Stupidest bollockings you’ve had at work?

[TimeAtTheBar]

I got called into a meeting with my bosses boss yesterday to address a complaint from a member of my team that I had disappeared off for half an hour last weekend.

…I took just half an hour of my one hour paid break and left another manager in charge.

Apart from the fact I am SO DONE with this particular job, this could have easily been resolved without a face to face meeting which I found intimidating and overkill.

To make me feel better, tell me about your stupid or unfair bollockings please; because I am still raging about it a day later.

Years ago I had an admin job. I was told explicitly that for a few days I couldn’t go to either of my managers. They were both experiencing unrelated very serious health problems. Problem occurs and I got a disciplinary for not telling one of the managers.

Oh oh I have another one. When I worked with celebs a famous TV presenter once rang my ddl and gave me a thorough bollocking for not being the person he expected to talk to. I've never met or spoken to said presenter and politely explained that he'd dialled one digit wrong on the extension and I would get the person he wanted to ring him back. He just kept having a go at me for being me and not the other person. He is notoriously mental though.

Started a new job replacing someone who had left because he wanted more money. After two weeks he decided he couldn't do the new job and wanted to come back. Somehow he was given a job in IT which he wasn't remotely qualified for, he then spent most of his time trying to get me into trouble.

When I tried to put an advert on the intranet, he offered to help and did it for me. Then reported me for describing someone as a slut. My advert read: "Sluttish behaviour by my cat means I have kittens looking for good homes..."

He then reported that I had pictures of a naked man on my pc. It was my desktop picture of an angel and he wasn't naked.

When something repeatedly set my car alarm off in the car park, I got hauled into the manager's office because it was disturbing the IT department. I didn't even hear a car alarm let alone know it was mine. Never had a problem with that car alarm anywhere else.

The department manager soon got to hate me because the IT manager was constantly ringing her about something I had done. It didn't matter how ridiculous it was, she still had a go at me.

New to a Teaching Assistant post I was chastised by the Lead TA for using my own aesthetic (& scented) stickers to reward students’ work. When I commented that I thought the school regulation ones were ‘uninspiring’ I was verbally ticked off and scowled at. She told me I would be disciplined if I continued to use the pretty ones. Lead TA was later done for workplace bullying by several other members of staff … it was ludicrous.

I once got told off for 'discussing pay with colleagues' when all I said was "what's the minimum wage again?"

Turns out they were paying everyone minimum wage apart from their favorites so they were worried they were going to get found out.

Got told off for not doing a job on Friday and in the same telling off I was told off for doing it too early the following Monday. Still don't understand it. 🤷🏼‍♀️🤔

Teacher….

Bollocked by new Head for buying a schoolful of Apple computers. Way above my pay grade.
True, I and other HOD’s had been in favour of them over PCs. But it was the previous Head’s decision.
Told her but my name was mud. It would have been minuted if she’d bothered to look.

Another school…… OFSTED in early July. You get 1 day’s notice. We got the call on Monday, inspectors in on Tuesday.
All Y10 out on work experience.
My y11 GCSE exam group had done their exam a week or two earlier and had left.

Head panicking - sudden decision on Tuesday - we had to set all of our classes exercise books out for inspectors to look at and evaluate.

‘Dexion where are your y10 + 11 books?

‘Y10 books - with pupils, who are out on work experience.
Y 11 books With pupils, they needed them for revision and have now left, sorry but I can’t get them back’

There was nothing he could do but he still huffed and puffed. It was the norm for pupils to have their exercise books unless you’d taken them in for marking.

We scraped the OFSTED - that time. Largely on our departments strong performance in lesson observations. Never got thanks or recognition.

@karmakameleon I had a similar issue. I had a full time admin job that could easily have been done with a day or so less a week, other than opening the morning mail and franking the afternoon mail which had to be done as late as possible. A lot of the time I was twiddling my thumbs. Some days were busy but only in a "this is around two hours work, but I could probably spread this out throughout the day and appear busy" sort of way. I went on maternity leave and a woman from another department covered me. She had been due to be made redundant from the other department but kept on as my maternity cover instead. When I had my return to work meeting I was told that because my role was such a busy one (???!!) the other woman would be kept on as well. So both of us full time doing one part time role. She was given some typing to do for one of the directors (different dept) which he would forward on to me for spelling and grammar corrections, she completely messed up the filing system, and would spend a great deal of the day working her way through the different departments for a bit of a natter. I spent time playing solitaire in between the short bursts of work that had to be done. I complained to my line manager that there wasn't enough work but was told that my colleague was rushed off her feet (doing sweet FA) and that I should be helping her out more. It was only a small organisation with around 30 employees at most in an open plan office. Everyone could see what was going on but guess who got a verbal for playing solitaire? A couple of us reckoned that colleague had something juicy on the line manager, but I think the line manager wanted directors to be impressed with her managing such a "busy" department. Crappiest manager I've ever had and now she's brown nosed her way up to senior director level with all the pay rises along the way.

I took voluntary redundancy as soon as I could!

Also, same job I occasionally had to cover the reception desk while customer services had a team meeting. A female customer/service user came in crying her eyes out with two children who were visibly upset at their mother's state. I couldn't do anything to actually assist her as no access to their computer system, so I made her a coffee while we waited for customer services (I'd informed the manager of the situation). We had one of those hot water boilers on the wall, so I was away from the desk for a maximum of two minutes. I sat with her, she calmed down a bit and the kids quietly played with some puzzles that were in reception. Did I do a good job for showing concern and empathy to this poor woman? Did I hell!! How dare I make a coffee for a service user. Apparently, it would have been the right thing for me to have stayed behind the high reception desk and let her and the kids cry. This woman had just fled from an abusive partner, taking nothing with her apart from the kids. The way staff spoke about the customers was absolutely disgusting. I was not sorry to see the back of most of them.

I got bollocked for laughing. Wasn’t loud, was just a quick laugh and it’s a small factory. Got reported by someone who had been there for 30 years and didn’t like people smiling let alone laughing

I got a bollocking because a new girl that joined our team had holiday booked the same week as me.I’d pre booked mine the year before manager was aware, girl had been with us for about 4 months when she decided she was going on holiday. Manager pulled me aside and asked why I didn’t tell her I was on that holiday that week. I had and she still booked hers.

When I was a student nurse I got a bollocking for talking to the porters. Perhaps I should have used sign language or semaphore!

When I was newly qualified, a senior nurse asked me about XYZ, thinking the answer would be ‘I don’t know’. However, I answered her question correctly having had a great deal of experience in that area in a previous role as a specialist HCA prior to qualifying.

The next day, I got pulled in for a proper sit-down bollocking by my ward manager (who was chummy with the other nurse) and told that I was ‘being difficult’ and that I shouldn’t have answered how I did. I asked if I should have lied and said I didn’t know and was told that I shouldn’t have ‘showed off’ and instead let her ‘teach’ me, even though I already knew.

That place has an incredibly high staff turnover because they like to absolutely break their staff and destroy their confidence; leaving was the best decision I ever made! I work in a totally different area of nursing now where our previous experience and expertise is celebrated and welcomed.

Got bollocked for smoking in my uniform.

I don't smoke. I was just outside on my unpaid break because it was hot. Told the boss I wasn't smoking and wasn't with a smoker either. Boss said I shouldn't be outside then because it looks like I could be smoking.

We're allowed outside in uniforms (with a coat over it if smoking) but as a smoker themselves, I reckon they didn't think anyone should be outside unless having a fag.

We are expected teach outdoor lessons similar to yours! Your HT would hate our school as we’re out in all weathers at least 3 times a week 😂

I worked for a large insurance company and I was given a formal warning for using the toilet for more than 3 minutes in an 8 hour day. I had severe stomach issues but that didn't matter.

Worked in a large open plan office. Got a bollocking from my manager for leaving the workspace without his permission. I had moved two metres from my desk into cellular office space for a meeting. I was clearly visible the whole time if he'd had the intelligence to look.

My miscarriage didn't suit my boss' timetable. She was an utter cunt.

More directly with a client than work but just had to call them as they had a complaint.
Complaint was that I tried to contact them and used text not a call .
I had called, and left a voicemail, had log on my phone , I suspect text was from service provider saying you have a voice mail.
They had clearly listened to my voicemail yet still insisted I had sent a text .
Apparently their phone didn't make a noise ( clearly my fault somehow) and they have bad reception at home so I should have called the landline ( which they had never given , clearly entering the one mobile as point of contact )
When I didn't admit to sending a text or actually doing anything wrong I was told I was arguing with her.
Eventually I gritted my teeth and said I'm sorry if anything I did was perceived by you to be wrong , and she said " well you just had to say that in the first place "

Whilst working at a well-known high street bakery chain I was:
Told off for not making sure the stripes of icing on the doughnuts were all facing the same way.
Told not to wave customers over to my till because 'they might think you're being cheeky'. Apparently it was better to stand and shout 'next please!' like a fishwife.

We were limited on use on the photocopier and found our one of our manager's code and everyone used that.

They read out the top 3 users in the staff meeting and it was Mrs brown has used it 56 times, Mr Smith next worst at 74 and Mr Peacock has used it 4541.

Was v funny but Mr Peacock probably wouldn't have thought so. He should be on this thread.

Well I kind of agree with that one. It doesn't take 2 of you to go get milk.

I got a bollocking for not being able to see into the future and prepare 3 weeks in advance for an event I'd normally prepare for a week in advance. Apparently I should have forseen myself getting the flu and it was completely unacceptable behaviour..

This too! I had a horrible rumour spread about me by a HCA on one of my placements as a student nurse that I was shagging one of the porters because we went to lunch at a similar time (not together, mind) and had previously ‘been seen chatting’

The rumour spread around half the hospital before I was approached by another lovely HCA I’d never met who finally told me what was being said, and I had to tell my DP before someone else did. It was fucking awful, the names the rumour-starter had been calling me behind my back were disgusting.

I complained to the ward manager who was a complete cow about it, so I got my uni involved. My tutor came to a meeting on the ward with me to discuss it and the manager started rattling off ‘complaints’ that had never previously been raised and weren’t even written down, literally just reeled them off out of thin air. One of them was that my hair had been a mess at 6pm one shift three weeks before (after I had already been at work for 11 unpaid hours and was run absolutely ragged), I asked if I had looked a mess before or since, whilst sitting in front of her with my hair neatly plaited and secured in a bun and she admitted it was a one-off occasion where a pin had fallen out and my bun had become loose. I took it further in the end and the HCA was eventually sacked for what she’d done to me.

Temping in a very middle class department store for little more than NMW, I was told off by the manager because my jumper wasn't cashmere

I worked in a pub when I was 18 with the most horrendous, misogynistic male landlord. Every evening he would empty the drip trays and if there was too much liquid in them he’d give all the (very young) staff a bollocking. I took to emptying the drip trays on the fly about half an hour before closing.