd to his job literally 5 minutes later.

[SmileyBoy]

181. Made me scrub a huge dirty floor on my hands and knees using a rag.

I was 16 and working at a grocery store. My immediate supervisor was an absolute tyrant. But I didn't know it. One day he told me to clean up the produce floor (I thought this was a standard task), and I asked him at the sanitation closet which solution I should use with the mop, and he gave me a rag and a spray bottle and told me to just use the rag. Well, not knowing anything at the time (being completely naive), I just went ahead and did it. I sweated like I never sweat before. I was huffing and puffing, and I probably lost a lot of water weight. It was more intense than any football practice I ever had. I didn't even realise at the time that what had happened to me was wrong. I scrubbed that entire produce section floor (probably at least 1,500 square feet) spic and span and spotless. I then told him I was done, and he didn't say a word. I told my parents about it, just because I thought it was weird, and they were shocked and appalled at such abuse. Only then did I realise that it was abuse. The supervisor got fired only a week later. I had already quit by then.

[OnionPatch]

190. Well, I heard lots of things but

In my own personal experience, the worst thing I witnessed was this: My first job was at a Dairy Queen. The manager actually slapped my hands when I was learning to work the ice cream machines, etc.!! (No, not tapped them, SLAPPED them.) Blew my mind. I was only 16 or I would have turned the guy in or sued him or something. All I did was quit.

Oh, and I forgot this one:
My sister worked at a gas station/mini mart. Every night the manager told her or whoever worked that night that the money was short. He would make them pay the difference, ranging from 20 to 200 bucks!! My sister is a sharp cookie, (she's an accountant now) and she knew she hadn't lost the money. The eventually got arrested for stealing but the employees never got their money back.

[KurtNYC]

191. Either keep us in a burning building or deny earned wages to a dead

employee.

At a ski resort, my check on Christmas week was short. They made me go through the stack of time cards. I got to the time card of a friend who had been killed in a car accident that week and across it is a big red mark and the words "Dead - Do Not Pay" (Isn't that convenient?)

More recently, was working at a wealthy private bank. People were coughing and the fire alarm went off repeatedly over the course of about four hours. They told us it was nothing. Finally when the HVAC shut off for the day around 6PM, the fire which had been smoldering in an electrical closet all day, started to rage. The elevators seized up in between floors. My supervisor says "do we use the fire stairs?" D'uh.

[Coexist]

192. I was rubbed up against by a manager who was standing behind my chair

as I was typing something. I just sat there pretending it wasn't happening (I was young) until I heard the breathing getting heavier, then I turned around and said, "what the hell are you doing".

Of course I was told "nothing" and then treated like I had a dirty mind, and I "misunderstood". It was damn hard to misunderstand someone rubbing their pelvis on the back of your chair and breathing like someone who just got off a treadmill.

Why is it that creeps who hit on you unsuccessfully make it out that YOU are the one misunderstanding their intentions - like you think you are irresistible and they are just being friendly. I hate that. Tell a married jerk to leave you alone and you become a conceited bitch. Sigh.

[LibertyLover]

193. One of my supervisors

At my first legal assistant's job in a well-known boutique NY law firm we had the paralegal supervisor from hell. She was a workaholic with no life outside the firm and expected us to be the same way. She was divorced and although she had kids, never saw them because they were estranged. She had had a disabled daughter who had died about 6 years before I joined the firm and she took great pride in telling us that she never missed a day's work when the girl was sick and even came in after the funeral to handle a filing with the courts. If we failed to work overtime several days a week, we were lectured. One time there was a fire in the building we worked in. You could see the smoke in the corridors, not just smell it. One of the partners who was a fire warden came around and told us to evacuate. Ms. N wouldn't let us because "you know the Mr. X is a joker." It was no joke when the firemen in full turnout gear found us working and ordered us out. Ms. N tried to argue with them and was threatened with arrest if she did not comply. They were so desperate to get us out that they let us take an elevator rather than walk down the 25 stories. Once out of the building Nancy insisted that the legal assistants wait with her so that we could go back to work. The battalion chief happened to be passing by when she said that and he informed her that they were letting nobody back in the building that afternoon and perhaps even the next day. You should have seen her face - she was devastated.

Another time I had worked until 5 am and the partner told me not to come back in until the next day. I left Ms. N a note explaining what had happened and the partner's order. She called my house at 10 am to demand that I come in immediately. Fortunately my mom answered and said that since I had not gotten home until 8 (the cab had broken down on the way home and the car company had to dispatch another one which took ages) she was not awakening me and that Ms. N could speak with the partner if she had any questions. When I went back in the next day, Ms. N. raked me over the coals. I went to the partner and told him and he had a few words with her.

The worst that she ever did to me was to ruin a vacation I had taken my young niece and nephews on by having one of the new paralegals call my hotel a couple of times a day to ask really stupid questions about an assignment I had left her with - questions that Ms. N could have and should have answered. When I returned from vacation, I had had enough. I found a new job in a matter of weeks and on my exit interview explained in just one word why I was leaving - N.

I heard later that the partner whom she worked exclusively with - one of the name partners - retired and the managing partner who couldn't stand Ms. N., told her that she was no longer the paralegal supervisor.

[Neshanic]

194. If I told you, you would not believe it.

Phoenix developers, homophobe firm owners, computer illiterate fundamentalists, archeological site shenanigans, sociopath/narcissism disorder architects, gay porno model landscape designers....

[GregW]

195. My boss picked me up by the front of my shirt and pinned me against a wall

He then screamed in my face, "I guess I should just fucking crucify you over that!" (what I had done). I was 25 and it was my first job in the country as a programmer, jobs were tight, so I had to let it go. This guy was a real manic-depressive asshole. He purposely didn't take any medication so that he could use his manic swings to advantage during sales calls (when he had superhuman abilities) -- the depression cycles were hell for everyone who worked for him. To top it off, he was also a drunk.

Last I heard his third wife 'mysteriously' fell off a cliff north of Santa Cruz.

[noiretextatique]

200. the worst in recent memory

was a little female tyrant i worked for at a well-known retailer here in the bay area. she was the most insulting, condescending, controlling, and DUMB asshole i've had the displeasure of working with recently. i am a contract accountant...senior level. i was given the task of fixing this company's franchise receivables which had gotten screwed up after they fired the person who handled that work. the tyrant was given the job of managing me, even though she hadn't the faintest clue about what needed to be done. i kept asking her for the information i needed to check sales and invoicing, and she kept telling me to call the franchisees and get the information from them...DUH! the last thing any thinking person would want to do is to let the people who are paying lots of money for merchandise, supplies, and royalties know the corporate office is completely clueless about acccounting for their money. anyhoo...i managed to get the job done without any assistance whatsoever from her, in part because other people in the office hated her guts too, and helped me find the INTERNAL information i needed, something she steadfastly refused to do. but she did manage to scrutinize every adjustment i made, and she always weote sticky notes on mu journals telling me to attach backup. i finally told her: those attachments attached to the journals ARE backup, dumbass. she sent me a spreadsheet once to use for invoicing, and when i asked her about a figure in the spreadsheet, in her most ultra-condescending tone, she asked: "do you UNDERSTAND the spreadsheet?" i couldn't do anything but look at her like she was some very annoying alien...and i finally said: "are you asking me if i know how to use excel? you do realize i am an accountant, don't you?" :eyes:
well...obviously, we did not hit it off. i just couldn't stand the sight of her, and of course, that made her even more determined to bug the shit out of me all day long. she's come to my desk a zillion times a day to ask stupid questions or to nitpick about something trivial. i would have to brave myself everytime i heard her very annoying voice.
meanwhile...there is contruction, yes construction, going on in the area where i am working. drills, sawing, hammering, painting...you name it. they were actually tearing down a wall right next to my work station, and when they finished drilling, hammering and sawing for a week, the wall was finally down...and we were outside. yes...there was no wall yet, and this was winter, so there i was freezing my ass off for a week :grr:
after about a month of all of this shit, the tyrant comes to me one after i'd told her i had completed everything she wanted me to do. she says to me that she has a special assignment, just for me. the special assignment: remove checks from a drawer and put them in a box. ok...fine...i can do that, but why all the condescending bs about a special assignment, you annoying little jerk? god i hated that woman. i worked with another manager while i was there and she and i got along fine...she showed me what to do, and i did it....a complex cash/loan analysis. no problems with her.
and even for the tyrant, i did a lot of work that most people there couldn't do, like creating import scripts and uploading their sales info into the accounting system and invoicing directly from there instead of from excel as they had been doing previously. i mean...i did some great work that would save them a lot of time and make their franchisees a lot happier.
the check in a box thing was the last straw...i left that day and never returned. btw, this woman was hated by everyone in the company...not just me...except the boss, of course. why is it that people think condescending little napolenic tyrants are effective managers?
the bottom line to this story...she couldn't get past the fact that i was a black woman and a senior accountant, and neither could her boss.
none of the other senior level people they hired had to put up with the shit from them that i did...the questions about whether i understood spreadsheets, and asking me to put fucking checks in a box, and expecting me to work during construction...outside. the other accountants, all white males, worked in offices...i was the only one who was expected to work outside. they actually tried to stick me at the edge of a table once when they finally moved me from outside, stuck between two other people with about an inch of deskspace. i told her that was not an appropriate workspace for anyone, and certainly not for someone who would be using the computer all day...and certainly not for me, since i had already put up with a horrendous workspace.
while she was just an insufferable bitch to everyone, she was especially condescending to the black employees. and of course she knew how to kiss ass, being filipina woman herself. she's play the helpless female with the white male boss, and he fell for that shit everytime. a real sweat shop that hell hole...with an overseer.

[The Flaming Red Head]

203. RGIS (the inventory company)

Refuses to give breaks even after 6 hours of back breaking work and refuses to let people sit down when doing inventory on the very bottom shelves (for hours at a time) and tries to make you stay in a squat position. Also they refused to give us latters to stand on, on the top shelves preferring that you climb shelves or reach up beyond your ability to reach. The one time I had to sit, a supervisor came by and told me to "get off my fanny" It's not surprising that the crew I worked with inventoried Walmarts in a tri-state area.

[420inTN]

204. My Boss hits me. n/t