Awful mistake at work - totally panicking, please help

[triangles5]

I’ve made a dreadful mistake at work and am devastated. I’m in tears, feel very low and am having suicidal thoughts. I’ve been with the company for several years, adore my job, am hardworking and usually careful and diligent, but it was simply silly human error. I feel sick with fear as it’s going to cost the company a significant amount of money. I haven’t spoken or apologized to my managers yet as I was so upset and couldn’t face it. But they’re aware it has happened, we’re due to meet next week and it will obviously come up. I feel sick with fear that I’m going to be sacked. And if they don’t sack me (unlikely), they’ll never be able to rely on me again as it’ll always be in the back of their minds. I’m distraught and can’t think of anything else. I’ve let the company and worse, my kids (who rely on my income) down so badly. What can I possibly do from here?

people make mistakes

think of the 100,000 times you did the job correctly

nothing will be as bad as you are imagining and your children do not care about your job, they care about you and being in their life. No money could ever replace you!!

Have you an Employee Assistance Programme at work? They are confidential and can help you over the phone.

it will be ok

Come up with some ways to rectify it and take time to rest. Mistakes happen. You can get past it. Call Samaritans if you feel despondent. You can reach out online too or call, 116 123.

$ 50 million's worth, OP? because that's my biggest error and I kept my job.

As other posters have said, speak to your manager, tell them what went wrong and why and what you've put in place to stop it happening again.

I know others have pulled you up already but FFS! The OP only started the thread 42 minutes before you posted and has said the meeting with management is next week. She is clearly in a dreadful state. Wind your neck in with your snidey digs.

You can't casually post "yeah, I just lost 50 million" and not explain . . . .

Come on, you know the drill . . .

That is quite the story…

I don’t think OP can or should say exactly what happened… 🙄 Your nosiness is irrelevant to how she’s feeling.

So what if she doesn't? Are you that emotionally invested in Mumsnet threads?

Theres lots of good advice on this thread already, so I won’t repeat it, however I just wanted to say that almost a year ago I started a similar threat to this (it was in 30 days only and I’ve NC since then). It was honestly nowhere as near as I thought it would be in the end. At the time it felt like the worse thing in the world, and there were a few very uncomfortable meetings, but within a month things had blown over.

Thanks everyone. I don’t want to go into specifics in case my manager is on Mumsnet.

@Maria198222 how are things for you now if you don’t mind me asking. If they don’t sack me, I’m not sure if i will ever get past this.

You do need to apologise and own your mistake. Tell them it will never happen again and you feel really bad about it. Think about any solutions you can to mitigate.

Oh, you all want to know about the $ 50 million...?

I was working in the back office to FX traders in a city bank, back in the last century (not saying where and dating it, can't be too careful). They did a trade of $ 50 million to be paid to an overseas bank. At the time you had to go onto the telex machine and type out the payment using the standing payment instructions - and how my error arose was a) the payment instructions were on index cards and as they were updated the cards just got scribbled on with the new ones and b) very big banks had several names depending on location, type of business - and obvs, different bank accounts. Say Smith UK, Smith USA, Smith Inc, that sort of thing. What I did was misread the instructions and pay $ 50 mill to Smith Inc when it was Smith USA. What made it worse was that Smith USA had lent the money to another bank, who'd lent it to another bank and so on and so forth....and over a UK bank holiday. So we had a lot of banks wanting three days overdraft costs on $ 50 million.

Mind you, whoever checked and released that payment didn't pick it up EITHER and was just as badly at fault. My bollocking was, under the circs, mild (it was actually a pretty easy mistake to make and I wasn't the only person to have made it then or before). Just not over a BH weekend.

Coincidentally I'm sure I was shipped into a department where I couldn't do stuff like that. But I didn't lose my job over it.

Hi OP. I've been in this jam a few times. If I were you I would ask to meet as early next week as possible. Better to run through fire than wait for it. I fucked up large this week. Sleepless night and walked in to meet my boss with my resignation in hand. Meant it too, not just a dramatic touch.

She absolutely ripped me a new one, which she had every right to do. But she knows it's out of character, that I've been under ridiculous pressure for months and once she'd said her piece, and I apologised unreservedly we are ok. The upside is, you never make the same mistake twice.

You need to calm down and stop thinking like a victim. If you worked for me I would initially be angry/annoyed about the mistake. But I’d get over it pretty quickly and we’d need to work together to rectify it. I’d be more annoyed about your catastrophic reaction. You will make many mistakes in your working life, and you’ll learn from every one of them. Dealing with it maturely and responsibly - and asking for help - is part of your development, and part of being a team player. Think about why the mistake happened - are processes clear, should fail safe procedures be implemented, do you need more training, can you recommend changes that would mitigate the risk of future incidents?

Going around saying you’re “not sure how you’ll ever get over it” hanging your head in shame and not being part of the solution is not the way to build trust.

You really need to speak to your managers or at least try and explain what has happened.

Sitting in the quiet waiting for them to meet will not help you in the long run.

The mistake happened purely because of me. There aren’t any processes that could be improved - it was my own stupid fault.

@MrsDanversGlidesAgain that doesn't appear to have cost anyone 50m, 3 days overdraft costs for that amount is 14k max each!

Don’t panic. You won’t be the first or last it’s happened to.

This happens to most of us at work eventually (I’ve had my fair share!) and it’s never ever as bad as you imagine..we are all human and we are all just doing our best xx

Depends on how many banks got caught up in subsequent payment chain. The error wouldn't have been there but for the original wrong payment. Anyway, I say it was a $ 50 mm error and I'm sticking to that 😅

The mistake happened purely because of me. There aren’t any processes that could be improved - it was my own stupid fault

If there are no processes you can follow then that's the company's issue. Clearly there should be but there aren't and you went ahead and did what you thought was right. 'Stupid mistake' would only apply if you misread a standing instruction. You didn't.

I find in situations like this k imagine worse case scenario and have a plan in place. Look at your finances if you are sacked and how to move forward until you find new employment. Look at applying for any jobs in the meantime and update your cv to get the job you want long term. Be prepared for it to happen and know that will be ok and know what to do. Chances are you won’t be sacked though but it may alleviate some stress that if you are you will be ok.

hang in there OP. My initial reaction is that your company should have checks and processes in place to make sure that one case of human error couldn’t cost them a significant amount of money in the first place. They should be looking at themselves in this.

I sent out a mass email - used cc instead of bcc. They then started replying to all and then came the emails that they could see each others email addresses. I was watching the nightmare unfold in my inbox and nothing I could do about it.

Humans are fallible. Own your mistake, apologise and learn from it.

I think my previous comment was unclear - I meant there are processes in place but there’s no way to make them better, they work well 99% of the time. It’s me that is the problem.

Please don't worry and try to stop panicking. I'm a senior manager and I can tell you:

Everyone makes mistakes, we're human. Unless someone died, it really isn't that awful.

You need to tell your manager but in your position I would document it first to show you have thought about a solution. I'd document exactly what happened, in plain English and I'd structure it as:

1. What happened?
2. What was the impact? (money, risk, people, customer?)
3. Why did it happen (human error is fine to put here)
4. What can be done to correct this issue now / fix it for the customer?
5. What processes can be put in place to stop it happening again? (if there are none it WILL happen again because that's the deal with a process that relies on human intervention!)
6. Recommended next steps and any other information

Unless you did this deliberately it is not sackable or even gross misconduct, it's just a mistake, they happen, we all make them. It is fine to apologise but you don't need to offer to resign, you need to approach it calmly and professionally.

FWIW I once paid the wrong person £100k, totally my fuck up and it was fine. I wasn't sacked, my career is fine. I also extended £300k of credit to a company who went bust the next day. I wasn't sacked then either. These things happen (we did get the money back in the first instance but weren't insured in the second so lost it all).