What is the worst job you have had?

[FoodLover36]

I would say sales assistant at a supermarket , too repetitive for me.

@bluesheep I've worked at a call centre too and it was exactly the same as you describe. Also never had enough hours for the work they agreed so enforced 9-9 working for weeks on end plus Saturday's. I was so exhausted I couldn't find the time to find anything else and they threatened to sack me when I told them I didn't want to do overtime. Throw some sexual harassment and being in a department where almost every customer was angry it was horrific. I just used to come home eat, cry and sleep.

I would love a boring job!

Beats a majorly stressful one any day!

I worked for a large UK bank arranging repossessions. Some of the stories that used to come back to us were heartbreaking; families where only one person knew of the huge arrears and repossession, meaning it was a huge surprise to their partner, people who committed suicide when the bailiff turned up etc. We worked in an office coordinating the activity of the repossession and felt quite removed from it until we heard stories like that.

I lasted two nights in a chippy when I was 17. Awful. No training whatsoever bar a quick "watch me serve this one person, and then you figure the rest out", so I kept making mistakes and was harshly reprimanded by one woman in particular who seemed to hate me (she'd been there about 30 years and was jealous imo). Bitchy women, hot and smelly, and a measly 5 minute break despite working from 4pm-11pm.

The evening my arsehole boss pulled me up for making mistakes on the till, from which i'd not been properly trained, I took my dm's advice, left, and never went back. I was due in on the Wednesday, so I felt slightly gleeful when 4pm rolled around and I was out and about up town and not in there. Never even called them.

Worked 6 years in a fork truck “dealership” it was horrendous, I didn’t mind the actual job but the MD and his wife (also a Director) were horrible to work for, staff used to breathe a sigh of relief when they went on holiday and it became a happy place to work for a couple weeks while they were away.

If your pen ran out you had to show them and they would scribble on a piece of paper to check you were telling the truth, if it started working you were handed it back to continue using it, I used to bring my own pen rather than go through that rigmarole every time a biro ran out.

If you wanted to use the photocopier and someone else was there you had to wait until they had finished and then you could get up and use it, you must under no circumstances stand and wait and have a conversation with whoever was using it.

If you wanted to use the loo you had to incorporate it with a trip to the coffee machine, you would have to walk around the whole e and ask every person if they wanted a drink, so if you were busting for a wee that was just tough. If you were “too long” going to the loo and getting drinks you would be questioned.

Staff appraisals every year were really character assassinations followed by a pay rise, nothing constructive was ever said, every year it was your awful at your job, an awful person, scruffy etc here’s a pay rise.

15 days holiday a year 4 days had to be saved for Christmas (this wasn’t in dark ages all other companies were giving on average 20 to 25 days)

That’s just a few of the “rules” we had to follow, i was a nervous wreck, had my confidence destroyed and became severely depressed working there, but needed the money and it was during a recession so was “lucky” I had a job.

Strangely my next job was incredibly happy, well paid, promoted several times and was never told I was a scruffy, awful person...

I was once offered a 6 week temp job when i was at Uni basically forwarding emails received to set mailing lists until they wrote a program to do it. Paid well but i took a different lower paid more interesting job as i knew I couldnt do that all day.

I should add I was also sexually assaulted at my shitty job while heavily pregnant but was so terrified of directors I didn’t say anything as he was a friend of MD who was there as a consultant. I regret to this day not going to the police

@letmethinkaboutitfornow

For me it was never the job but the boss. I had a a couple of a*hole ones, they ruined the best job... 🤷🏻‍♀️ And doing waitressing was great fun with a brilliant team! 👍👍👍

Exactly! I worked in a store when I was a student and it was a lot of fun!

It was a great job for a cool IT multinational...unfortunately my manager was a psycho narcissist who demanded adulation and attention like a baby. She made my life a misery. Moved on and learnt the hard lesson that you have to manage up as well as down and people above you in the pecking order arent necessarily any more mature, capable or worthy of respect.

Like a lot of people, it's often not the job/responsibility itself, or the work and context.

Worst for me was as a young teenager working a few hours per week on office/admin/cleaning for a local GP. Turned out it was a creepy unsettling experience, but was too young and immature at the time. But nothing bad happened to me personally (but later there were police investigation in the practice).

@MrsMomoa

I would love a boring job!

Beats a majorly stressful one any day!

I’ve never had a stressful job and I’m sure it’s worse but it’s surprising just how demoralising and depressing a boring job can be. I’ve had quite a few (I apparently suck at reading between the lines on job descriptions) and it really gets you down. One place I only lasted three months, handed in my notice when i was still just within my week notice period, but I’d have walked out earlier if the people hadn’t been so nice, managed to hold on till I’d gotten another job (which also sucked) but I used to go the loo and cry because it was so shit. Literally ten minutes worth of work in a day most days.

I do think the really stressful jobs on here sound far worse, so I’m not disputing that a stressful job is worse, but boring jobs really can be fucking awful as well.

Office job where I had to put code numbers on orders.
Just moved into the area and got everything be off the only jobs around. Very little going on.
The young people who were there were my age but seemed so sheltered.

It was like they were still in the classroom. I couldn’t actually find anything in common with them.

Word went round that I lived with Dp and it caused a stir.
I was summoned into the managers office, my supervisor was there and he asked if he could go out for a drink with Dp to see if he could be persuaded to marry me.

In the end I walked out. A YTS boy got a promotion over me because he was a man and would need to look after a family one day. It wasn’t like he could actually do the job.

It put me off ever going to work in paid employment again

Should add this was late 80s

I n a pharmacy , boss was a walking bitch , she literally could not be pleased and wouldn't show me or let any other staff show me how to do anything , she also expected me to run to work at her call even though I had a child and would have to get childcare out of nowhere . She had a child the same age as mine so she knew how hard it was but didn't want to hear it , I was also working at another job at the same time but they paid me a proper wage she paid me less than half of minimum. I used the small staff discount to buy my Christmas presents and quit

Door to door sales, basically being told to fuck off every 2 mins. I was a student and needed a cash in hand job as I was that skint at the time.

Working in a night club and getting the short straw to clean the toilets - the horror, the horror

Data entry clerk, typing in hand written applications for an insurance firm onto their old mainframe computer. Never has time been so slow.

Call centre, as others have described, unrelenting barrage of calls, virtually no breaks, awful people on the phone.

I had a temp job as 'seasonal help' at a stately home. Working in the office it meant that I was basically the skivvy doing everything from emptying bins to setting up meeting rooms. They had B&B accommodation and I was also expected to clean these. I don't mind mucking in and it made a change from answering phones.

But...once they found out I'd been an executive PA they loaded on the PA-type work as well while they dossed around the office (they were a team of 6 - goodness knows what they were supposed to be doing, but they preferred to leave it to me!). No increase in hourly rate for the enhanced duties either as they didn't inform the agency.

I left after 10 days.

Strangely enough it didn't make much money and has now been sold off as a hotel.

Door to door sales for damp proofing. I worked there for 2 weeks on a commission-only basis and paid more for my train ticket than I actually earned.

Work experience in the music section at Asda. It was mind-numbingly boring. I much preferred stacking fruit & vegetables in the fresh produce section. It's a blessing that no one buys CDs any more!

I've worked in all sorts of jobs, from cleaning to recruitment, to admin, to retail, to driving, to a specialised technical role at senior management level. Those are definitely the two that stand out.

When I left the armed forces I took the job of a court appointed bailiff.
I was going round some of the most deprived area's in London and I've been less frightened in war zones.
One man chased me down the street in a rage with a machete.
At another, a few of his friends appeared out of nowhere and tried to encircle me whilst trying to manoeuvre me into the flat at the same time.
Had buckets of piss thrown at me.
I preferred my sergeant going berserk and throwing our wardrobes and mattresses through the windows, followed by a beasting of a few sit ups while screaming in our faces.
I lasted 2 years before quitting and rejoining the forces.

I've had a few bad ones.

My first job was in a shoe shop and the manager was tyrant.

My first office job was sales and I was crap at it so I got fired after about two months.

My first "proper" job my boss went from being almost a friend to a bully.

I love my job now, though.

Why are so many bosses abusive sociopaths?

Au pair. The first two weeks I was kept in the house all day, ploughing through housework. At that point I complained that I was only supposed to work five hours a day and things improved a bit. On the worst days, I’d be up at 7 to get the older kids to school, then free for the morning, back at 2 to look after the toddler and with a list of housework to do, kids to collect from school, feed, supervise their homework get them too bed, get the toddler to bed. If the toddler wouldn’t sleep I’d be up until she did. I had to stick it for five months as part of my language course and o this day I have nightmares about it.

Gotta be the few months I spent working at a call centre before uni. Awful.

Having said that, I also had two bad experiences during my professional career, but very early on, when I was an intern/training, due to bullying individuals. But this wasn't due to the job, it was just a couple of terrible people to work with.

Working in a Chinese takeaway - not the takeaway itself that part was fine, and yummy free food haha

The shit part of the job was my creepy, handsy boss, and the very racist customers. Like wtf why come be racist after your night out - if you don’t want to see Chinese people or Chinese food there are lots of other places in town to get your chips!

Working in a busy pub age 17 dishing out canteen style food and trying to quickly add up portions of lasagne, chips and variously different priced veg in my head with a queue 20 people deep. No automatic pricing on the till in those days and when I used my initiative and brought a calculator to work I was demoted to washing up and quit. Then working at a solicitor's where about 8 of us secretaries sat outside our bosses' office doors in a big circle. Nobody spoke. No good morning or goodbye at 5pm. 7.5 hours of icy silence each day crushed my soul and I walked after a week!

I worked in a cafe/soft play inside a zoo. The actual work was lovely, the team in our bit amazing, as were pretty much all the other zoo staff, but it was a nightmare due to the dragon of a manager.

She would change rules depending on what mood she was in. Some sandwich combinations were absolutely forbidden. (she once screamed at us all when she found a crust less tuna sandwich in a bin. Tuna was not a child option. But the next day would tell someone it's no bother to make one) Another day I was sent home early as she was so pissed off that I had offered to carry a drink over for a lady with a pram and toddler. I shouldn't have as then everyone would expect table service. The next day I was told I'm lazy for not taking over an elderly ladies tea. Constantly on egg shells.

Holiday pay was dependent on wether she was pissed off at you or not.

No one had proper training but heaven forbid anyone done anything wrong.

On one horrible day she came in first thing in the morning, told me she would be back last thing to sack someone so don't let that person leave until she got there. It was time to go and I had to tell this poor girl to wait. It was appalling.

This sounds awful but I worked at a support centre for homeless people and it was the worst job I ever had for several reasons.

It was frustrating and heartbreaking to spend hours and hours with people helping them to get things sorted and make progress towards getting their lived on track for them to just show up a few weeks later back on the streets or back in active addiction.

It was scary getting yelled at and attacked by addicts who were high or who were denied medication. It was scary leaving work to walk through a dark car park where service users were hanging out.

It was heartbreaking to see women fall pregnant, lose their babies or have them adopted off, and then be back out on the streets when they'd not physically or emotionally recovered.

It was stomach churning to have to work in an environment which was regularly covered in all sorts of body fluids because people couldn't help it or were so high they lost control of themselves. Some days I used to come home and spend an hour in the shower without feeling totally clean.

I found four of our service users dead in the 3 years that I worked there which affected me hugely.

It was the most horrible job and I had to leave after just three years because I couldn't take the pressure, the heartbreak, the fear, the daily grind, the uphill struggles, and dirt. I'd have loved to have been able to make a difference but I just couldn't take it.