We've all had a bad job, bad boss, or bad coworker at least once in our lives. Sometimes they cause us to lose our minds but rarely do they actually make us snap. However, when they do, it's a memorable experience, to say the least. We see it in movies when people quit in a dramatic fashion, but we never hear about it happening in real life.
But it definitely does happen, and it's typically more intense than the scenes in the movies. We wanted to hear the best and most insane "forget this, I quit" moments in restaurants, so we looked throughout Reddit and found the best stories there are. This content was edited for clarity.
The Quitting Story We All Needed To Hear
“Years ago, I worked in a restaurant and it was Christmas time. This place was supposed to function with four waitresses, a busboy, dishwasher, manager, and two cooks.
However, only the manager and I showed up. He did the cooking, I took orders, served, bussed tables washed dishes and so on.
During this, I accidentally dropped two bread plates and they broke. The manager said to me, ‘I’ll have to take those out of your pay.’ I told him that was funny, thinking he was joking. He wasn’t.
I turned around and grabbed a stack of dinner plates, threw them on the floor and said, ‘Take those out of my pay, too,’ and walked out to leave him with the whole mess.”
A Bitter Bartender Stood Between Her And Her Tips
“I worked as a server at a bar during college. The head bartender each day was in charge of assigning tables to the server. There was one bartender who really didn’t like me and every time she worked, she would give me the worst tables so that I wouldn’t make as much in tips. She also did the scheduling. She started only scheduling me for slow times early in the day, like during lunch when we would have 50% off lunch specials. It sucked, but fair enough, she does the scheduling and I needed the money. Well, it just got worse and worse until I was barely making minimum wage even though I was making close to $20 an hour when I started.
One day, during a slow lunch, I was working with a different bartender. When the bartender’s shift ended, the other bartender who did the scheduling came in to take over. I was serving a large table of probably 15 people, probably the best table I had had in a week or so. She saw this and decided to ‘reassign’ tables and work as a server as well as a bartender. She, of course, took my table and said it was now hers, even though I had been serving them for about an hour and they were almost done with their meal. This wasn’t the first time, but it was it the last straw for me. I went up to the table, explained the situation, and instead of just transferring the table, I cashed them out, which they were happy to do. So I collected the cash tip, told the bartender ‘Forget you. I quit,’ and walked out with the tip from the table and never talked to anyone at that bar again.
I found a better job the next day.
It was years ago, but it was worth it. It wasn’t even about the money so much as the principle. Luckily I am in a much better place now.”
“Lessons Learned: It’s All About Money”
“I worked at a family friend’s bar as the kitchen manager. It wasn’t very big and usually, it wasn’t overly packed. They fired two cooks and I was on my sixth week straight with no days off and no paid overtime. I was closing and the kitchen closed a few hours before the bar closed. The kitchen had been closed for over 40 minutes when I heard the printer spit out an order. I went out to the bartender and was like what the heck.
‘Ahhh, he’s a regular and I didn’t think you would mind.’ I was so mad, I went to turn everything on and started his order. After about two minutes of cooking, I’m was thinking what the actual heck am I doing.
I walked straight inside to the manager and simply said: ‘I’m done.’
Him: ‘What do you mean you’re done?’
Me: ‘I’m done.’ I turned around and walked out the back and got in my car. He came running up and asked if I was serious. I said, ‘Yeah, I’m freaking out of here, this isn’t worth it,’ and I drove home.
Six weeks straight, no days off. In my young and naive mind, I was sure they would eventually take care of me since we’d been family friends since my dad was a kid. Nope! Learned a valuable lesson, that when it comes to business, it doesn’t matter who it is; they will take full advantage of you. It’s all about money.”
Thank Goodness She Quit Earlier!
“I had a ‘Forget this. I’m glad I quit.’ I was 14 and worked at a small local bagel shop after school. I was supposed to go into work but I called them and told them that I was quitting. A couple of hours later, during what would have been my shift, the shop got robbed and weapons were involved. They held a weapon to the 17-year-old manager’s head and demanded money from the safe. I didn’t know the combination to the safe so if he did that to me, maybe he would have shot me.
That manager went to my school and it seemed to have traumatized her.”
The Five Minute Freakout
“I was five minutes late and was chewed out because of this, but they were so keen to forget that I filled in for them the previous day because someone quit on the spot. I, too, quit on the spot.
I would often stay an extra hour past my schedule or I would come in on my days off, but apparently, the extra effort was a one-way street. The same place scheduled me on a day I had class; I told them I couldn’t go unless they wanted to pay for the class that day. They told me it was my job, I told them it was their job to write a better schedule. They were always short staffed so I could get away with stuff like this. Needless to say, the restaurant industry can be fun.
I know being late is disrespectful, but constantly requiring me to fill in for their scheduling errors or their consistent lack of staff is also disrespectful. I’m so tired of people seeing respect as a one-way street, where the employer will try to pull stuff over you all over your time, either expecting you to stay later, or cancel your entire day just because they’re disorganized, while an employee can’t be late after covering a shift the previous day. Sure don’t be late, but if you can’t look the other way then I won’t be there when you need me.”
All They Wanted Was A Bit Of Training
“When I was 14, I wanted a summer job with my best friend. We went to the fast food shop at the beachside. It was quite popular since it was the only fast food around. We got there on a Friday afternoon and we meet the owner, a 50-something man with a big belly from probably the fast food he served. He told us we can get there the next morning and people would show us around.
We got there at 9 am like he told us and there was no one. The first employees arrived at 10:30 to open. They had no idea we were supposed to work. They tried to help us the most they could but they were cashiers with no training for the food. Both their ‘cooks’ left that week and the owner was doing all the work.
We finished our first day without any trouble, it was a slow day overall.
Sunday arrived and we were not prepared for the sheer number of customers. We still had about no idea how to cook the food and how the equipment worked. The owner arrived with a bunch of his friends. We were swamped with people but he shoved them around a bit and asked us to do six hot dogs, six fries and six Diet Cokes, fast. We knew it was for him, so we told people to wait and we finished their order.
Not 30 seconds after, the owner came back behind the counter and began to tell us we were terrible at our job and that the fries were not cooked enough and that we messed the condiments on the hot dogs.
Mind you, there were a lot of customers waiting for their food at that point and they were all looking at us getting yelled at by the owner.
I looked at my friend, he looked at me and we both knew what to do. We took our aprons off and told him to forget it. We left him with all the orders right there and then, never went back there. They closed down about two years after.”
All Over Some Chickens
“I worked at a big retail grocery store, in the deli with the rotisserie cooked chickens.
Obviously, in training, they harped about food safe temperatures and all that. If the food was below a certain temperature, we had to take it off and prep it for the frozen stuff. If it was past a LOWER threshold, it was no longer food safe and was garbage. Also, the deli part closed at 9 pm and all food was to be taken out at that point and either cut for the wraps or thrown out.
It was about 15 minutes to 9. I checked the temperatures and all of them were below the threshold, so as per my training, I prepped the ones still safe for pre-wrap and threw out the one that was too cold. Now it was around 8:50 ish and the store manager came by and complained that there weren’t any chickens out. I told him I just finished doing a temp check and they were below the threshold, so I took them off. He asked why there weren’t any made to replace it, even though it’s a 15+ minute cook time, and we CLOSED in 15 minutes.
He threatened to write me up for not having the chickens out. I didn’t show up the next shift.”
That’s The Way The OWNER Behaves Himself?!
“I used to work at a barbecue. The owner was this fat, bald little jerk who went around looking for things to be angry about. He was always yelling at people, belittling them, and complaining about his employees around any friends he conned into visiting him. He kept strong drinks in his office, would openly watch hardcore adult films right there at work, and that’s not even getting into the messed up way he did business.
Near the end of a very busy Friday, which was worse than usual because he’d just run off the one guy who was basically holding the place together himself, the idiot owner was his usual inept self and we were inexplicably busy all week. I went on break, just a 30 minute sit down.
He came back after having scrammed for the dinner rush, not that he would be any help anyway, and appeared in the doorway to the dining area’s enclosed patio. He was standing there trying to look fierce and said in this anger tone, ‘DID YOU MAKE A DROP TODAY?’ We were supposed to periodically take money out of the register and put it in the safe inside the store whose lot we were parked on, but it was so busy I had forgotten to do so.
I said no. He said, ‘WELL, WERE YOU PLANNING ON IT?’ And right then something inside me broke or disappeared or something and I realized I wasn’t going to take any more of his crap.
So I stood up and threw the chair I was sitting on into the table and said, ‘No, I wasn’t planning on doing anything today.’
He walked right up to me and looked up at me and said, ‘If you ever stand up to me like that again-‘
I didn’t let him finish. I got right down in his face and said, ‘I DON’T GIVE A CRAP! FORGET YOU!’ and walked around him and left.
He followed me out into the parking lot saying things like ‘YOU PIECE OF CRAP GET OUT OF HERE! I DON’T EVER WANT TO SEE YOU AGAIN! WHY DON’T YOU CLOCK OUT SO I CAN BEAT SOME SENSE INTO YOU!’ and so on.”
They McQuit Thanks To The Boss AND The Customers
“I used to work at McDonald’s. Opening usually involved me at the front counter with a headset on so I could do drive-through orders and handle making coffee/putting orders together/taking money at the front from the little old people that came in at the crack of dawn every morning. We would also have a manager who was there to be important and one person in the kitchen. We’re a small rural town so usually, this would be fine but we were on a major highway so sometimes it would get busy out of nowhere.
Depending on the manager, the amount of help we had would vary wildly. One morning, we got super busy and I started cracking under the pressure. I’m a fantastic multi-tasker but my drive-through line was backing up since I was trying to juggle them and all the walk-in folks from my front registers and when it gets packed…well, it’s fun. I glance around trying to find my manager for help. I see him on one of our cameras — he’s outside smoking around the side of the building. Mind you, this is like his third trip out to smoke this morning. I’m absolutely dying trying to get caught up. Customers are being passive aggressive, saying they will come behind the counter and get their own coffee and stuff. I have people yelling at me in my headset from the drive-through. I end up having to remove the headset just to try to get the frontline sorted. I start making progress with the front but I basically had to sacrifice the drive-through customers for two minutes.
Apparently, the cars outside started yelling at my manager and interrupted his smoke break so he came in, saw me with my headset off and goes berserk. He said, ‘WHO’S TAKING THE DRIVE-THRU ORDERS?’ I was in the middle of trying to get a fresh pot of coffee going so I sort of auto-responded saying no one and to hang on as I continued to dash around behind our counter to grab a fruit and yogurt parfait for an order. He got in my way and started giving me crap, loudly talking to me like I’m a dog. I pointed to the camera and yell, loud enough to disrupt the entire inside of the restaurant, ‘I’m covering these two registers, first window, second window, and I’m bagging. I’m like FOUR PEOPLE and you’re out behind the building, not doing A THING!’
His eyes went wide. I could tell he knew I was holding on by my last thread. He sighed. He said, ‘You’re in a ton of trouble but we can talk about this later.’ No. Forget him. I was done. I was all riled up from random customers yelling at me.
I tossed him the headset, ‘You want to give me crap for not being able to run four stations with no support? Run five. I’ll watch.’ I removed my name badge.
He went to say something to me. I turned away, facing the one girl working in the kitchen who was watching this all play out. I remembered telling her that I’m so sorry and then I dropped my name badge, toss my hat on the counter, grab a water cup, put on and zipped my jacket so my uniform was covered up. I went to the drinking fountain, filled my water cup, and then I went to sit on the far side of the seating area and watched him go down in flames. He ended up ALSO taking off the headset and picked up the phone so he can spam call the whole workforce one by one, trying to call for help. It was like 5 am, so no one was going to accept a call from their work number. About ten minutes into his struggle, he ended up very loudly pleading with me to come back from behind the counter. I couldn’t even see him on the other side of the sea of people swarming the counter at this point.
I called back, ‘I need a smoke first!’ and I went outside.
I don’t smoke. I’ve never smoked. I drove home.
He ended up losing his job.
People really do treat us like crap. I had a guy come in one time that had just come through the drive-through and I guess the drive-through team had messed up his order but I was front counter and it was lunch rush so I’m not really sure what’s going on in the drive-thru.
He walked up to me, threw his bag down on the table and loudly declared, ‘WRONG.’ I just kind of stared at him, expecting him to say something or produce a receipt give me ANYTHING to go on and when it was clear he didn’t intend to do that, I asked him what he ordered and what was wrong with it.
He went crazy. I said, ‘Dude, I didn’t make your food or take your order. I’m trying to help you. You want your order right. I want your order right. We’re on the same team here.’ I used the team line a lot on irate customers. Usually, that helped. But not that day. The guy told me I’m an idiot and I get paid too much and other things along those lines. My manager came over to intercept him because we were getting rowdy. He almost immediately called her a dumb jerk. We ended up telling him to just leave.
People crap on fast food workers a lot. Honestly, that was the most stressful job I’ve ever had. I’ve worked in hardware, I’ve worked in a garden, I’ve been a landscaper, a wedding photographer, a tour guide, I’ve done ALL kinds of stuff. Stuff that I hated sometimes. But the fast food was the absolute worst as far as the way you get treated and you get paid nothing.
Whenever I see people insist that fast food workers always deserve minimum wage, I think to myself that I’d love to see them hold the front line through ONE busy morning. I’d sooner go back to any other job I’ve ever had than open that place ever again. They could pay me double what I made. Never again.”
The Wage Difference Was Too Much
“I worked at Sonic Drive-In while I was in high school. It was absolutely terrible. Every summer, the AC would go out and it was horrible working in the cramped kitchen in between a 400°F fryer and grill. The cooks in the kitchen made at most $8.50 an hour while the car hops averaged around $18 an hour after tips, there was no tip share. The carhops get tips if you pay with cash and decide to tip them. However, I never do after my experience working there.
At the Sonic I worked at, carhops were paid $6.25 an hour plus tips. This averaged out to around $15-$18 an hour, and I had one car hop tell me on really good days she’d make around $30 an hour. One day in the middle of my shift, I got a call from a friend asking if I wanted to come work with him detailing cars starting at $10 an hour, I asked him if I could start tomorrow and he said yes.
I immediately went to the manager and said forget this, I quit.”
“I Never Looked Back”
“I used to work at IHOP as a server. Our manager was wildly incompetent. She would leave with the manager card (which was the only way to correct an order, refund something, and do things like that). She was spiteful and stupid, a deadly combination.
So I was poor and had a raggedy pair of the non-slip shoes you’re supposed to wear in food service. I also had a pair of Doc Marten work shoes that were slip/oil/electric proof. They were the same color and all. She made a big stink about me not wearing the correct shoes. I explained they were on their last leg, and that even though the docs were technically not regulation, that they fit the criteria. They even said it on the sole. She threatened to fire me over these freaking shoes so I caved and wore the terrible shoes to work.
Saturday night, packed to the gills, there was not a seat in the house. Halfway into my nightmare understaffed shift, as I was carrying an appetizer sampler and a tray of drinks to a table, the sole ripped and I TRIPPED AND SPILLED THE WHOLE FREAKING SAMPLER ON THE TABLE. Ranch. Honey mustard. Marinara. Four Dr. Peppers. All over me and a couple. Face and all.
I freaked out and apologized, explained I’d comp the food and go to find the manager. Guess who went home? With that almighty card you need to void checks or discount them? I also had about five other tables suffering who saw all this happen. I called her, she’s at home. She lived 15 minutes away. I told her not to bother, asked her how she could be so freaking stupid to go home with the card for the 10,000th time, screamed about the dang shoes, and said forget you. I took my tips out of the cash I had, told all my customers their meals were on the house and stripped down to my underwear right there in the parking lot.
I walked to my car and changed my clothes. I never looked back.”
