Get Premium
Dark mode theme is available exclusively for premium users. Learn more about the benefits of subscribing.
No fees, cancel anytime.
Dark Mode 
No fees, cancel anytime 
52Kviews
30 Legit, Wild Or Weird Reasons People Got Fired From Their Jobs, As Shared In This Online Group
Employment – love it or loathe it, it is a necessity that takes over our lives, and it just so happens that sometimes we have no other choice but to endure it.
Not everybody has the luxury of loving their job. Some folks were unfortunate enough to get positions in toxic work environments, where they have to deal with the unethical approaches of their management; others might have learned that the field they chose is not their cup of tea, yet quitting on the spot is not something they can afford to do.
That said, things are not always going to go according to plan, but today we are going to focus on one of the most unpleasant parts of being employed: dismissal.
“What’s the worst reason someone got fired from your job?” – this online user turned to one of Reddit’s most informative communities to find out some of the worst reasons why people have gotten laid off. The post has managed to receive 825 upvotes and 993 comments containing crazy but entertaining stories.
More info: Reddit
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
I used to work with a super nice old man who had been at that company for 30 years, and he was getting to retire at the end of 2016.
He was 5 minutes late one day because he tripped and hurt his shin. He got fired.
The story had a happy ending though. He sued the pants off the company, won a s**t ton of money and got a lot of the corrupt upper management fired, including the CFO.
RELATED:
#2
A husband and wife both worked in the same building. The security guys notice some shenanigans going on in their car in the parking lot of the course of several days.
HR gets a call, reviews the tape, and sure enough, they're having sexy time in the parking lot after lunch.
HR calls them in and basically says, "hey, you guys, this is no big deal, but could you guys not have sex in the parking lot? Somebody might see, and that would be bad."
The husband acts bewildered, and claims he doesn't know what HR is talking about, so they go to the tape. Sure enough, it's the wife and *her supervisor* going to town in the couple's car.
The husband goes nuts, and demands that heads roll. Wife and her supervisor are fired that day.
#3
For having a criminal record. From a crime he committed 30 years ago. He was 50, had a rough childhood and had just managed to get his life back together. He had worked for this company for close to two year and was by far the hardest worker in that factory, he would output at least twice as much product per day as the next best person. He took time off to get married and regional management enacted a blanket rule and the branch management said nothing. I learned a hard lesson that day, companies have no loyalty towards their employees.
He went on to work for their competitors two blocks away and was given a pay rise so at least it worked out ok for him.
#4
Guy was fired for stealing from the register. We were all surprised since he was well liked, and a hard worker. Few months later I was helping the manager clean behind the cash wrap. When we got to the register that employee used most often and popped out the cash drawer we found a handful of 20s behind it. Turned out that bills were getting caught and dragged behind the till.
WordWeaver 2 years ago
And ... did he get an apology? So his reason for dismissal could be straightened out?
#5
This guy at my old job had a crush on another one of our coworkers. It was really obvious, and as time went on it got more and more intense and uncomfortable. It got to the point where she started having panic attacks at work whenever they were on shift together, so she approached management and asked if she could not be rostered on with him anymore.
Management agreed and everything was fine for a while. The guy was a little depressed because he mysteriously never got to work with his crush anymore, but we thought it was good for him because he seemed to have dialled it back a bit and wasn't so obsessive. Unfortunately we were wrong, because when it somehow got back to him that she had requested to not work with him anymore he went f*****g crazy.
He made a fake Instagram account in her name, adding all her coworkers and stealing pictures from her Facebook and uploading them with awful captions that contained super racist and f****d up s**t-shaming language. It was so awful. Then he posted a picture of the CEO of the company and wrote a long, insulting, ranting caption, tagged said CEO, as well as a bunch of people from upper and middle management.
Happily, no one ever for one second thought it was a real Instagram account as it was so obviously a revenge driven smear campaign. The main suspect was also pretty obvious. He was very quickly fired, and also banned from ever coming into the building again.
#6
I worked at a phone store. When I was hired they very clearly stated that client privacy is super important. The guy i was hired to replace had been fired on the spot because he had sold a contract to a client, thought the girl was pretty and later that evening called her to ask her out. I'd say that's such a massive breach of privacy he deserved to get fired over it.
#7
A client's wife made a scene that one of our receptionists was sending her husband nudes. She came with printouts. Was fired that day. I've never seen a woman so hell-bent on destroying another.
#8
Dunno if it's the worst, but it's certainly the dumbest.
Small late-stage start-up. Small U.S. staff. Me (account management, tech support), CFO, CEO. CEO is doing sales, but CFO (who is new) recommends we hire someone for that. So we do.
Guy was a trainwreck. Regularly low-key racist. Frequently made comments about "the gay agenda," and how it was okay for him to use homophobic slurs because he had a gay friend. Once laid into me in front of the CEO and CFO when I refused to lie to a prospective client about the viability of our product for their situation, and was shocked when the COs backed me instead of him.
But Sales Guy didn't get fired for any of that. No.
He got fired because, on a trade show trip, he shared a cab back to the hotel with me and the CFO. On the way, a but tipsy from dinner, he suggested we head to a strip club or get some prostitutes. CFO and I decline. So Sales Guy whips out his phone, finds a girl on Craig's List, and calls her up. *Haggles* with her for the rest of the cab ride. Talks her down in price, and gives her the name of the hotel.
Next morning, we're back on the trade show floor with the CEO. And Sales Guy starts openly complaining that the prostitute never showed. Called her all kinds of names, too.
That, he was fired for as soon as we got back to the office.
#9
Many years ago, when I was working at a Wall Street bank...
Dude got drunk at the office Christmas party, and knocked one of his female coworkers out cold. He had no memory of this. Monday AM he calls security because his badge doesn't work. They come down with a box containing his personal items, and hand it to him with a letter from legal stating that he'll be arrested if he ever shows up on their premises again.
#10
Our cart dude was a racist a*****e who always tried to provoke (usually random) people into fighting him. He'd accidentally knock displays over and then say "I ain't cleanin' that up." and walk away.
Management tried to fire him several times but, for whatever reason, the Union always stepped in to protect him. He was *finally* fired and escorted off the premises after he threatened to kill the floral manager because she complained that he was bothering her.
WordWeaver 2 years ago
"Bothering her" means what? Is that management speak for sexual harassment?
#11
Okay this is going to sound crazy but it JUST happened to me like an hour or two ago.
I'm training with a work at home call center right now and we use a zoom like program to communicate and like we typically mute our mics when we're not actively talking. So we are in kind of a just back from break lul before we got started and someone forgot to remute thier mic and like we could hear her talking to her husband (which is a nono because you're technically supposed to be in a room alone because credit info)
So we hear them talking and we're like "Yoooo mic check."
And then she said it y'all.
She said the n word. Not with a soft a, it was a hard r. A really hard r.
She was fired by the end of the hour.
#12
Sleeping on the job.
The kicker is, he was doing it every day, but nobody important noticed. But then they talked about his performance and how he needed to get more done, he said that he cant, cause he needed his mid day nap.
Glenn Schroeder 2 years ago
One of my wife's coworkers got fired because she posted an ad for her side business in the local newspaper, and gave her work number for people to call.
#13
The person was lying about doing their job. When we go to locations we have to get the signature of the person in charge on logs and submit them daily. Apparently this person was just walking into places, getting the signature of some random employee or just putting fake names, then immediately walked out without doing the job. They would hang out in their vehicle (work cars have GPS trackers) for the amount of time they said they were there on the inspection and repeat. Got away with it for months.
Only way anyone found out was one of the places called called complaining they hadn't gotten an inspection all year. Supervisors pulled logs and went to the places and verified that the person had not done any of their work.
#14
Guy at a big retailer drank a bottle of wine in his car during his break and then returned to work. He got the wine sleepies, and decided it was a good idea to nap in one of the display beds in the furniture dept. that probably would have been bad enough, but the thing is…. Nobody noticed him there. Security locked and armed the building and everyone went home. Fast forward to 3am and the alarms are going off and security was called in for an intruder. He had woken up and started wandering through the store. Security and cops just let him leave. Fast forward again until 8am and I (then the loss prevention manager) get called upstairs because the managers found a pair of shoes at the foot of a slept in bed. Which was also soaked through with urine. $4k in damages and the most awkward conversation later, he denied being drunk and almost got to keep his job on a technicality.
Powerful Katrinka 2 years ago
I hope that he ended getting help for his alcohol abuse disorder.
#15
She had head lice so bad they were laying eggs in her hair and inside her eye sockets. She refused to stay home and get medical attention and eventually had to be terminated because she kept coming to work and causing the rest of the line to be quarantined and tested, disrupting production on 4 different occasions.
WordWeaver 2 years ago
Why? In this day and age of easily accomplished personal hygiene? Sounds like a mental health problem in play there. Hope she got help.
#16
We had the new-years party (alcohol involved) and a guy started hitting on a big boss HR, who came to visit our country from the headquarters during that period of time. She tactically rejected him, but he started talking s**t about her and.. wait for it...then he f*****g threatened her lmao
#17
I'm a Director at a zoo here.
More people than you might think (mostly interns and one or two full-time hires) have been fired for being unable or unwilling to deal with the stench/foulness of the job.
#18
Mechanic of 32 years got fired for disabling the RF entry card readers on the back side of the warehouse, so he could throw parties in it after warehouse hours, nobody batted an eye until they mistakenly invited the plant manager to it.
#19
One woman got long covid and a note from her doctor saying she couldn't come into the office for some respiratory sensitivity thing (we have all worked from home for two years and are now coming back full time). Bosses said she had to come in. They can't fire her for being sick, so they wrote her up for insubordination because she was using too much bold font in her emails and it came across as rude. They are now firing her because she has a record of insubordination.
#20
dude at work was a known theif, just hadnt been caught by the supervisors. one day hes walking out with some zipties sticking out of his lunch box and an engineer walking by asked if he paid for those, dude said no. then engineer brought it up to his supervisor in a meeting and they fired the theif right then.
it was fantastic. dude lost a damn good $30+ hr welding job, with all the benefits, over $10 worth of zipties.
#21
Social worker here.....one lady was fired for falsifying case notes.....said she was "pre-documenting" her work.
SkekVi 2 years ago
this is terrifying. I'm so worried are all her clients she was screwing over okay??? The amount of power social workers have and the amount of screwing people over they do by just not giving a $%&* about their clients... and those clients can't get restitution, most times!! Glad she was fired but horrendously scary that she exists.
#22
He was in bad financial straits, and had debt collectors harassing him at work. We had a department-shared phone line, so about five or six of us would randomly get calls intended for him.
He got fired because we couldn't get work done under those circumstances. But you know, he couldn't pay back his debts if he was harassed out of his paycheck.
Tim Granger 2 years ago (edited)
If you inform a debt collector not to call you at work, the next call is harassment and a violation of the FDCPA, which results in fines that can be paid to you.
#23
She couldn't count. She was a cashier.
Kathryn Baylis 2 years ago
I remember working with a girl—-a junior in college—-who would routinely count the dimes in her till and get a grand total with a 5 on the end of it.
#24
My brother was hired at a bakery, as a baker. He got fired his first day cuz he couldn't decorate a cake
#25
Neighbor’s babysitter got fired because she left the kids (3 kids under 10) alone in the house when she was scheduled to leave. Apparently she thought the Dad was still upstairs and she got paid weekly so she didn’t have any reason to talk to him after she had put all the kids to bed. But Dad had left and the Mom was late coming home. The Mom about had a heart attack. I could hear her yelling from my house.
Edit: counts for the prompt because I also babysat for them occasionally
#26
Stole a ton of money from our workplace
We worked at a gas station and he would incorrectly count the money in the till and pocket the rest. Also would delete security footage off the computer. Took a long time for them to figure out it was him. There was a warrant out for his arrest after and I'm not sure what happened after that. What's crazy is he was always super nice and you would never suspect him of it.
Bec 2 years ago
Receptionist at the Dr.'s office my aunt managed was not ringing up people who paid cash and pocketing the $. Even after setting up a 'sting' and recording it, the police said there wasn't enough evidence to press charges. They fired her, then her family was threatening my aunt. This woman had pulled the same at her previous job but for legal reasons you can't say too much when you call for a reference.
#27
Waked in on a guy chugging from a fifth of Smirnoff in the break room at the movie theater we worked at. He told me he had drank a bit more than half of it. I didn’t rat on him but I didn’t really have to after he vomited in the concession booth…
#28
She was drinking on the job. Would frequent a local bar/restraunt every day on her lunch. The owner went for lunch one day and saw her belligerent at the bar. Instantly fired, packing her office by the time lunch was over.
#29
scammers called and asked for $2k, she pulled it outta the safe and handed it to them no questions asked
Bi-Polar Express 2 years ago
She pulled it out of the safe and handed it to them through the phone?
#30
Back when I was 21, I got fired from the green apron coffee company because I was drinking during the overnight shifts when we were drive thru only. Fair's fair.
From my current company, I've seen two people fired for six-figure overruns on projects. One was due to the person not really understanding any of the technical details of what they were managing, but they'd gotten by for years on having really good technical staff underneath them so they only had to do admin. The other was supposedly a senior subject matter expert but burned through over $100k of project budget to fill in a 3-tab worksheet that should have taken 2 weeks tops... and none of it was even correct.
In both cases there were some obvious issues with higher up leadership as well that let those situations get to that point, but no one came out a winner.
A Thousand Years Wide 2 years ago
Drinking coffee on the overnight shift makes sense to me? Didn't specify if coffee or alcohol...
What do you think ?
Benita Valdez 2 years ago
All I got is a waitress was fired for credit card fraud. She would steal card info and use them to buy stuff. Not sure how long she did it or how much she stole but she was very bold and stole enough for the fbi to contact the manage since our restaurant was the common factor with all the credit fraud.
Joshua Moon 2 years ago
Had to walk a guy out at work for going to the bathroom and coming back to the fabrication shop smelling of beer. Talk to the guy about it and he offers me a beer from a six pack he had stashed in the tank of a toilet in the bathroom.
Dippin Dot 2 years ago
“Stealing company time” - I didn’t write down that I took 5 minutes extra for lunch because I came in 5 minutes early but wrote down my scheduled starting time… they refused to pay overtime, even a minute. But it’s also illegal for me to work off the clock, which I did often. I’m pretty sure this was their way of getting rid of the person who, the previous week, uncovered they were knowingly coding things wrong to not pay taxes, which is also illegal. It was not long after the whole company went belly-up because they couldn’t pay their bills. The CFO (owners son) had multiple sets of books he was cooking.
Benita Valdez 2 years ago
All I got is a waitress was fired for credit card fraud. She would steal card info and use them to buy stuff. Not sure how long she did it or how much she stole but she was very bold and stole enough for the fbi to contact the manage since our restaurant was the common factor with all the credit fraud.
Joshua Moon 2 years ago
Had to walk a guy out at work for going to the bathroom and coming back to the fabrication shop smelling of beer. Talk to the guy about it and he offers me a beer from a six pack he had stashed in the tank of a toilet in the bathroom.
Dippin Dot 2 years ago
“Stealing company time” - I didn’t write down that I took 5 minutes extra for lunch because I came in 5 minutes early but wrote down my scheduled starting time… they refused to pay overtime, even a minute. But it’s also illegal for me to work off the clock, which I did often. I’m pretty sure this was their way of getting rid of the person who, the previous week, uncovered they were knowingly coding things wrong to not pay taxes, which is also illegal. It was not long after the whole company went belly-up because they couldn’t pay their bills. The CFO (owners son) had multiple sets of books he was cooking.
Related on Bored Panda
