Workers Share Their “SCREW THIS, I QUIT” Stories
Trying to snag a decent job in today’s world can be very stressful. With hundreds competing for the same positions, you’ll likely be waiting for a long time. As soon as one lands on your lap, thoughts of swimming in a pool of money start marinating in your head.
Unfortunately, there are some jobs that are a complete nightmare. Whether it’s a horrible boss or demanding customers, many people have no choice but to quit. If you think quitters only make up a small crowd, think again. A recent report from the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics determined that more people have been saying farewell to their jobs than ever before. In fact, the rate of people quitting has been the highest since 2001.
These people have come forward about what made them simply walk away from it all. Fortunately, they’re doing much better now.
Don’t forget to check the comment section below the article for more interesting stories!
#1 A Pregnant Woman Scorned
I worked at McDonald’s. I was in my third trimester working two jobs. I would close almost every night and then work mornings at an embroidery shop.
We wore all black and by the grills, it was 110 degrees. It was uncomfortably hot. They said they couldn’t afford air conditioning. I had a doctor’s note for a break every two hours but they would work me 6+ hours no break, no lunch. They kept throwing away my water too!
The breaking point for me was being told to grab a 50-lb box of fries. I said: “I can’t do that,” only to be scorned with a: “YOU CAN’T OR YOU WON’T?”
I would always get screamed at. I took off my uniform shirt and hat, then left.
#2 New Year’s Resolution
I worked at a restaurant and missed every major holiday: Christmas; Mother’s Day; even my mom’s birthday. It was unfair since all my coworkers got those days off.
Anyway, around Thanksgiving, I asked for New Year’s off since I usually go out of state to visit family. I requested those days and they were approved.
When the week comes around, and I tell my boss I’m planning my family vacation. He had the audacity to tell me: “I have to work those nights too. I’m missing my family time.”
As if we got paid the same. I had to hold in every urge in to say, “Yeah, well my pay doesn’t pay rent.”
I told him I wasn’t going to show up anymore, and I never did.
#3 Becoming The Boss
I worked for a Fortune 250 company for 16 years as a senior manager. It was awesome until “The Bob’s” came along. They were consultants who outsourced and offshored dozens of jobs. My entire staff was decimated and replaced with incompetent knuckleheads. I could have retired from there with serious perks. Instead, I told them if they got rid of my staff, I was quitting. They called my bluff.
It’s okay though because I started my own business and I’ve never been happier.
#4 I Smell Trouble
I worked at a fairly small but growing food chain in North Carolina. I washed dishes but being one of the younger employees, they’d ask me to do other things, from taking out the trash to cleaning the washrooms. I was only making minimum wage but doing a lot of work.
At one point, I went to the bathroom to find someone made a mess after changing their child’s diaper. It stunk up the whole bathroom. I was told to clean it and when I went to get supplies, some guy had walked in, smelled the stench, and puked in the sink. So now, I had to clean up the floor, sink, toilet, trash can, and mirror. Anytime I opened the bathroom, the smell would leak into the restaurant and would make anyone close gag. I just quit there on the spot because it was so unbearable.
#5 Let The Music Take Over
I had worked at this bakery for almost two years. In the last months, I debated quitting for good. I was living with my parents at the time and it was a three-day-a-week gig, while the other four days were reserved for school. At one point, I wanted to go to a festival, I knew months in advance that I would be going, and told them I couldn’t work then.
The next week, when new schedules had been put up, I was not only signed up for shifts during the festival week, I was set to work for four days that week. I simply finished my day, because I didn’t want to leave my coworkers alone, and told my boss that I quit.
She told me I couldn’t quit without it being in writing. So the next Tuesday, I showed up with my friends, parked the car full of festival gear right in front of the store. I went in, slapped my written resignation on the counter, thanked everybody for the great time I had, and walked out. Best decision of my life.
#6 A Collective “Peace Out”
I was hired as a bartender in a new tapas restaurant. I opened and closed five nights a week. One relief bartender closed with me but on weekends only. It was a lot of work but I was making BANK in tips. It was like, $300 to $400 a night on the credit cards. The waiters loved us too because we didn’t make them tip me out.
Then, I noticed that I wasn’t getting the exact amount of money in tips I should have. Instead of $400, I was getting $150. All of our paychecks bounced. When we came in for work on Friday, we asked about our paychecks and the manager said it was an oversight She also admitted to taking from our tips because she claimed she deserved a cut too. Yet, she didn’t clean the bar, help make drinks, or do any tasks, really.
She said if we didn’t like it we could leave. So we did. The restaurant only lasted two months.
#7 Stashing That Money
My previous boss didn’t pay me for the month I had worked for him.
The first time, the direct deposit form was wrong, and the second time, he said it was wrong even though I gave them a written copy. I asked for weeks for my check but they said I could only use direct deposit. I told my manager that I’d need a paper check by the end of the day and my boss left me a message saying it was all my fault and that he “wants to keep me but doesn’t like being threatened.” I walked in and quit immediately.
#8 Nothing’s Set In Stone
I quit working for an inventory counting company after a manager who wrote my schedule wrote the wrong street to the store. When I told him it caused me to be late he stated, it was my fault for not checking before heading out. The last straw was when we were doing a Macy’s that had two stores, one for male and another for female, on the same night. I came in early because they asked, yet they let a team go home early which put us behind.
It’s not a particularly hard job. In fact, it’s mind-numbingly boring. I just couldn’t stand the mistakes and ridiculous schedules, so I quit.
#9 The Art Of Leaving
I worked at an art gallery that had really expensive paintings, like original Picassos worth more than $200,000. Two weeks after starting on the job, my only two colleagues quit because of harassment. My boss was paranoid and accused us of everything that happened, like a small crack on a sculpture we never even touched. He trusted me and wanted me to have the key to the gallery. I could already hear the police sirens at my house if anything went missing. It was a good job, but I quit shortly after.
#10 Pasting Lies Together
I was putting up wallpaper at a hotel, and for the last week, they got me to come in and finish off the last few areas. However they didn’t have any wallpaper or paste, so I couldn’t really do my job. I’d do a couple of other jobs each day and then leave after like, two hours.
I constantly tried to get them to bring wallpaper and paste, to which I’d receive messages saying we didn’t have any in storage. Eventually, I got the manager to agree to go to storage and bring back a tub of glue and some wallpaper. I waited for about an hour but there was no sign of them, so I called and they told me they were driving to another city. I asked about the wallpaper and they said, “Just finish the job.” I tried to say something, but then just hung up and went home.
I got a message saying “Good job” the next day. I still don’t understand these people.
#11 Cat Scratch Fever
I worked in a veterinary clinic of an SPCA. The vet was a complete hack, just really awful. We had two female cats come in during the evening (I worked day time hours). The cats were near identical calicos. One was there to get spayed and the other was there to get spayed and declawed. Somehow, the night receptionist got them mixed up, so the cat that supposed to be just spayed got declawed also. I get in the next morning and the vet blames it on me. I didn’t even give him an argument because I was so confused. I walked out and over to the other building and went in to see the administrator. I dropped my key on the desk and told him I quit. They were left with dirty cages, a dirty surgical room, and unsterilized instruments to deal with.
#12 All American Fool
I worked at A&W back in high school and had a 12 p.m. to 8 p.m. shift on a Saturday. I also had a pretty bad cold, so I called in sick, but the manager told me I had to come in or I was fired.
It was a long day of running the fryer, sick as a dog, and this was back when you could get buckets of fried “Chubby Chicken.”
Then, of course, we had a huge rush right at 8 p.m. right when I was about to leave. I stayed to help the guys out (without getting paid). At 8:45 p.m., I’m getting ready to walk out and the manager comes into the back to tell me I can’t leave until I cleaned out the CVAP. This was normally done first thing in the morning and it’s at least a 20-minute job.
I told her to go get lost and never went back.
#13 Extra! Extra! Read All About It!
The newspaper I worked at wanted to switch to morning delivery. I told them I wasn’t going to do that and they said okay. One day, they showed up at my house to complain to me about how the papers weren’t getting delivered early enough. I just handed my bag to the lady and told her to do it herself.
#14 It’s Way Better Than Working There
When I was working at Wendy’s (I only lasted a week) I was constantly yelled at by the general manager. I do something right, I get yelled at. I do something wrong, I get yelled at. They wouldn’t train me either— they even wanted me to jump in and cook the food before I was trained to do so. I barely knew how to navigate the touch screen at the register.
The last straw was when I was getting one of those smoothy drinks for a customer, and he yelled at me for doing it the wrong way, grabbed it from me, and redid it. A coworker pointed out that I had literally exactly followed the instructions that were on a picture right beside the station. He didn’t even apologize. I quit that day at the end of my shift. I put the hat down and asked if they wanted the shirt back too. Everyone was watching me but I didn’t care.
#15 Just Playing Hide And Seek
I worked a job at a printing company. One time, there was some emergency where I really needed help. The receptionist called in sick, so they put me on the phones, which was something I’d never done before. I didn’t know how to do it, nor did I know anyone’s name at the company or how to solve problems.
One call came in from a big client… HUGE PROBLEM. I didn’t know how to help them so I paged my boss over the intercom to swing by and help me, but he never answered. I finally calmed the people down enough by promising a call back ASAP. A few minutes went by and I walked around the corner to do something else. I saw my boss crouching down behind a cube wall trying to hide from me so he doesn’t have to help me.
I grabbed my stuff and walked out.
#16 Shaving Off Your Entire Employment
I worked in the butcher department at a grocery store when I was in high school. I had been there for two years and was their best non-manager employee. In one week, my parents split up and my grandfather passed away so I explained to my manager what had happened. I asked for some time off just to relax and have some time to myself to think about some things.
I was denied the time-off request which I was not happy about. I showed up for my shift to open the store in the morning and the manager was there. Before he said anything he flipped out on me for having a bit of scruff on my face. He walked to Shoppers Drug Mart to pick up a disposable razor and told me to shave in the employee bathroom. I walked up, and grabbed all of my things and left.
#17 Getting Played Like Nintendo
Worked at a local video game store when I was a teen. The manager from a neighboring town came to work in our store for a bit. The guy was a total sleazeball. I lasted a week before quitting, and was so scared of him I asked my dad to come in and make sure I got my last paycheck.
A bunch of other people quit and sleazebag replaced them with his friends. Then, they quit on the same day because they knew he was about to get fired. I was offered a job as a manager with a big pay bump. I took it but quit again a few months later because they were doing a ton of illegal stuff and they wouldn’t work around my college schedule.
#18 The Gift Of Saying Goodbye
I worked part-time for Kroger for over two years. They didn’t put me on the schedule for a whole month, despite the fact that they were understaffed. My store had just met a goal so we all received gift cards. On my first day back, I got my gift card and quit.
#19 Not How They Roll
I once worked at a huge cowboy-style steak house. The manager would always find ways for me to roll silverware at the end of the night. Mind you, there were like, 15 people working here but every night I was the one rolling the utensils.
During this time, I was making $2.15 an hour and it would take me a good two hours to roll all the dinnerware. After the fifth night in a row, I had it and threw all the silverware I could find in the dumpster. I walked out and never came back. I later heard from a friend that they never found the utensils and had to buy more.
#20 Putting The Boss In Check
I worked for a large bank with nice people but bad morals. I found that out when the most impressive female coworker sacrificed her well being by coming in to work whilst pregnant. Here in Vienna, it is illegal for pregnant women to work at a certain point during pregnancy, but her boss pressured her to come in.
She went in for her yearly performance review and they rated her a C. With a B, she would have been eligible for a bonus. In all objectivity: to this day I haven’t worked with anybody who deserved an A more than that colleague. Two months later, I told the same boss that I need to take days off because my dad had fallen seriously ill. She said I couldn’t go, as there was too much work. So I just went up to her and said: “ I quit.”
Immediately after, I backpedaled and said hold on, we can get HR up here and I’ll tell them all the situations I’ve encountered whilst worked there. She then agreed to mutually end the agreement. I never regretted leaving that kind of workplace.
#21 Ungraciously Filling That Position
I started out part-time at a Big Box electronics retail store and worked about 24 hours a week. My senior year of college was coming to an end and three months out before graduating, I had a conversation with the general manager asking for a full-time job. He said, “When that time comes, we can talk about it.”
Fast forward to a few weeks before graduation. Since summer was around the corner, they hired several more people to different departments. The sales manager introduced the new hires to us. “Oh! and here is your new full-timer!” he announced. I was baffled.
I spoke to my general manager about the conversation we had three months ago and he said, “Oh, I didn’t know if you were going to leave or stay with us after you graduated.” I quit the next day. It was such a shady move by the general manager. The girl they hired didn’t even stay for six months.
#22 A Golden Thief Among Them
I worked the night shift at a convenience store. They hired a guy who quickly became the manager’s “golden boy” and he was moved to the coveted day shift. Every evening when I came in, he would taunt me and the other night shift workers on his way out. He would also fill a bag with stuff from the shelves as he left without paying.
Well, this eventually showed up as shortages, which they blamed on the night shift. I said, “No, Golden Boy is taking armloads of stuff every night.” The manager refused to believe that. All of us except Golden Boy was made to go downtown and submit to a polygraph. Questions focused on whether we had stolen anything. I answered all questions, and also added, “Golden Boy is robbing the store blind.” This was ignored.
A couple of weeks later, they told us all (except the Golden Boy) to go downtown again. Everyone walked out, and never went back.
#23 Teaching Right From Wrong
I was a teacher. My (assigned) mentor grabbed a student by the arm to yell at him. The kid jerked away and left. The kid got in trouble. I complained to the principal. The next day, it was announced that he’d be the principal next year. The mentor scheduled a meeting to talk to me about the incident and the importance of talking to each other before going to higher-ups. I scheduled a meeting with the principal to hand in my resignation letter.
#24 Not In It For The Long Haul
A little over a year ago, I was a long haul truck driver for one of the larger shipping companies in America. I was a team driver because it paid more and the company assigned me some random guy I didn’t know. The guy seemed off from the get-go—he was 12 hours late to meet up, didn’t bring anything but protein shakes that needed to be refrigerated (no fridge onboard), etc. We worked together for a while and I could tell he wasn’t right in the head.
Fast forward to when we arrived in Texas just east of Dallas. I am running out of hours for the day, and he’s out of hours for the day, so I decided to pull into a truck stop for the night. When I pull in, there is a newer driver struggling to back into a spot, so I stop and wait for him to complete his park. My co-driver wakes up, comes up front and starts telling me to rush the guy. I refuse he starts getting more agitated. I park the truck and tell the guy I am going to go inside to get dinner. I eat, come back out, and find all my stuff is thrown out on the road in front of my truck. I start picking it all back up to put away when he guns the truck and almost hits. All my stuff was destroyed. That was the exact moment I quit long haul.
#25 No One Outworks The Hut
Worked at Pizza Hut as a driver. I applied to other jobs to get something that paid better. I informed my boss that I would need to not work too early if I got on anywhere. I got my old job back making a chunk over minimum wage, plus it was full-time so got benefits.
I told my boss as soon as I knew when I could work. I wanted to stay as a driver to get more cash. I think I warned her two weeks early. The weekend before my training starts at the new job, she published the schedule for the week and had me work all day on multiple days. I couldn’t do any of those shifts because I had training at the new job.
I confronted her about it because I’d given her plenty of notice. She yelled at me saying, “Well, I hired you to work HERE.” Right but you’re paying me minimum and having me work only part-time. Why would I stay? Especially when you just yelled at me in front of the store. So I responded with, “Well, I guess I quit then. I’m not going to screw over the rest of the guys working tonight so tonight’s my last night.”
#26 Call It Off
Worked in a call center for about six months. I think I was a good, hard worker. I was never off sick or late in, and I would do multiple shifts and all the overtime they offered to help them out since they were always understaffed.
I then found another job, so I put my month notice in and for that full month I got no help from my manager or team leader. People would phone up and ask questions I wasn’t able to help with and the management team would just leave me hanging. I was getting frustrated, so four days before my last day, I grabbed my jacket, emptied my locker and left. It took them 40 minutes before they realized I was missing.
#27 A True Soap Opera
I worked at a Tim Hortons part-time. They had scheduled me for eight-hour night shifts for nine days straight. I told them that I was unable to work them, and they basically said I needed to work them or I was fired. My third day in, I had been working with a guy who was supposed to be training me, but he was new and didn’t speak any English. It was about 5:30 a.m. (I worked until 7 a.m.) and a guy came in complaining that his coffee tasted like soap. He demanded a refund and a new coffee. I looked at him and said, “That’s impossible because I haven’t had a chance to wash the pots all night. I went to the change room, packed my stuff, left my uniform and walked out.
#28 But The Ride, Though
I was working at a company for only a few months when things started to get bad. I had direct deposit set up and I was away on vacation when payday came around. My paycheck didn’t drop in my bank account. Okay, interesting. I texted a co-worker and the boss said that the new assistant forgot to approve it.
This happened for the next three pay periods. I had to go to my boss every payday to try and get her to cut my check. Some days, she would leave early and tell us she totally forgot. That following Monday, she comes in and shows off a new car she bought over the weekend. Right there, I told her I will not be coming back into work and demanded my final pay. I didn’t say “I quit,” but I sure as heck should have! No way was I even going to give her the decency of two weeks notice, either.
Who the heck buys a new car when you’re struggling to pay your employees? Still gets me mad!
#29 Keeping Them Secure
I was hired to run a college’s office and manage the students who got hands-on work in the field. When I discovered that they were ripping off students hours, I started providing students copies of their hours and told them to keep a notebook with the copies for their records. The students were on a contract that stated if they didn’t graduate by the date estimated for completion, they’d be required to pay $200 for every additional week it took to complete among suspensions. They also asked me to falsify reports of students absences to suspend them, even though I had documented proof that the students were in class. I decided to leave that job but not before telling students to report them to the state board and providing statements for the lawyer who the students gathered to represent their case.
#30 Welding Their Escape
I got hired in a custom fabrication shop as one of their two welders. The boss promises to have me learn a bit of everything (machining, water jet, design) but barely even had me do any welding, on top of being a massive jerk to everyone. He talked bad about us to customers while we were working right next to him. I got hired at a different company on Thursday evening, and I quit on Friday at lunch along with the other welder. It felt real good leaving them up the proverbial creek.
#31 A Secret Getaway
The company promised a retreat in Banff because we hit our sales targets. Two weeks before the trip, they tell us it’s been canceled, with no plans to pay us out for the pooled bonus that would have gone towards that trip. On the weekend of the trip, a manager posts a photo of her and other managers in Banff. But oh no, it wasn’t work related! They said it was for a manager’s birthday. I quit shortly after.
#32 Come Hungry, Quit Happy
I used to work at IHOP as a server. Our manager was wildly incompetent. She would always leave with the manager card (which was the only way to correct an order, refund something etc.). She was also spiteful and stupid, a deadly combination. I was poor and had a raggedy pair of non-slip shoes. I also had a pair of Doc Marten work shoes that were slip/oil/electric proof. Same color and all. She made a big stink about me not wearing the correct shoes, even after I explained that they were on their last leg. 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 the shoes, so I caved and wore the bad shoes to work.
It’s Saturday night, packed to the gills. Not a seat in the house. Halfway into my nightmare understaffed shift, as I’m carrying an appetizer sampler and a tray of drinks to a table, the sole rips and I TRIP AND SPILL THE WHOLE SAMPLER ON THE TABLE. Ranch. Honey mustard. Marinara. Four Dr. Peppers. All over me and a couple. Face and all. I freak out and apologize, then went to find the manager. Guess who went home with that almighty card you need to void checks with?
I also had about five other tables suffering who saw all this happen. I call her, she’s at home. Lives 15 mins away. I went off on her about how she could be so stupid to go home with the card for the 10,000th time. 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. Never looked back.
#33 Long Hard Climb
I was a cell phone tower climber. Winds were pretty high; right on the edge of where we should have called the day off. A few hours in and the winds keep getting gustier, but the foreman wants to finish the job.
By the end, I remember just trying to get the cable stable on the tower, leaning off as far as I could to bring it back in and then pinning it to the steel while my coworker attached it to the tower. Mind you, this is heavy cable, a bit more than a pound per foot up a 300-foot tower. When those things get moving, they can fall, get damaged, and even hit someone. I kept my calm throughout the day, but it wasn’t my first day of being forced to overlook as many safety precautions as possible.
Obnoxiously, the pay wasn’t even good. The cell phone companies contract out to construction management firms who contract out to smaller, fly-by-night crews. There is no money at the bottom of that worthless ladder.
#34 Shut Up And Drive
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 hear the printer spit out an order. I went to the bartender and was like, “What’s going on?” The bartender said, “Ahhh he’s a regular and I didn’t think you would mind.”
I had to go turn everything on and start his order. After about two minutes of cooking, I’m like, what am I doing?
I walked straight inside to the manager and simply said: “I’m done.” He replied, “What do you mean you’re done?” Then I just turned around and walked out the back to my car.
#35 Doing It For The Kids
I worked for a preschool for a short while, and the great thing was that I was allowed to bring my toddler with me. She was a little younger than most of the kids, but no big deal. She sat for story time, got to learn her letters and colors early, and generally did what the other kids did. The older kids loved her and pretty much made her the class mascot. Unfortunately, my supervising teacher had a problem with me bringing her. Not that I was focusing only on my child, or that she was a distraction. It was just that bringing a child to a workplace was against her principles. She’d insinuate that I was a bad mom for working in the first place and that I was neglectful for exposing my daughter to my place of employment, which, again, was a preschool.
Finally, after she had a particularly rough day, she went off on me, saying I should have my child taken from me and that she’d be making a call to CPS. She also said I was fired, despite the fact that she didn’t have the authority to make that decision. I simply handed her my keys, told her to never contact me again, and walked out. I called the director that afternoon, filled her in, and thanked her for the opportunity. The supervising teacher got fired the next day.
#36 Swim Like A Fish
I did roofing in during the summer. By the way, roofing sucks. It’s hot as heck. I was getting paid $5 an hour under the table. Well, I found out at school that roofers are supposed to make a lot of money. I thought I was doing well for my age so didn’t make a big deal about it.
That weekend, I was at a job, carrying shingles up a ladder to the other guys. The homeowner was laying on a float in his pool, and yelled, “I hope y’all aren’t hot up there?” I told my boss he needed to find other help and climbed off the roof. I walked over the pool and cannon-balled in. The homeowner got really angry. I got chewed out by my parents too, but I felt great about it.
#37 Pay Attention To Detail
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 absolute torture 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.
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 the next day and he said yes. I immediately went to the manager and said, I quit.
#38 Sucks To Be Them
One summer during college, I found a job selling $1,500 vacuums. The company offered a free room cleaning. We’d go and clean the room, while in the process try to make the sale. I quit within the first week.
A few of the things I hated about the job: We had to sing a song together at the start of each shift, and they publicly called out who had made what sales the day before. As the new guy, I had to shadow a veteran. The guy assigned to me liked to drive 120 mph down the highway, weaving super aggressively between cars. I was trying to sell a $1,500 vacuum to people who clearly couldn’t afford $1,500 vacuums.
But the thing that made me say “Screw this, I quit” was this: finally, on Friday of my first week, I got my first sale. I did the pitch and demonstration, and even the veteran I was with said that it was all mine. When I got my paycheck, I didn’t get the commission. I called and asked, and they said, “Since [veteran] was with you, he gets the commission.”
#39 Feel It In The Air Tonight
A long time ago, I got a summer job working in a factory. The factory made car windshields and my job was to wipe it down with hexane while my co-worker applied other materials to the outside of the glass.
I wore gloves while dealing with the hexane, but after a few days, I started getting nosebleeds and hives on my body. I asked my boss if I could switch workstations because I was having issues. They refused and said it must be the dry air in the factory.
I ended up passing out in the caf at lunch. They offered to let me work somewhere else, but I told them I quit.
#40 Run For The Border
Roughly ten or so years ago, I was working my first job at Taco Bell. I was about a year into my employment when one Taco Sunday, I had enough. There were roughly ten people working, and most of them were cleaning for a big inspection coming up. There were another four people in the front, one person on drive-thru duty and the other three just standing around socializing. I was the only one stationed making the orders. I had a dozen orders at one time and I called for help, but no one came. The manager knew I was struggling and never once sent someone to help or came to help themselves. Not too long into this, I took off my hat, walked up to the group laughing in the front, handed them my hat and calmly said that I was quitting. Everyone just looked at me shocked as I walked out of the store, never to return.
#41 Developing Some Backbone
Early in my web development career, I got a job working on a website. The office was a tiny little room with three of us crammed inside. We received hardly any direction on how things worked, and they had me working in a language I didn’t know. I hated it. One day, the three of us came in from lunch about five minutes late, and we got scolded like children.
I got another job and stayed at that place for seven years.
#42 This Turtle Moves Quick
I worked at Outback Steakhouse for two years growing up. We were a busy restaurant but began to have lighter-staffed shifts after a cut down from corporate. I always had a partner with me doing the dishwashing, but, after the cutbacks, it was a solo mission. One day, the dishes piled up so high and there was nothing I could do because the dish machine was broken. My boss asked me, “What is going on back here, kid? Why are you being such a turtle?”
I waited until my boss finished his rampage and went back into his office. I took my apron off and put it on the dish counter. I walked out of that place and never went back. I feel bad about the nice coworkers I left behind. They cared about me a lot, more than they should’ve.
#43 Kneel Before Zod
I worked in a clothes shop. One day, I was manning the shop alone— tending to customers, looking after the changing rooms and sorting the delivery out by myself. My back was aching from continuously bending up and down to hang up the stock so I briefly gave myself a break by kneeling down for a few minutes whilst I finished the delivery. No customers came in during this time luckily, Sundays being slow.
The next day, on my day off, the manager called me saying I needed to come in right away. So, I got on the bus and made the 50-minute journey to the shop. She took me into the office and proceeded to bollock me, full on screaming in my face. She had seen on the CCTV the five minutes when I dared to kneel down to rest my back and told me this was completely unacceptable and unprofessional— she said if a customer had seen me processing stock while kneeling down, they would have been horrified.
I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t believe that I had been made to come all the way in on my day off just so she could scream at me over something so trivial! I quit on the spot and told her to stick that job where the sun doesn’t shine!
#44 Certainly Neither A Trick Or Treat
I worked for Verizon selling cable packages for three days. This entailed setting up booths outside apartment complexes and going door-to-door selling packages. The third day was Halloween, so my boss decided we can get some customers in between all the children trick-or-treating. The sheer amount of disgust on people’s faces made me quit the next day.
#45 That Was Easy
I was in charge of the back receiving area and returns at a Staples. I was gunning for a manager position and was told I had it. When the time came to select someone, I was told my position was no longer promotable. Who did they give it to? The greeter at the door. They decided the dude in charge of saying hello and helping people find items was better off than a guy who literally did everyone’s job throughout the day, including the managers. When I quit, the head manager got fired.
#46 Unfair Punishments
I’ve worked in retail part-time since I was 16. At my first job, they started introducing a “punishment” system for when team members didn’t make their target.
Thankfully it never happened to me, but one day a manager posted on our staff Facebook page a video of them throwing a bucket of water over an employee who didn’t make his target, purely for everyone else to laugh at. This didn’t happen with any of the other “punishments.”
He had worked there for 10 years. He was a stockroom member so he wouldn’t even be on the shop floor with targets to aim for.
He had taken off his shoes and placed them to the side so they didn’t get wet. He did this because he had to take two buses to get to and from work every day.
That was my official “screw this” moment and quit after that.
#47 IT Woes
I give so much credit to IT workers. The number of STUPID questions they receive must drive them insane. It sure as heck drives me to lunacy when I overhear my coworkers call our IT guy for an emergency that quite frankly could’ve been easily resolved with a single Google search.
We all use laptops and dock them into our stations to use on monitors. A coworker came in one day and kept pressing the “On” button. He started freaking out because the screen remained black, no matter how many times he pressed it. He blamed everything on the IT guy, saying the “malfunction” had something to do with the update he ran on her software that week.
She frantically called him over and over, leaving voicemails that he needed to come to her desk IMMEDIATELY otherwise she wouldn’t be able to get any work done. This went on for about an hour. One of the coworkers noticed she didn’t have anything docked into her station and asked her where her laptop was. She said that she left her laptop at home and thought there was no reason to bring it into work. We all pointed out that the reason her monitor was black was that she didn’t have her laptop docked in to connect to the monitor. She was DUMBFOUNDED. I swear, if I was the IT technician helping her, I would’ve lost my mind AND my job as a result of the immense anger from her stupidity.
#48 A Miserable Situation
I worked in an outgoing call center for a day. I was ringing up small business owners to get them to do a survey. Essentially I spent several hours being rejected by every single person I called.
If you weren’t dialing a new number as soon as you ended a call, management would be on your back. In our opening script, we told them the survey would take 10 to 15 minutes. The one time I got someone to do it, he asked how long was left after spending over 20 mins on the survey. It was miserable.
The second day, I got in, spent an hour doing the same old miserable thing, then just stood up and walked out. I’d rather sell packets of noodles than do that.
#49 Delusional Owner
I’m currently helping rebuild an e-commerce store that was mismanaged by a contractor. The contractor botched two re-platforms in the span of six months erasing 10 years of marketing efforts and resultantly dropping traffic and sales by 88%.
The new owner of the company thinks that the website can generate $300,000 a month in sales “in short order,” despite my continuous objections. That revenue target is well over twice of what it generated in a month when it was at its height.
Dude does not get it, isn’t listening, and has delusional expectations.
#50 All Work For Bad Pay
I was working 70 hour weeks alongside two other people at a video game gig in California.
The other two people quit because of the work hours. I was working 110 hours a week for several months to keep things going. I was told there was a hiring freeze, which was why they couldn’t backfill my two coworkers.
Eventually, they moved two junior people in under me and gave me a promotion on paper only, with no raise, to manage them.
I quit when I found out that each of them was making $20,000 more than I was.
#51 He Should Probably Sue
My manager wouldn’t give me a 20-minute break despite the fact that I had been working for the past 13 hours with no break. Her superior swore at me when I asked if I could take my well-deserved break time, so I called her something really offensive and walked out. I was 23 and they said: “Good luck finding a new job with that personality.” Well, I already had one lined up and eventually got hired within a few weeks. I stand by it when I say she is the worst.
#52 Inconsiderate Boss
My boss repeatedly yelled at me even though it was her incompetence that slammed my department with more paperwork than was humanly possible to get through in the time she arbitrarily needed it. Eventually, it led to the company cutting my hours. I dipped out of that job as soon as they started scheduling me less.
#53 When Customers Are The Problem
I got my first job as a cashier at a trashy Circle K next to a shady bar. NOT A DAY WOULD GO BY without some creep commenting on my very obvious underage appearance. I assumed it was normal. I had to deal with people having breakdowns because we didn’t carry their preferred brands, annoying gambling addicts clogging up the line at peak hours to re-buy 20 tickets a day, and tipsy people coming in and eating things before paying. I was also expected to stay 45 mins after my shift to sort recycled bottles.
One day, when I was about three months in, I was kept FIVE extra hours without prior notice because a coworker had an accident and my manager didn’t want to call someone else in. I finished my shift in the middle of the night and was set to start again at 5 a.m. on a Saturday. You can just imagine how a Friday night next to a bar looks like. I was just about to finish my soul-sucking shift when a kid threw up on the floor. I didn’t bother to show up the next day.
On the bright side, I got a job at a fast food joint and it turns out, dealing with harassment and theft isn’t normal at all in student jobs.
#54 False Promises
I worked at a company that promised raises because of the recent tax cuts. They didn’t give anyone raises. Instead, they cut many part-timers and made people work 10-hour days because there weren’t enough employees to cover store hours.
#55 Zero To 100 Real Quick
I was burnt out from working in a chronically-understaffed prison. So I put in for two weeks of vacation starting the next week, and once it got approved, I put in my two weeks notice.
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