Many people consider various courses in business ethics and business to be a waste of time, but in fact, they are not. Of course, there is a lot of useless information there, but the main thing they teach is the ability to separate personal and business behavior.

In fact, this is the cornerstone of professionalism – to behave in certain situations at work differently than in personal communication. This is especially true when an employee gives in a 2-week notice, and the manager perceives it as a teenager in love who was abandoned by their beloved.

Actually not the best role model for working behavior, but sometimes it happens that way. For example, it happened to this 19-year-old gas station worker whose bosses, apparently, decided to avenge his decision to quit. The original post on the AITA Reddit community got almost 7.5K upvotes and over 560 different comments.

More info: Reddit

The Original Poster worked at a gas station and sent in his 2-week resignation notice

Image source: Brian Harries (not the actual photo)

So, the Original Poster worked at a gas station and was going to quit in two weeks, by all means sending a notice to management. His 8-hour evening shift was coming to an end, and he was waiting for a colleague to hand over the night shift.

Image source: tea_leaftea

The night shift started but nobody showed up and it looked like everyone was just ignoring the OP

The co-worker, however, did not appear and did not answer any calls. The OP decided to call his boss – but he didn’t pick up the phone either. He then tried to contact one of the managers, the boss’s assistant, and she didn’t answer as well. It looked like everyone was just ignoring the OP – and meanwhile, the night shift had already begun, the customers came, and our hero, being a dutiful person, decided to stay at his workplace.

Image source: tea_leaftea

Hour after hour passed and the OP continued to work, all while also trying to contact at least one of his colleagues. Unsuccessfully. Fatigue rolled over, he was very upset by what was happening – but still did not leave the workplace.

Image source: tea_leaftea

The boss then said his phone was muted and told the OP he should have texted him about the problem instead

Finally, early in the morning, the boss showed up. He looked very surprised to see the OP at the gas station, and not his fill-in, and asked what was the matter. Having learned that during the night, the OP repeatedly tried to get in touch with him, he said that he was busy in the evening, and in the early morning at 4 AM, he was already up.

Image source: tea_leaftea

The OP found out that his bosses expected him to cover another shift, working around 24 hours in a 36-hour span

According to the boss, our hero just had to text him, and then he would immediately come. The OP, of course, thought that this was a bit weird – after all, any person, waking up, checks their phone – and will definitely see a number of missed calls. In any case, he filled out all the paperwork for the shift and clarified whether he should come to work the following day.

Image source: tea_leaftea

The fact is that in eight hours the OP had a new shift scheduled, and he was already completely exhausted from 16 hours of work in a row. The boss called his assistant, who, oddly enough, immediately picked up the phone and said that her phone was just in silent mode in the evening. She also said that she did not know why the OP’s shift member did not come to work in the evening.

Image source: tea_leaftea

The boss asked the OP to cover his new shift anyway so he decided to quit immediately

As for work, the manager said that if she still could not contact the fill-in guy, then it would be good for the OP to still come on his shift. Our hero was on the verge of a nervous breakdown, so the boss told him just to go home, and he would later text about the shift.

Image source: Ann Larie Valentine (not the actual photo)

When the OP came home, his parents told him that it all looked very suspicious. When the OP finally got in touch with his shift member, he said that he had warned the manager in advance that he was sick and would not be able to cover his shift. After some time, the boss texted, noting that it would still be necessary to go on shift – at least for four hours, or even six. The OP could not stand it and announced that he was resigning at that point.

People in the comments told the OP that he should have closed the store and gone home as soon as his co-worker didn’t show up

The OP admits that he was worried about the fact that, having quit immediately, he acted quite unprofessionally. However, commenters massively supported him, saying that it was necessary in general, as soon as the fill-in person did not appear, to close the store and go home – perhaps after waiting a little just to ease his conscience.

As it turns out, the gas station was corporate, so the people in the comments advised the OP to just report the incident to someone in higher management – so that such an instance of unprofessionalism on the part of his boss would not go unpunished.

As always, we welcome your comments on this case, and if you’ve faced some similar stories at work, we’d love to hear from you.

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