People do the craziest things, both off and on the job. Restaurants are the sort of place that seem to attract the wackiest of the wackos, so it no wonder why the reasons managers had to fire their workers are so outrageous.
No One Could Figure Out Why The Lobsters Kept Dying
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“All of our lobsters kept dying off and it happened several times. We’re talking several thousands of dollars worth of lobsters gone, and this was even after cleaning the tank a couple of times in case there were some lobster hating germs in there. Turns outs, one of the overnight floor cleaners was staging gladiatorial lobster battles. Unfortunately, he forgot to wash his hands that were covered in floor cleaning chemicals, did not bode well for Spartacus and his armored brethren.”
If You’re Gonna Steal From Customers, At Least Put Some Effort Into It
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“I was managing a restaurant and I noticed a new hire had really good tip averages the day before when I had been paying her out. I did morning cash out where I checked all slips against the information in the computer. The next day, I was going through her slips and noticed a…discrepancy. Namely that she had added a one in front of each tip and changed the total. How could I tell you ask? SHE USED DIFFERENT COLOR INK!
She was fired and we refunded the money, but seriously, at least use the same color ink.”
His Long Weekend Took A Turn When They Ran Out Of Gas
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“I had an 18-year-old server go to Vegas for a long weekend. He had been late a few times before and had been warned that continued tardiness would result in disciplinary action.
So this Einstein was headed back from Vegas with his buddy after they both blew all their money and they realized that they didn’t have enough gas to make it back. He really didn’t want to be late though. There was a multitude of options available to these two fine upstanding citizens, like they could have called and said they were in a jam, they could beg for $20 and see if anyone took pity on them, or they could even steal some gas, but they chose none of these options.
The two of them decided the best option was to take a handgun from their trunk, go into a gas station, hold it up, and demand exactly $20. They then drove one mile down the road to the next gas station where they filled up, paid, and were surrounded by the police as they were attempting to pull back onto the road.
When I first heard what happened, I was sure the story must have been exaggerated or wrong. I knew the kid wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I never dreamed anyone could do something so amazingly idiotic, but he did. It still boggles my mind.”
Sometimes It’s Not Even The Employee’s Fault
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“I was working as an assistant manager of a small, local restaurant chain. We hired a new waitress. She had lots of experience and was really personable, I liked her. She began her first shift and things were going smoothly. She’s tending to her tables and the guests are all happy. She required very little training, as she was pretty much autonomous. Part way into her shift, she began to become uneasy and nervous. She approached the General Manager and asked if she could run home quickly. He told her, ‘No.’ She seemed slightly upset but continued with her tables anyway.
About an hour later, she looked even more upset so I decided to approach her. Since I’m a girl, I figured whatever issue she was having might be easier to say to me instead of our male GM. She began to tell me that she got her period at the start of her shift and had no tampons or pads with her and that she was bleeding through her underwear at this point. I felt awful for her, but I had none of my own to give to her.
I asked the GM if she could leave for five minutes to go across the street to the convenient store to get some pads. He basically said, ‘She just needs to deal with it and continue her shift.’ He had many laughs at her expense throughout the night, telling the other employees about what a ‘baby’ she was and that she was ‘whining.’ I’m not certain, but I’m sure it’s a definite health risk to have a bleeding waitress tending tables and touching food. I had an issue with this, but I didn’t have authority over him.
I asked if I could leave to get her some, to which he again refused. This poor girl started crying. She told him that she was ‘saturated’ down there and really needed to leave, but she wanted to come back to finish her shift. He had a lot of fun mocking her ‘saturated’ plea. Finally, after hours of this poor waitress soaking in her own blood, he decided to let her leave. It was closing time by that point. He made me call her the next day to tell her that we wouldn’t be keeping her as a server – I hated it. I quit shortly after. They treated their employees like crap and I’m so glad I got out of there.”
Starting A Fire Isn’t A Great Start To The Day
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“I worked in a fast food kiosk at an amusement park. We had a machine that cooked our burgers and toasted our buns, one of those ones where the food goes through on a conveyor belt.
One day, it was raining. While walking to the kiosk, a girl got wet. So, logically, she took her clothes off and put them through the machine so the heat could dry them. Her shirt caught on fire and set the kitchen sprinklers off, then her shoe forced the two toasting plates in the bun section far apart, creating a large repair bill and her losing her job”
The Case Of The Missing Pizza Driver Was An Easy Case To Crack
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“I’m a manager for a well-known pizza chain. We use GPS tracking to keep track of our delivery folks. Mostly just in case a customer calls in and asks, ‘Dude, where’s my pizza?!’
Delivery guy took a couple of orders out to drop off in the same area. Customer called in, ‘Hey, we ordered over an hour ago, where is the pizza?!’
I checked the GPS system. Delivery looked like it was one or two blocks away, depending on who he drops off first.
I said, ‘Looks like it will be within five minutes, I’m sorry for the wait.’
15 minutes passed.
The Same customer called again, ‘HEY, still no pizza, I want a refund!’
I said, ‘I’m sorry sir, certainly and I will still send you some coupons.’
I checked the GPS system. The car was still in the same spot. Drove out to check on the driver.
1) He was asleep in the car with the seat cranked back.
2) He had a cord and adapter plugged into his cigarette lighter.
3) It was connected to an old electrical blanket that is wrapped around the pizzas inside the thermal delivery bag.
Dude, it’s a freaking pizza delivery, just drive to the location and drop off the pizza while it’s hot, make sure the order is right, DONE.
Idiot – obviously he was instantly fired.”
“Now That I Think About It, I Don’t Know Why I Hired Her In The First Place”
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“I own a catering company. One time, I asked one of my employees to fill a cooler with bottles of water and ice. When I came to check on her an hour later, she had filled the cooler with ice and had opened every individual water bottle and dumped it into the cooler. She also didn’t understand why that was wrong.
A few weeks later, I gave the same lady the task of melting some butter for a clambake. She put about 25 pounds of butter in a double boiler pot and turned on the burner. She decided it would be a good idea to walk away from the pot of melted butter to go have a smoke. When she came back, the butter was burnt and boiling. In a panic, this woman decided to take a bucket of ice and dump it into the pot so the ‘butter wouldn’t be burnt anymore.’ The ice mixed with the boiling butter, causing the molten butter to basically explode and cover the entire kitchen. Everyone was standing there in disbelief that she had sprayed hot butter over everyone. She also had the audacity to tell me that it was my fault that I didn’t tell her not to put ice in molten burnt butter. Now that I think about it, I don’t know why I hired her in the first place.”
Just Because You Work At The Bar Doesn’t Mean You Can Act Like That
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“Bar manager here. Had to sack a bartender for showing up after he’d been partying hard. I mean, totally messed up.
I’m not a total cold hearted manager, I understand strange stuff happens in this line of work, BUT the icing on the cake was when he pulled out his junk and started waving it at the regulars at the bar. I tried to stop him and he took a swing at me, missed, fell over, and passed out.
I spoke to him a couple days later, he didn’t remember a thing.
It’s become great barroom lore at work.
‘Remember the time Jimmy pulled out his junk, you should have seen the look on your face, ha ha ha!'”
She Left Her Own Kids Out There In The Heat
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“I’ve had a few in my immediate control:
1) Throwing knives in the kitchen.
2) She brought her two kids with her while she worked her shift, but chose to leave them in the car, in summer, in Texas, rather than have them in the restaurant. I actually told her to go home or I would call Child Protective Services on her.
3) While on my day off, and not yet upper management, a whole detective team arrested a guy for murder and searched the whole restaurant.”
When The Safe Opened, His Heart Dropped
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“I was a district manager for a grocery store. I received a call from the loss prevention manager that one of my stores had a couple of outstanding deposits, not a huge deal, but something to be addressed. I called the store to ask how many deposits they had in their safe, and per my conversation with the store manager, all the money was accounted for, he just had not made it to the bank yet. I decide to stop by his store to confirm the deposits were present and do him a favor by running them to the bank since he was so busy.
When I got there and the safe was opened, the money wasn’t there. What should have been several thousand dollars in cash was only maybe a hundred or so in small bills and coins. I kept my cool, told the store manager that we could sort it out, but I had to call the loss prevention manager to let him know what’s up. The loss prevention manager came to the store. So the three of us went to the back to have a meeting. We started talking and the store manager broke down and admitted he has been floating deposits for weeks now. He just couldn’t make ends meet, had a small child, etc, etc. Then it took a turn for the worst because he started only talking to the loss prevention manager in Spanish, which I do not speak. Apparently, the guy explained that he was actually an illegal immigrant, used a fake/stolen identity when he took the job (I did not hire him) and yes, had stolen thousands in cash and merchandise. The loss prevention manager took me outside, explained the situation, and said we’re going to have to play it off like we can work it all out if we can get a signed confession from him. The store manager wrote the confession, and once we had it, the police were called and he was taken out in handcuffs. After the guy was cuffed, I had to let him know he’s also officially terminated – it was a bad day for all involved.”
Pat Needed To Take A Chill Pill
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“I was the manager of a Papa John’s and a lady called and complained about a driver going too fast near her kids. The driver in question, Pat, came back, and I said, ‘Pat, a lady called, try and slow it down a bit.’ He went postal in front of a packed audience of pick-up customers:
Pat: ‘Screw you, man, who’s side you on?’
Me: ‘Not mad, Pat, just be careful.’
Pat: ‘Nah, screw you, she’s lying!’
Me: ‘Pat, dude, really not mad, just saying be careful.’
Pat: ‘Uh-uh, no, screw that, you and I need to go outside!’
Me: ‘Calm down, dude, not mad at you, don’t worry.’
Pat: ‘Screw you, we gotta take this outside!’
Me: ‘You’re done, man, go home.’
Most awkward pizza firing ever. And get this: Pat’s a nurse now.”
Reggie Had No Idea Why They’d Want To Fire Him
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“One of my cooks, Reggie, asked for a smoke break. I told him to go for it.
He hadn’t come back after 10 minutes, so I looked out the window. He was smoking something else entirely.
He came back in, started cooking some food, turned to me and said, ‘Dude, I don’t feel so good, I think I need to go home.’
‘Yeah Reggie, maybe it’s because you just did some serious stuff by the dumpster — Get out.’
‘Nah man, I can still prep.’
I then spent 5 minutes explaining to him why I couldn’t have an addict using a giant cheese knife. To this day, I still don’t think he understands why he was fired.
Reggie had screwed up a few times though, so this was the last straw. I really hated letting him go because he actually was a good line cook.”
Murray Was A Town Legend Who Took Delivering Pizzas Very Seriously
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“This story is a legend in my hometown.
There was a strange dude named Murray, a local kid, that had something wrong with his mind – never fired on all cylinders.
Murray got a job at a pizza place as a pizza maker, which was a good job for him as he stayed in the back and didn’t face the public. All was well until a driver called in sick. Murray decided it was his night to shine, and offered up his services as a delivery driver.
Unbeknownst to the company, Murray didn’t have a driver’s license, but that didn’t stop him, this was his big night.
Murray got pulled over next to the elementary school, but that didn’t stop him either. Murray grabbed the pizzas and made a run for it through the soccer field. It was around midnight and dark out. Murray turned to see if the police were chasing him and proceeded to run into a large, white, metal pole that I call a ‘soccer net.’ Pizza went flying, Murray got arrested and fired – Freaking Murray.”
They Didn’t Know Who Was Tampering With The Whip Cream Cans
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“At Fuddruckers, we serve hand-dipped Blue Bell shakes/malts with whipped cream on top. For months, our food distributor kept sending us ‘dud’ cases of whipped cream that were only shooting out heavy whipping cream. I called the other Fuddruckers in the area and all of their whipped cream cans were working fine. I called the distributor/manufacturer to ask questions and see if there was a problem, nope. Well, apparently I’m the only one in the world who didn’t try ‘whip its’ as a kid and therefore didn’t know I had a cook sucking all the nitrous oxide out of the cans. I wish we had cameras to see my face when I caught him red handed with a can of whipped cream in his mouth; I just thought the guy loved whipped cream.”
How Did He Even Get Hired In The First Place
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“I worked at KFC. Guy got fired for doing drugs at work. In the office. Where there are cameras.
In hindsight, they probably should have seen it coming. He showed up to the interview with a shirt with the Wheel of Fortune board on it. Guess that was his nicest shirt? Also, I once saw him eat ice out of a bucket that had raw standing chicken water in it.
Kind of speaks volumes of KFC that he even got hired.”
She Kept Saying Her Boss Was “Hitting Her In The Back Of The Head”
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“I used to be a recruiter so there are a lot of great stories but this is my favorite.
I didn’t have to physically take this person off the job but I was involved second hand. I got a call from a temp employee working in the cafeteria of a large call center in town. She was YELLING that people were after her, that her boss was ‘hitting her in the back of the head.’
For a moment, I was concerned and thought I should call the police but as she continued to go on and on I realized she was just crazy. The company she worked within is a Fortune 500 company and we’d worked with her supervisor for years – he was not hitting her in the back of the head.
We sent one of the other recruiters down there to figure out what was going on and to pull her off the job. I spoke to her supervisor and he said she just went nuts and was accusing everyone of ‘hitting her in the back of the head.’ No one had touched her or really gone near her. The supervisor, and security, wanted her gone cause she kept screaming and running around, but she wouldn’t leave.
So my coworker arrived and she immediately ran into his ARMS like a child. She screamed, ‘Ohhhh, Mr. Richard they hitting me in the back of my head!’ And wept openly onto him. When he made it apparent she was fired, she ran away crying and everyone chased her. She ended up on the floor crying and they all had to pick her up and call her emergency contact to come get her.
It was her first day.
We reviewed the security tapes and no one hit her in her head. Her sister said she would sometimes have outbursts where she felt like the devil was possessing her, but she apparently got over them quickly.
She reapplied a few months later and unsurprisingly was turned down.
“Anyone Looking Out Could See Her”
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“My manager once fired a woman for sun tanning during lunch. She went out to her car, stripped to her underwear and laid on the hood/windshield to sunbathe. Anyone looking out could see her. She didn’t think she was doing anything wrong since she was on her lunch break.”
She Came In To Work, Just So She Could Refuse To Work
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“One of the girls who worked for me when I managed a Blimpies came in, clocked in, and told me it was her last day. I was not too sad to see her go honestly. But she not only refused to work her last shift, she refused to even pretend to work. She stood IN THE WAY in the narrow lane I had to walk up and down to make sandwiches. This was 1998, so she did not have a cell, so she either kept making calls on the business phone or was waiting for calls. I told her if she wasn’t going to work, she should just leave. So she made more phone calls looking for a ride and then continued to stand, in the work area, in uniform, staring at customers but not helping them. I told her to go wait in a booth for her ride, and she said something rude. She continued to be hostile and scare away customers, so I told her she had to leave, NOW, or I would call the cops and tell them she was trespassing. That got her of off the property. When I went back to the office and erased her punch-in for the day – felt good man.”
The Good News Is, The Sprinklers Work
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“I had an employee once test out the fire-suppression system at a restaurant. Turns out, it worked great. We had to shut down the restaurant for four hours in the middle of the day to clean it up.
That was pretty dumb of him, but he wasn’t the dumbest. The dumbest was the guy who told him the fire-suppression system didn’t work so that the poor idiot would pull it. That guy thought we couldn’t fire him since he didn’t actually pull the pin.
That’s right, he thought he could dare someone to do thousands of dollars in damage, and wouldn’t get fired.”
Was He Stupid, Or Brilliant?
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“I’ve worked in the restaurant business for 20 years. There was one guy, I’m not sure if he was stupid or brilliant. Stupid, because he was guaranteed to get caught, or brilliant because it took over a year to catch him.
Each waiter had their own card key to swipe into whatever computer was available and ring the customers’ orders in. Well, one day this guy realized if he jiggled his key, it would switch from his name to the name of a manager that opened the store, one that didn’t even work there anymore. So what he would do is open his checks and ring crap in throughout the night, and if he didn’t get a good tip, he would jiggle the key, open up a customer’s check under the manager’s name, void some of the food, and keep the extra money. He did this every shift for over a year before he got caught. Like I said, hard to tell if it was stupid or brilliant.”
They Fought Over The One Girl Neither Of Them Had A Chance With
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“Couple of straight men got into a physical fight over a lesbian, on the floor, in front of customers.
She was out, everyone knew she was gay. It started out as an argument over who she was friends with and turned into who was going to be going out with her in the future.
That’s like idiots arguing over who’s gonna win the Nobel Prize.”
