Ever been fired or let go?

[Nighthawk 0]

It's sort of an overly complex story, but it was this: at this sporting goods store, some of the items were stored in the back, and if you wanted one, you went and told the cashier and they would call for it over the PA. Often, because the store was a wreck, we'd be out and you'd have to go up and say we didn't have any. She'd look in the computer and then storm back there and be like "The computer says we have three, you're just being lazy." and look for a minute and then be like "I have to get back to the register. Stop being lazy and find it now!" and you don't find it, and she then she complains to management, which on this unfortunate instance was me. I put up with for a while... but I decided it was time for the truth.

I was sort of coasting by that point, didn't really want to work there. The place was incredibly incompetent. New shipments would come in, and somebody would be like "I don't feel like putting this up." and stick it in the corner put a bunch of stuff in front of it (largely why we could never find anything). People would always show up drunk or high, one guy even carried a flask on the sales floor. Everybody was fucking everybody else, occasionally on the clock. I mean, I fucked a couple girls I worked with, but not, you know, during work.

[CBright7831 0]

It's sort of an overly complex story, but it was this: at this sporting goods store, some of the items were stored in the back, and if you wanted one, you went and told the cashier and they would call for it over the PA. Often, because the store was a wreck, we'd be out and you'd have to go up and say we didn't have any. She'd look in the computer and then storm back there and be like "The computer says we have three, you're just being lazy." and look for a minute and then be like "I have to get back to the register. Stop being lazy and find it now!" and you don't find it, and she then she complains to management, which on this unfortunate instance was me. I put up with for a while... but I decided it was time for the truth.

I was sort of coasting by that point, didn't really want to work there. The place was incredibly incompetent. New shipments would come in, and somebody would be like "I don't feel like putting this up." and stick it in the corner put a bunch of stuff in front of it (largely why we could never find anything). People would always show up drunk or high, one guy even carried a flask on the sales floor. Everybody was fucking everybody else, occasionally on the clock. I mean, I fucked a couple girls I worked with, but not, you know, during work.

[treble 0]

I got laid-off a few months ago when the factory decided to cut down from 24 hours/7 days a week to 24 hours/5 days a week, which cut the number of crews from 4 to 3. Anyone who worked there for less than 3 years or whatever was let go, which was a good chunk of people. About a week later they hired a bunch of temp workers since they got some new contract, which pissed enough people off that there was a story in the newspaper about it, but I didn't really care.

 

About a month ago, I got a call telling me I could go back until the end of August, but fuck that. I'm not spending my whole summer working a shitty job that I know there's no future in.

[NoCalMike 0]

I worked at the same place Ced did, (well I worked for the place that did the shipping/packaging for them, but it was attached) so I got the layoff from there as well when the moved to Houston.

 

I was fired from a job once cause I made a joke to a co-worker that it would be easy to screw up the system in place and then quit, leaving nightmares for the crew, he ran and told the boss, and the boss got paranoid and fired me.....I got a good laugh from that one.

 

The last job I was fired from, I have no idea why. The company made me sign a paper upon employment that basically said they reserved the right to fire anyone at anytime without explanation, so they never told me why. I have my suspicions that not being part of the inner-club within out department played a role, considering all my "buddies" worked in the IT department and I was in the data entry department.

 

I have been laid off from various temp jobs, but those were merely because I had completed the assignment and they had no full-time positions to offer....the bastards.

 

I guess you can say I haven't found a job yet that pays me enough to care or put forth much effort. Don't get me wrong, when I show up to work, I work and put in my 40 hours and my attendance record is superb and I usually have no complaints about quality of work. The most often criticism in my reviews is that I don't show enough drive, I don't go the extra mile, but quite frankly, with the companies I have worked for, all that wouldn't have got me further anyhow. The one job I had that paid pretty well was a warehousing job, but that job sucked so hard that the money was the ONLY reason to do it, and eventually you get burned out. Lucky for me my wife(well in 3 weeks) brings home mucho buckaroos, which affords me, for the time being to take more time in finding a long-term job.

[Corey_Lazarus 0]

I used to work at the local Bob's Store. For those that don't know, Bob's is a primarily Northeastern US chain of apparel stores. They claim to specialize in sports apparel, shoes, and men's clothing attire, but every Bob's I've been to has the same amount of shoe choices as your average Wal-Mart, and less sports apparel than a Wal-Mart or a Target. They do have a decent selection of men's clothing, but again: there's better at Wal-Mart. Bob's is, essentially, a yuppie K-Mart, but they do have a decent selection of working gear, like Dickies and Carhartt and such.

 

When I got the job the store wasn't even finished being put together yet (it was going into the same place where an Ames was before, and I worked at that Ames before it went out of business), and as a part of the morning shipping/receiving/stock crew, it was part of my job to help put the store together. That part was easy. Putting together fixtures, placing out the store as to the specifications of management and the "art department" (ie. store lay-out for maximum annoyance), getting in product before the store ever opened its doors...it was fucking sweet. I actually loved my job, outside of having to get up for a 6am shift that lasted anywhere from 10a to occasionally 3p. Then the shipping manager, Fred, switched stores to go work at another Bob's that just opened. Enter the former shipping manager of the Framingham Bob's: Missy.

 

Missy was a fucking cunt right from the get-go. I introduced myself to her, as did the rest of my crew, and all she told us was that we weren't allowed to bring our coffees onto the dock, that I needed a new hoodie (I had a Slayer hoodie on at the time, and all it had was the band's logo on it with sword graphics down the sleeves), and that the entire backstock area was going to be overhauled. After 3 months of a decent part-time job that gave me enough money (combined with the month and a half where I finished working at a pizza place) to fill my gas tank, pay my car insurance, and buy some CDs and food here and there, with the slight promise of upward mobility in the company (literally, the original manager Fred liked me a lot, and said I'd probably be a manager in another month or two and working full-time), I got shit on right away from a cunt on a powertrip.

 

So another few months go by, and not only am I told I'll likely never be a manager there, but I don't get the raise I was promised by the STORE MANAGER, and my hours get cut in half. I put up with it, since I still only needed enough money for my car, food, and booze, but then I finally have enough...especially when my car got totalled. So my buddy Crawford gets me a job at the warehouse he works at since he's leaving in a couple of months to go to college (Berklee, which he has since transferred from to UMass Boston), and I get an interview and am told later that day that I've got the job as soon as I want it. That night I write out a pretty damn professional letter declaring that I'm entering my 2-weeks notice into Bob's, and I put it into the store manager's mailbox the next morning before the end of my shift. Then I see Missy picking up the store manager's mail, and since it's mostly vacation request forms I think nothing of it, and then I go home.

 

A week and a half later, my schedule says I'm only working 4 days that week, so I work the first three and call out the fourth (I legitimately wasn't feeling too good, mostly due to a hangover), and then I get a letter after my second week at my new job (where I still am today) about how my employment with Bob's Stores and TJX Ltd. (the company that owns Bob's, as well as TJ Maxx and Marshall's and Home Goods) has been terminated due to a no-call/no-show on my last scheduled day. I called in, legitimately not up to working, and they fired me anyway.

 

So yeah, that's my story. Not as entertaining as the rest of yours, but amusing at least to me.

[kkktookmybabyaway 0]

The most often criticism in my reviews is that I don't show enough drive, I don't go the extra mile, but quite frankly, with the companies I have worked for, all that wouldn't have got me further anyhow.

 

What exactly can you do with data entry -- grow more fingers?

 

Been "fired" twice at dead-end jobs due to attitude. Worked two seasonal jobs when there was no more work we all went home. Surprisingly, my workplace departures from the past 10 years have been quite positive.

[CBright7831 0]

So I found out tonight, the manger that suspended me and the one I'm supposed to go and talk to tommorrow decided to go on vacation today.

 

He'll be back Monday.

 

Wonderful management skills I tell ya.

[CBright7831 0]

I went in and the assistant manager told me that the manager wanted to let me go.

 

This is going to be hard for me.

[Guest Vitamin X]

Hey didn't you have the Dubya avatar a while back?

 

Sorry, I feel no sympathy for you.

[CBright7831 0]

Hey didn't you have the Dubya avatar a while back?

 

Sorry, I feel no sympathy for you.

Ugh...no.

 

I've had this avatar for almost two years.

[CBright7831 0]

Although I will admit I did have a avatar w/ Dubya's face on it's saying "Four more years! OH BOY!" as my caption under it for a few weeks.

[CanadianGuitarist 0]

One was a door-to-door salesman job in 2003, in college. I had a flat tire on my way to a demo, so when they called me with my next lead about an hour later, I asked if there was anything in town, as I couldn't really take my car on the highway until I got a new tire. (By the way, I did go the demo when I got the flat tire. I parked a block away, did the demo, and then put a donut on). They told me to come in the next morning and let me go. The fact that this company hired 100 people on Monday, trained them on Tuesday and Wednesday, and had 65 people simultaneously walk out Thursday on the second-last day of training, and have only 6 people show up Friday, makes me think I wasn't getting let go from anything too special.

 

Two was about two months prior, also in college. Telemarketing. I pride myself on having a good work ethic, but I sucked at this, and my attitude had a lot to do with it. I missed a few shifts, including a Friday. Missing them was frowned upon, but not all bad if you made it up the Saturday, which I did in this case. But I knew I was just about done missing three shifts in four weeks, so when a customer on the phone started yelling at me, I let him have it. I don't even remember what I said, but I do recall saying something along the lines of "I'm just a college kid, this is not my job for life, I don't care about the product or you".

 

Three was about a month ago. I got hired at Gibby's, a mom and pop electronics store on June 3. My plan was to quit the paper I worked at, which was getting a little awful. Think Office Space. They also wanted me to leave Wal*Mart, which I loved. I said I didn't want to, but fine, the pay justified it. After two weeks notice to the paper and Wal*Mart, I was there full time, and I got a call on July 5 (Thursday night, which due to scheduling, was akin to my Sunday night), that since business was down and I was the newest and least agressive, I had to go. This one rankled me quite a bit, because I knew I was good at my job at Wal*Mart (both electronics/sales), I was told training would be anywhere from 2-6 weeks (I had been there in full exactly two weeks), but most of all, that they had me quit both my jobs to be laid off after two. Fortunately, Wal*Mart was happy to take me back without any questions, and my dad since has got me a job with him driving a bread truck, but I'll be staying at Wal*Mart just out of loyalty for a little while.

[Guest Vitamin X]

One was a door-to-door salesman job in 2003, in college. I had a flat tire on my way to a demo, so when they called me with my next lead about an hour later, I asked if there was anything in town, as I couldn't really take my car on the highway until I got a new tire. (By the way, I did go the demo when I got the flat tire. I parked a block away, did the demo, and then put a donut on). They told me to come in the next morning and let me go. The fact that this company hired 100 people on Monday, trained them on Tuesday and Wednesday, and had 65 people simultaneously walk out Thursday on the second-last day of training, and have only 6 people show up Friday, makes me think I wasn't getting let go from anything too special.

 

Vector Marketing? If it is, that shit is such a scam. Good riddance.

[Dobbs 3K 0]

Vector Marketing? If it is, that shit is such a scam. Good riddance.

 

Not to go way off topic, but one of my pet peeves is multi-level marketing companies (which I think Vector is, at least kind of). At my current business I've been approached by like three different reps from MarketAmerica to either carry their products or join them, and a couple years ago when I was working retail some bitch tried to recruit me for Primerica. I also had a client of mine try to recruit me for one called Quixtar or something (basically an internet wing of Amway). Idiots don't think you can Google their companies.

[Guest Vitamin X]

Primerica is another bullshit one, but it has backing from Citicorp, so that makes them look more legit. At least certainly much more legit than Vector.

 

Their hook is usually, "I own my own business, you can too!" but it's impossible unless you have this enormous social network of extremely gullible people who you can take advantage of. This girl I knew who tried to recruit me for that in Miami had these huge knockers and that raspy Scarlett Johannson voice, so I figured that's how she was so successful (enough that she could be a recruiter and all for them). I wasn't interested in really anything but getting to know her a bit, but her insistence on being part of this company was rather unappealing. Plus, she kept repeating, "I have my own business!" Fuck you, bitch. I have one, too. All it takes is $50 and a letter.

[Steve J. Rogers 0]

I have one hell of an I QUIT! story

 

I'd been working summers for my town's recreation department for several years as a tennis court attendant and occasional basketball hallway attendant (in a local elementary school) and so after a solid 6 years of that I get an offer to work a 9-5 job for a financial institution. Now, this was happening in early October so the tennis season was pretty much winding down, but I was still on the schedule, especially the upcoming Columbus Day Weekend, and my first day was that Monday (not a federal national holiday so the stock market is open).

 

I call my boss, the day I'm pretty much officially hired, from the office space I'm about to be working in, and essentially explain that my services would no longer be required by the recreation department, even that coming weekend! The guy was (well still is I should say) a good guy and understood. I mean I was paid as a part-timer anyway and with the season wrapping up (plus I was in good standing as an employee) I pretty much could give them no-day notice with my intention.

 

I do have a journalistic "let go" story. About a year earlier, 2000, I was a part-time stringer for a local daily newspaper doing HS football games and they did seem to like my work. Well let me put it this way, I am still waiting for the call to go back to work for the 2001 football season!

 

Eh, part of the business, apparently they wanted to keep those jobs in-house rather than bring in freelancing stringers. Ah well, what can you do.

[CanadianGuitarist 0]

and a couple years ago when I was working retail some bitch tried to recruit me for Primerica

 

A friend of mine got into that with her now ex-fiancee. I went along with it for a lot longer than I should have, just out of guilt to her. The fact that she made a point to tell me about her new venture while I was drunk in a bar kind of tipped me off.

 

Vector sounds awfully familiar, I'm not sure why. The salesman job was vacuum cleaners, billing themselves as CleanAirCanada or something.

[Your Paragon of Virtue 0]

"I'll never know why Bill said you were such an easy sell."

 

*Flashback*

 

"Buy this vacuum cleaner!"

 

"Okay."

 

That Kids In The Hall skit is one of my favourites.

[Vanhalen 0]

Do you guys in the States have the same sort of employee protection that we have in the UK, where you've got to take it to a verbal then a final verbal warning, then a written warning, then a final warning then you get fired? Unless its for Gross Misconduct, you can get fired right off the back for that.

[Guest Tzar Lysergic]

I have been fired from every single job I have ever had, except for where I am now. Don't give up hope, though.

 

Most of them were for insubordination, because the very idea that someone is my boss is absurd to me.

 

"Hey, Gene, go mop the back room, please."

"Hey, Gary, please eat my asshole."

 

[Corey_Lazarus 0]

Do you guys in the States have the same sort of employee protection that we have in the UK, where you've got to take it to a verbal then a final verbal warning, then a written warning, then a final warning then you get fired? Unless its for Gross Misconduct, you can get fired right off the back for that.

Most US companies, at least that I know of, make you sign a contract wherein the statement of the company being able to "fire you for any reason" is located. So no, we don't. Though a lot of the food-service companies seem to have something close to what you're talking about, but none of the companies where you could actually make a living do.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Do you guys in the States have the same sort of employee protection that we have in the UK, where you've got to take it to a verbal then a final verbal warning, then a written warning, then a final warning then you get fired? Unless its for Gross Misconduct, you can get fired right off the back for that.

Most US companies, at least that I know of, make you sign a contract wherein the statement of the company being able to "fire you for any reason" is located. So no, we don't. Though a lot of the food-service companies seem to have something close to what you're talking about, but none of the companies where you could actually make a living do.

The language might be in there but it's generally not necessary. I believe at-will employment (you can leave at any time for any reason, you can be fired at any time for any reason) is the standard in all 50 states. Of course, there are legislative protections for various sorts of discrimination, some federal, some specific to individual states, but you can ultimately get shitcanned for just about anything. Someone could be wearing a monocle, say "I don't like the cut of your jib," and you'd be done.

[Dobbs 3K 0]

Unless you have some cushy union job. I have a friend who works at an auto plant, and he can literally tell his supervisor to fuck off, as long as he doesn't threaten him. It's called a "shop talk clause", I guess. No wonder Toyota and Honda are eating the American companies alive.

[Vanhalen 0]

To be honest, thats kinda scary to think you can be fired on a whim, in the UK its basically impossible to get fired unless you seriously fuck up

[Big Ol' Smitty 0]

Someone could be wearing a monocle, say "I don't like the cut of your jib," and you'd be done.

 

That's typically what I've been fired for in the past.

[Red Baron 0]

I'm trying to quit my new job at the Hotel I work at currently. I hate it, and I hate how they handle things.

[King Kamala 0]

and a couple years ago when I was working retail some bitch tried to recruit me for Primerica

 

A friend of mine got into that with her now ex-fiancee. I went along with it for a lot longer than I should have, just out of guilt to her. The fact that she made a point to tell me about her new venture while I was drunk in a bar kind of tipped me off.

 

Vector sounds awfully familiar, I'm not sure why. The salesman job was vacuum cleaners, billing themselves as CleanAirCanada or something.

 

 

Vector sells cutlery. I had a job interview with them a couple of months back that literally lasted 30 seconds. I wasn't too crushed by their rejection because I didn't really want to sell cutlery in the first place.

[godthedog 0]

I'm trying to quit my new job at the Hotel I work at currently. I hate it, and I hate how they handle things.

 

isn't quitting a job something you sort of automatically succeed at doing? how do you only "try" to do that?

[the max 0]

Got fired out of Walmart, which was my first job because I was able to milk the clock, hide in the backroom and read magazines and swipe various items out of the damage department. Eventually they pulled me out of my department and stuck me on a register during the xmas rush, which worked fine for me and the people who I rang out because I was fast as shit and didn't ask any questions. But management didn't like my "attitude" because they felt I wasn't smiling enough and not showing enough enthusiasm. Except when I got to use the PA system and would drone on monosyllabically. Eventually, even though I was hired far before xmas, I was let go. But by then, I had already started at MVP Sports across the street (and was already basically running their footwear department.)

 

Got fired by Babies R'Us (where most of my friends worked) for destruction of company property. I was the janitor there, a job shared by myself, a 300 lb. retarded woman and a Guatamalan known as "Skip". Great team. I lasted almost two months and three write-ups, but when I accidentally broke a paper towel dispenser in the break room, the boss fired me immediately, walked me out to my car and (I still remember this) told me that I was a poor excuse for a janitor, which was bad news for me because that's the only career option that I probably had. I told her to fuck herself and threatened to run her over with my car. Funny sidenote: I ended up working at/managing the Dunkin Donuts down the street from this place and I wiped my balls with her danish one time.

 

Also got fired from RFVideo when I worked in their kiosk in the local mall. Basically, I took the job because I hung out there and bought a lot of shit from them anyways. The boss there was a prick who was forging his timesheets (putting down that he stayed until six, when he was ducking out at 230 when I got there) and stealing tapes, shirts and whatnot from the inventory. Anyways, I got canned when I called the main office and complained because I had yet to receive my paycheck and it had been almost two weeks. Since I was closing alone in the middle of december, I threatened to drop the curtains, lock the joint up and go home. They assured me that I would get my check that weekend. I called BS and closed up for the night. I think they got fined for us closing early and made up some bogus charge that I was responsible for all of the tapes and shirts that were missing (even though I didn't watch any of the tapes that were stolen) and got fired. They were going to take it out of my paycheck, but I told them that I had contacted the BBB and they gave me cash and told me to get lost. Not long after the fact, they closed the kiosk themselves in the middle of the night. The morning guy came in to find that the cart had been completely emptied and had a "FOR RENT" sign on it. Oh and I got my revenge on that boss by slashing his tires when we saw him at some restaurant.

 

I also have the McDonald's firing story. I just stopped showing up. But, I was working three jobs at the time and being swore at in creole every night wasn't worth the six bucks an hour they were paying me. I ran the grill and just decided one morning when my alarm went off at 415a that I was sleeping in and showed up two weeks later to turn in my never washed uniform (I worked there for almost a month) and get my final paycheck.

 

Also got fired by KMart. I put in for certain days off and got the approval in writing. My buddy came down from MA for the week and when I went back to work after he left, I was told that I was fired for five days of "no-call/no-show". I asked to see the schedule and found out that they had handwritten days for me to work without telling me anything. Eh. It wasn't like I needed the job.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Jeez. Hope you've found something more stable by now; I think I would have killed myself had I managed to get fired by Kmart, Walmart, and Babies R' Us in one lifetime.