Ridiculous ‘calling in sick’ reasons

[Sofacat]

A member of staff has called in sick with a bit of a reason and it reminded me of a young member of staff years ago who called in sick with jet lag - they’d been to Ireland .

Any one else with daft reasons for calling in sick ?

I once had to ring in, well after I should have been at work, because I'd laid down with DD to get her to nap and fallen asleep myself. I was only on for the afternoon and her dad was at work, so by the time I could have got us both ready, taken DD to my mum's and then got to work it would have been pointless me coming in. I was a young-ish new mum in a team of lovely mostly older ladies, and thankfully they took it well and nothing more was said

Years ago I had a colleague who was due back into work on a Monday morning after a fortnights holiday. It was a beach holiday to somewhere like Tenerife. Despite the fact she was an adult in her 20’s her mum called in sick for her. The reason was “Her holiday has really taken it out of her” She was such a CF.

Years ago, one of the apprentices in my friend’s firm was dreadfully late for work. Notorious for sleeping in and had quite a few warnings. He lived out of the city. (Relevant)

He came in, looking the worse for wear, saying that he’d had to go to the hospital for suspected drink spiking and they’d kept him in for observation. Fair enough.

But unfortunately for him, he chose to embellish his story with the name of the hospital. He chose the name of the hospital which deals solely with mental health, not the hospital he really would have been taken to.

Colic is real, I had an on call GP (back when they still came out) diagnose me with colic, the pain was related to my intestines apparently, i was in such pain he gave me a morphine injection. Different pain to when I had gallstones (also called colic pain) years later though that was also absolute agony on and off til I got my gall bladder out.

@purplebob it 100% wasn't that! She meant she had a mildly upset stomach giving her gas

@Iwannatellyouastory she definitely didn't have that.

I've had renal colic before and thought I was dying, it was worse than labour. She meant she had gas and a slightly sore tummy.

Someone couldn't come in because their tortoise had broken it's leg.

You’d at least be late for that. You’d have to take it to the vet ASAP.

Not a colleague but my teacher at school read out a classmate’s note from his mum once. It explained that little Johnny had been off school for 3 days because he’d run into a tree while watching a squirrel and knocked himself out.

I once had someone call me from the motorway to say he was going to be late. He’d got halfway to the office and realised he hadn’t put any trousers on

Someone l know received a call from a colleague saying they couldn’t come to work, as their wife had conjunctivitis

Not my story, but the other week a MNer said she knew a serial sickie puller who had rang up to say she was trapped in her living room as she'd put hand cream on and so her hand kept slipping off the door handle 🤣 she literally couldn't get a grip 😂

I got sent home from work when I had a call from the vet to say my cat had died. She’d been in a RTA and crawled home the night before. I’d taken her to the emergency on call vet that night who was going to operate next morning but she died under the anaesthetic. To be fair, I was so upset I was useless at work.

I don't have a good one but wanted to point out that it is entirely possible to oversleep during the day if you're either working odd hours to pay your way through uni or if like me you're a chronic illness sufferer with severe insomnia (it's common to finally switch off at five, six, seven in the morning and recently thanks this I slept through my alarm)

Also, @OhLook I've genuinely eaten hash cookies (two decades ago) which I had no idea were hash cookies. Friend actually had a jar if regular ones in the kitchen but didn't tell me about the hash cookies, never did find out if they thought I knew and had said to grab some, or if they thought I knew but were genuinely saying help myself to a few biscuits.

I didn't have to be anywhere which was good. But I ate several.

I wish I could say that was the only time something like that happened but it wasn't the first or last time something similar happened.

Did get spiked with acid one night when I was 17 and out, had no idea what was going on and the next day I went to work but had to go home early. Was seriously unimpressed to find out what a supposed friend had done. Crosses it off the bucketlist though.

Not my story, but the other week a MNer said she knew a serial sickie puller who had rang up to say she was trapped in her living room as she'd put hand cream on and so her hand kept slipping off the door handle 🤣 she literally couldn't get a grip 😂

Howling at this!

Colleague phoned in saying she had a tummy bug and wouldn't be coming into work or going to the team night out.
That night we're sat at our table in a restaurant (about 20 staff and management). Guess who walks past the window dressed up as if she's off to a nightclub? Yep, the "poorly" member of staff.

@MrsMoastyToasty did anyone say anything to her about it?

The trick is 'no pay for the first day of sickness'; maybe across the board. Unless you have a doctor's note. Which we all know would be v hard to get. D&V? Poo sample.

I am beyond shocked by how many of my NHS front line fellow employees call in sick. For one day. And never the lucrative shifts, Oh no.

Exhausted by over-onerous night shift/long shift commitments? Then say so. Enough evidence might change that, for everyone.

You'd have to be a serious CF to pull two days of fraudulent sickness.

Meanwhile I was once made to work my bar shift until 2am despite telling them how sick I I felt - he let me have a 30 minute nap at 10pm in the office - and it turning out I had really bad strep throat. Slept for three days in and out of fevers after that ducking shift

@tdmn if I broke my finger I would definitely need DP to come and help me. That kid of thing makes me pass out and my blood pressure skydives. I wouldn't have made it to a phone let alone a car

An office based colleague was off for 6 weeks with a broken toe

(NHS)

I once had a colleague who called in sick and was spotted at Wimbledon on TV that afternoon.
I was once really late for work because I'd been waiting for surgery and was so exhausted I fell asleep on the train to Doncaster and the next stop where I could get off was Peterborough.

@Miljea is an impossible test though - I have migraine anything up to 27 days a month. Yes really. I work through lots of them, but at times my medication fails and I have to take to a cold, dark room to sleep. It means most of my sickness are single days, because I drag my arse back in during the recovery (as long as I can see). There's millions of people out there in the same sort of boat with migraine, we'd be fucked. So would anyone with fatigue as a consequence of a chronic health condition. A GP note for a migraine would be impossible - I couldn't drive or be in any form of transport to get to a surgery for one thing...

You'll always get liars and lead swingers.

This thread has reminded me. I was once late for work because, whilst travelling to work in my colleagues car (there were 3 of us in the car who worked for the same very small business), radio 1 announced that the breakfast show with Chris Moyles was, quite unbelievably, coming to our small home town for a special breakfast show! They announced where the tickets were waiting and it was a race to get there to collect them. First come first served! It

It was a choice of, go and get the tickets and all be very late for work or just go to work. It was a no brainier! The town was utter chaos, vehicles driving up the pedestrianised high street, nearly knocking those of us who were on foot racing to get our tickets in the pouring rain! Let’s just say our boss was NOT impressed!!! Worth it though!

I had to phone in late once when I realised I was still wearing my slippers.
7 of us phoned in sick after a work do, we were all still drunk and couldn't drive. Not sure whose idea it was to half the end of term night out on an actual school night.

I did have to phone in once to say I was going to be late because a seagull had shit on me. I was half way walking to work, walked under a street light and the seagull let loose. It was truly appalling No idea birds could shit that much. I had to go back home strip off, jump in the shower scrub myself madly and then toss my clothes in the washing machine.