Please tell me batshit things about your work.

[TheLightSideOfTheMoon]

I am unwell and hunkering down with MN and TT for the day.

I’ve just started a new job (today is a day off), it’s all new, I’m not settling in as well as I’d like (I’ve gone from a tiny place to a HUGE one) and I’m kind of hyper-focussed on different work practices right now.

Funny stories will cheer me up.

I’ll start.

At my new work they use poly pockets/polywallets UPSIDE-DOWN!

They go in upside-down and they slide the paperwork upwards into it.

I find it so, so weird. Each time I look at them I’m like, WTAF?

Anyway, that’s mine. Please share yours. Entertain me with batshitness. I beg you.

I worked for a financial services company where one of the mid-management didn't "do" emails, even though this was how 95% of things were communicated so any time we needed an answer we had to phone her or go to her desk to ask.

She wasn't even that senior, nor did she have a specific skill set. I have no idea how she got away with it for so long.

If he walks on the grass someone will shout "man overboard" Then he will get his backside kicked.

Local Authority. Our team manager tells people to have coils fitted to avoid having time off work with period pain. I listened to her and it was horrendous for the whole 6 months it was there.

As a student nurse, I once got told off by the Operating Theatres manager for knitting in the staff canteen during my lunch break. Apparently it looked ‘unprofessional’ so even though my lunch break was unpaid, she still felt she had the right to decide what I could do during it.

Along with many of you, I've had the misfortune to work for a micromanager extraordinaire🙄

I joined in a well-paid specialist role that I had years of experience in. Every new/different idea I had was shot down. Whenever I did any piece of work, she would insist on checking and 'marking' it - literally like a teacher. This continued for months until I eventually left.

At the same place I worked full-time hours (often more than contracted), but all staff were expected to work overtime at weekends (essentially working on a factory floor making a product the company sold). It was brought up in my 121 that I never worked any weekend overtime and therefore I wasn't a 'team player'.

I'm guessing they don't "heart" the company

Really intrigued which one is now 😂

I work for a company that has a payroll department who seem to not ever want to do any work.

If they mess up an employees pay, it’s never their fault. Ever. It’s always someone else’s fault. The employees fault. Their manager’s fault.

They are impossible to contact. They’re the only department within the company without an email address that is widely known what it is (it’s never shared). They “don’t” have a phone line. Any issues have to go through a stupid online form where you’re waiting anywhere from 7 business days to 6 months on a response.

You could write the most detailed description of the problem in the world and they won’t even bother to read it. They’ll mark it off as dealt with and so you’ll begin the cycle the next month, and the month after that.

The only way to get any payroll issues sorted is to send a snippy email to HR which publicly embarrasses them and then like magic, the problem will be sorted within the hour.

It drives me up the wall.

I have a pen tapper here. All day, every day. Faster when they are concentrating. It is torture as the office is really quiet apart from tap, tap, bloody tap. I have said - with varying levels of temper - that it drives me insane and I have to go for a walk. They don't realise they are doing it, so stop for a minute and then back to bloody tapping. I'm their line manager too .... awkward

I'm just picturing that McDonald's advert

Why is this batshit? Of course you should work the hours you're paid for! (Though this would actually be 4hrs 48 mins).

Exactly this 😂

So did I!! But only in our (head) office the sub branches were allowed them!

I think our boss's must get their signs from the same place ( see my post up thread at 13.57 )

That's common in local government.

The law required (and probably still does) councils to put all contracts above a certain amount out to tender, and they're not allowed to make one-off purchases without getting tenders in.

I once had to get an exemption from the tender process from 2 chief officers and 3 senior councillors to just get a tender from one company, which was the only company that made firefighters' uniforms that met the required spec.

Used to work in a super woke place - recruitment policies were basically don’t hire white people unless they are gay or refugees. White men had zero chance being hired unless gay. Quite a few people were hired who are not fit for their roles but hit some diversity targets. We also have a special EDI advisor whose main job seems to be sending all staff articles about inequality.

Sorry to ask on here but what happened to the pink glittery accountant thread? Just wondering how her first day went

@PuttingDownRoots military brat here - grew up on a navy base, their little lunch bags are called "galley bags"

I worked at a big corporate and one of the canteen workers was this lovely Welsh man that was a drag queen at the weekends. He had the idea to bring snacks and cakes from the canteen around all the office floors in the afternoon, thus making lots more money for the catering company. The best bit was if it was a special occasion he'd come round in these amazing outfits 7ft Xmas tree, the Queen, Halloween costumes, when it was the Olympics in ridiculous lycra outfits, then random stuff there was no occasion e.g a glittery unicorn. He made everyone happy, then the catering company made him redundant. Everyone e practically went into mouring.

The army call them Grot bags!

WTAF did I just read.

Delighted you escaped.

We use a metal guillotine to cut paper

He's actually Army. (Not Devonport, bit further around the coast....) The Army is just as batshit in its own ways though!

For a while, there was someone in our finance department who clearly didn't have enough to do.

Part of their job was processing mileage claims. They used to go through the claims with a fine toothed comb, and check the claimed mileage on AA Autoroute, and access our Outlook calendars so they knew exactly where we'd been.

The amount of time that was wasted by them sending the claims back to our manager, who had already approved them, with queries like why someone was claiming 10.6 miles from A to B when the actual mileage was only 9.8. As no-one actually goes the long way round for the fun of it, there was always a good reason, like the main road being gridlocked because of an accident, a flooded road on the shortest route etc, this was an utterly pointless waste of everyone's time.

My mate once replied to our manager's query as to the route she'd taken with an email that said "I had to go via Sainsburys because I needed a piss and that's where the nearest toilet was."

Male co-worker having an argument over the phone with his wife. He hung up then proceeded to scream, "My wife is a bitch! My wife is a f-ing bitch!" about 10 times.
No one did a thing. We all just kept our heads down staring at our screens. The whole thing was bizarre. He wasn't treated differently after that either. All the normal pleasantries exchanged daily. I couldn't wait to get out of that toxic f-up place.

We had a senior partner who demanded I be sacked because I told him his filing would have to wait whilst I dealt with a client IPO!

This was also a man who would scream down the phone at his ex, while picking his nose and firing the finding all around the office.

He was an absolute pig.