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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To challenge you all to name a stupider co-worker than mine?

184 replies

BossyBitch · 02/10/2017 19:24

I'm a project manager and have recently had a new person join the team. They need to be given various user accounts and access privileges, and there's a system for requesting all that.

I delegated the task of requesting all the stuff to one of my team supervisors - he might not be the brightest crayon in the box but the whole procedure consists of filling in a web-based form, uploading a passport picture and hitting the 'submit' button. What could possibly go wrong, right?

Imagine my reaction when I got an e-mail requesting that, in my function as the new joiner's manager, I supply a passport picture ...

... as opposed to the phone snapshot of an actual passport that my genius co-worker had sent to them!

And, no, he wasn't taking the piss, he actually is that bloody thick! Angry

Please tell me there's worse out there!

OP posts:
ineedamoreadultieradult · 02/10/2017 19:48

Asked my colleague to.cut and paste X from a document onto another document. 5 minutes later she comes to ask where she can find the scissors and prit stick!

Original poster
BossyBitch · 02/10/2017 19:50

ineedamore, okay, that is approaching painful ...

OP posts:
PutTheBunnyBackInTheBox · 02/10/2017 19:50

except the new guy's not British, so slightly different colour and emblem.

Hmm Grin
Cornettoninja · 02/10/2017 19:50

I once had a doctor (possibly consultant) insist I should ring to let him know if ever a fax he sent to me didn't come through...

We argued for a good five minutes about how I would know he'd sent one in the first place if it didn't come through.

OhThisbloodyComputer · 02/10/2017 19:51

I once got a job at McDonald's when I was under age.

The manager knew, but he was desperate for staff and told me not to tell anyone.

I didn't tell my co-workers.

But then this American bloke came over. (This was only the second McDonald's to be open in the UK.)

The bloke actually shook my hand, and asked how i was (which was a rare thing social greeting in England at the time.) So I was completely undone by this friendliness and trusted him completely. When he asked how old i was, I said, "don't tell anyone but I'm 15."

The American man was visiting to see how the UK restaurants were being run. The one person who would be upset at any impropriety. So the manager got a bollocking and I got sacked on the spot.

That was pretty dumb

burninghigh · 02/10/2017 19:52

I had a secretary who once when I was working in a really important doc with a tight deadline had a few minor
Amends to make. Instead she took out paragraphs, moved paragraphs around and added random crap. It wasn't as simple as going back to an old version (and I think she deleted that anyhow) and I couldn't just run a comparison to see exactly what she had done because of the format. I was under so much pressure (wasn't the only thing i needed to get done) I nearly had a nervous breakdown when I realised at around midnight (she would have been at home for about 6 hours by then). She got moved elsewhere. I still wonder why she did it. There was a massive investigation and I think they also concluded she was a bit stupid.

AuldHeathen · 02/10/2017 19:52

I like the sound of Bernadette is there. It made me laugh.Though l wouldn’t want to work with her or stay in her hotel. Smile

QuimReaper · 02/10/2017 19:52

Bishop that happened to me once with Bailey's and coke! Interesting combination...

CaveMum · 02/10/2017 19:52

Not a co-worker but a customer:

Customer needed to pay a registration fee. Told him we couldn't take card details over the phone (company policy - we need cardholder signature on file for anti-fraud measures) so he should fax them to us.

5 minutes later the fax pings and a sheet prints out with a dark rectangle in the middle. It took me a few moments of staring at it to realise he had tried to fax the actual credit card to us 😂😂😂

Timmytoo · 02/10/2017 19:54

I had a colleague who sent about a hundred faxes to a company and when the company phoned to complain she said she though they hadn’t been received as they kept coming out the other side ConfusedBlushHmm

ToadsforJustice · 02/10/2017 19:56

This is not a very nice thread.

Puzzledandpissedoff · 02/10/2017 19:58

If it makes anyone feel better, at least this wasn't a co-worker ...

Opening my new account at a building society, the cashier noted down my various replies then asked "does that have one "T" or two?"

I thought she meant my surname, which can indeed be spelled either way, but no - she meant Scotland (as in Royal Bank of ...)

nakedscientist · 02/10/2017 19:58

To the pp that said stupider isn't a word...it is a word:

"Stupider is the comparative form of the adjective stupid. Because stupid is a two-syllable word, it’s comparative form can be created either by adding the suffix “-er” or by using more."

SoPassRemarkable · 02/10/2017 20:01

Not stupid as such but funny.

Two colleagues are travelling down the A1 to head office and stop off at a service station in/near Wyboston. They're arguing whether it's pronounced Y-Boston or Wibberston.

So they ask the lad serving them in the fast food part of the service station "can you tell us how you pronounce the place we're in". Young lad looks at them like they're stupid and says very slowly and loudly "bur-ger-king!

Fluffypinkpyjamas · 02/10/2017 20:01

Nasty thread and nasty OP

Clearly proud to be a bullythen OP?

Biscuit
scrabbler3 · 02/10/2017 20:04

Someone asked me who Gordon Brown was. He was the PM at the time.

Lanaa · 02/10/2017 20:11

How on earth is anyone on this thread a bully? Letting off a bit of steam and having a chuckle about the half wits we work with isn't bullying. Stop reaching @Fluffypinkpyjamas

Emily7708 · 02/10/2017 20:12

It was several years ago when people still used fax machines and I was desperately trying to send a confidential 50 page fax in the middle of the night. The office services guy kept trying to send the fax but the line was constantly engaged so it wouldn’t go through.

Anyway he eventually handed it back to me marked “sent” and said there you go, it’s all gone through. I said oh that’s great, thank you - I can go home now. Yeah, he said, I couldn’t get it to work so I changed the last digit of the number to a 9 and it went through fine 😩

londonista · 02/10/2017 20:13

Not sure how it’s bullying ... was someone named or a workplace named? Haven’t RTFT.

oldlaundbooth · 02/10/2017 20:16

Had a colleague who thought that our clients in Japan should just all speak English... Cos y know, it's easier Confused

ineedamoreadultieradult · 02/10/2017 20:16

Where on this thread has anyone actually said they had a go at the co worker for their silly things they had done! I can't see how it's bullying?!

londonista · 02/10/2017 20:16

Emily oh my god, was there any comeback from that?!

HazelBite · 02/10/2017 20:18

My late MIL used mine and DH's landline number a few times as a contact point for her as she didn't have a landline.
We had quite a few irritating calls before we realised what she had done.
DH was cross, with her and told her she was being unreasonable, to which she replied, "if they phone and ask for me just don't answer the phone"

I used to be a manager in a retail outlet and we had a newish member of staff. For several weeks she would stand back watching (or not) myself and the other staff taking in deliveries and checking the delivery notices and putting the goods away.
Fed up with her lack of willingness to get involved I asked her to check the latest delivery I watched her check off the invoice and felt quite relieved that she seemed to be doing okay. I left her at it and went to lunch. When I came back I saw the boxes that the delivery had come in were still there only they had been re-sealed. I went to lift one thinking they were empty, and realised she had re-wrapped every item and put them back in the box they came in.
I wondered what she thought we were going to sell!

Caulkheadupnorf · 02/10/2017 20:19

Colleague: Want anything from the shop?
Me: Dairy Milk please
(Ten minutes later)
Colleague I got you a pint of dairy milk. Is that enough?
Me: I meant chocolate, not milk...

HarrietSchulenberg · 02/10/2017 20:19

I used to work with someone who sent a fax to our office then rang to tell us that we'd recognise it when it arrived as it was on green paper Confused.

But I am the person who crashed the entire company's network (think 1700 people just in my building, plus the rest in far flung corners of the globe) by emailing a video clip of Barbie Girl to everyone in my immediate office. In my defence it was 1997 and video clips via email were a novelty, but that day I learned how network servers work.