What is the worst job you have had?

[FoodLover36]

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

When I was at school, a long time ago, I would have been about 15, I helped my dad, who was a plumber. It was mostly good, but we went to a house of an old lady with a blocked outside toilet. The pan was full to the brim with solids. So, we went to the drain inspection pit, took the lid off and that too was full to the brim. Shovel out time, and the moment I decided that plumbing was not for me. I was telling my younger ds this tale, and she told me after I had left home, he came back from a job at the local Woolworths and he was absolutely stinking. Apparantly, the incinerator in the ladies staff toilet exploded and covered him with burnt used sanitary towels. Nice.

A job at a so called “prestige” not-for-profit organisation, destroyed my mental health, partly as I sat near a head of department and heard and saw so much how they mistreated their staff, but the high/ups thought they were so wonderful, and partly through having a horrible boss myself (although at one point he didn’t speak to me for a year which was a relief, one other poor sod sat doing nothing for 6 months as the boss didn’t give him any work to do and refused to speak to him either!)

Love reading these, especially the funny ones. I had forgotten all about microfiche until this thread reminded me. I will take even more care to avoid Smash and potted meat paste now. Useful knowledge.

I had a summer job as an office junior when I was 16, before doing A levels.

Good bits:

Close to home (10 minutes’ walk)

Got to go to the shop to do everybody’s errands, mostly buying their fags and diet lilt (???), could spin it out a bit.

Crap money, but I was 16 and it kept me in nail varnish, magazines and Topshop.

Bad bits:

One day per week filling envelopes then sealing them using weird roller device in tray of water (1987, obviously self sealing envelopes had not become a thing by then)

Shredding papers for two days at a time. So dull.

Having to take cakes around the building whenever it was somebody’s birthday because they were too lazy to do it themselves. I was given a wooden tray with a strap to go around my neck and had to walk around the office asking who wanted a cake. They all used to moan at me because somebody had got to the eclairs before them GET OVER IT

Other people in office rejoicing because somebody (me) was now junior to them, thus elevating their status. Did not like hearing that in September 1987 I was going back to school to do A levels in maths, further maths, physics and chemistry. Instead advised me to stick with that company because I’d have a steady job and find a fella. (I didn’t)

My first job working in a cafe! I had a horribly toxic boss who would tear me down at any opportunity, eventually I was fired

Cleaner at a lorry park in the local docks where I had to clean the toilets... I managed a week

Toss up between tomato picking and working the bar at a wedding. Both Uni. summer jobs.

Tomato picking was dirty and hot, and the boss was abusive.
Working the bar at a wedding meant putting up with drunken lewd comments, complaints about having to pay for their own drinks all night and NO TIPS!

Doing service washes at the launderette. Worst batches were from the rugby club (with under garments I was not familiar with but knew were nasty) and from the butchers. I was 15.

Working in Boots stacking shelves, in a fairly posh town. One woman complained about me because I didn't know which teeth whitening kit was the best. I've never used a teeth whitening kit in my life and I'm not a dentist. I should have just said the most expensive one

I have a few.

Working in a dog kennels when I was in sixth form. It was horrible, dirty work and they did not treat the dogs well. All the other girls were full time and they didn’t bother to put the names of the dogs on the kennel, so when I came along each Saturday I had no idea which dog was which!

Working in a night club whilst at Uni. It stayed open until 7am and was just before the smoking ban. I’d come home stinking and knackered and I got a sore throat every single week from the smoke. By 3am, I’d hardly be able to stay awake, my feet would be agony and all the customers would be wasted. I’d allow myself to sneak off to the toilets every hour for a cry. It was a cocktail bar and the lime juice would trickle into any tiny cuts on my hand and sting like mad. I still can’t stand the smell of lime 14 years later! We were meant to be able to remember all the recipes too and I never could.

Working in a pub that was on Gordon Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmares. It was a nightmare and the owners were batshit. I did get on TV though 😂

Almost 20 years ago I got made redundant (along with about 20 others) from a job I loved.

I started temping for a large water utility company in the South and I remember everyone being so dull, 100s of them. I lasted 6 weeks into a 6 months contract and then left. The dole office never looked so sophisticated in comparison!!

Luckily a week later my previous company offered me a long term contract on a lot more money, but I still really feel for people working in those huge soulless places - a colleague told me at the time that everyone just leaves their personality at the door...

I had a brilliant job in the charity sector and was very good at it which pissed off the manager. He undermined me at every turn and once told me that he was sorry but he would never fancy me.
I laughed and said thank god for that and his reply was that he could see the hurt in my eyes but I just wasn't his type. WTF???
Arrogant little prick.

Working in Boots as a teenager after school. I was way too quiet and the full time staff were confrontational and so bitchy. I used to spend all day distracted in my lessons by the thought of an evening spent with women my mum's age being horrible about eachother. Luckily I got a bit more life experience after that and have loved working ever since lol. I also still spend way too much money in Boots so it didn't have any lasting affect lol.

Call centre, most definitely. 8.5 relentless hours of call after call with no break in between (apart from scheduled lunch), name calling, abuse, threats, being timed every time you went to the loo. Caused an awful decline in my mental health, I used to wonder if it would actually be so awful to crash my car on the way

In Paris one summer as a student I briefly worked for a company which bought gold. So I had to call up dentists asking if any of their patients had any old gold fillings they wanted to sell. En français. I didn’t actually speak much French. I was fired after a week. No one wanted to sell their gold fillings, to me at any rate.

I think it would be pretty impossible to pluck the balls of a conscious cat.

That's a sentence I never expected to write!

Working as a hostess in a whisky bar in Japan when I was 23.
You were supposed to chat in English to these much older drunk Japanese men and encourage them to drink more whisky. Just awful !