To ask for stupid reasons you've been told off at work?

[chailatte123]

I once asked a member of the Senior Team if she had dyed her hair.
Apparently this was very rude.

At least we all know that you know what being rude is

For completing an accident form after an injury at work. I was told I had to report accidents to the department head who would then decide if the accident was to be recorded.

A colleague who I get on well with typed a 6 digit number into a group Teams chat, clearly a password or login and likely a DOB.

I replied and @ him to let him know so he could delete it. My exact words 'can you give us your mother's maiden name as well please Andy ;)'

I got a public ranty bollocking from head of Dept (still on the group chat) about being unprofessional and misusing the chat!!

That would piss me right off.

I worked for two bosses years ago and one of them stuck a picture on the wall in our main working space of a bloke with diarrhoea shitting into the wind.

We all hated it but left it there because - boss.

The other boss approached me one day saying how inappropriate it was for me to have stuck it there. I told him I didn't and it was his partner that did. He was embarrassed and appalled but then tried to make a joke of it. He then turned as he was leaving and told me I was on a fizzer for leaving it up! The cheeky fucker!

I left a few months after as this sort of thing was regular and the place was so badly run I felt vulnerable.

A during covid one - at the supermarket I worked in we had to take turns to man the door for an hour at a time (but not everyone had a turn - you know how it goes). I was well into my sixties and badly asthmatic, and was still standing there and it was snowing for goodness sake, FOUR HOURS LATER! When I was eventually relieved I was told to go to the manager's office, and in my innocence thought she might apologize, but no - I was told off for not being smiley enough. I just turned and walked away. Five years into retirement it still makes me seethe!

Weren't you wearing a mask though? So how could they tell?

I was the only non smoker in the office. All the others used to go out for fag breaks at least twice a day, leaving me to cover the office on my own. It was annoying but I liked my colleagues and I wasn't senior to them, in fact, some of them were senior to me, so I could hardly tell them not to. However, they were only supposed to nip out for a few minutes but it was getting longer and longer and one day, the manager walked into our office and went absolutely crazy, shouting at me, because they had been outside smoking for longer than allowed!

A colleague of mine once emailed his boss on a Monday morning and started his email with

Hi (name)
Hope you had a lovely weekend, weather was dreadful wasn't it?

He then moved on to work stuff and she threatened him with a disciplinary for wasting her time with irrelevant chat!

I got told off for being "pedantic" when I pointed out the CEO had got the name of a government department wrong - in a document being submitted to that government department.

Same CEO also had a go at me as she wanted me to produce a leaflet to promote the company and I told her I couldn't add video to it.

I wouldn't dare comment on anybody's appearance though - can totally be taken the wrong way, some people love taking offence!

Yes. I told a male colleague yesterday that his new tattoo was cool! It was his little girls name. Both happily married, before anyone accuses me of trying to be a ‘work wife’. He thanked me for noticing, told me all about it and then we both carried on working. HR were not involved in the conversation.

Being told off for being four minutes late in due to significant train delays and told to make up the time at the end of the day. I was almost always quite early into the office, except for that one day which was beyond my control.

The stupid thing was every day I stayed 15 or 20 mins late to finish off my work. So that one day out I stayed until exactly 5.04pm and then left, meaning I left earlier than usual.

I was sacked for deleting an email that I was told to delete!

I've never had this exact thing, but I just remembered that in a previous job some feedback I was given in an appraisal (not said critically, but I was a bit bemused by it nonetheless) was that it'd be 'nice to see me sharing my emotions a bit more.' By way of comparison I was offered the example of one of my colleagues who would punch the air and go 'Yesss!' when something went well. (Kind of like the 90s equivalent of all the 'sharing your wins' drivel that gets spouted nowadays, I guess. 🙄) That's just not the kind of person I am, I did always share good outcomes with the team though, and the feedback left me feeling a bit like I had to be something I'm not.

I told somebody to leave a burning building! I got told off because the procedure was that they were supposed to tell the fire service the address themselves. ( I was a 999 operator) My point was that they wouldn't be conscious by then ! I had verified the address and was waiting for the fire service to answer.

I commented on one of the mumsnet fb posts saying I like to poop at work because I get peace and quiet to do it and someone screenshot it and sent it to my manager. I got a warning. Left soon after

This rings a bell. My old boss was a nightmare about timekeeping and if anybody walked in a minute late he'd adopt his most sarcastic tone and say "Trouble with the trains?"

Until one day, a newish member of staff replied "No, I couldn't be arsed to get up", strolled past him and started her working day.

Same CEO used to insist we came in even in heavy snow. One guy walked for two hours across fields to get to a station that was open and he was told he had to stay late to make up the time by his manager. The CEO? He was working from home that day. Because of the heavy snow!

In one absolute peach of a job (retail head office, very toxic culture of presenteeism and hoop-jumping) I was once called, together with the rest of my team, into a meeting where we were basically threatened with being fired if we didn't start coming in before, and staying till after, our contracted hours. In a job where we weren't being paid much more than NMW. It wasn't worded directly as a threat, they were very careful about that, but the meaning was unmistakable. Apparently the top brass had 'noticed' that there was 'no buzz' in our department, this turned out to mean that when they were wandering about long before/after contracted hours because they didn't have a life outside work we weren't at our desks.

I ended up resigning from that job on principle (for numerous reasons including this one), but I was lucky at the time to be in a financial position to do that, most probably weren't and had to continue being exploited. What really got under my skin was that it was a relatively young workforce (I was in my 40s at the time) and they were gradually being gaslit into thinking they had to put up with this kind of shit if they wanted to be employed. It was so depressing.

A colleague cycled in instead of their usual car journey and I said something like "well done you, saving those icebergs".

Aparently this was insensitive because it was the 100 year anniversary of the titanic sinking, and my flippant talk of icebergs might be "triggering for any titanic survivors that over hear". We don't live anywhere with a connection to the titanic, and there were no 100+ year old, that could feasibly be survivors present.

Both examples are rude and inappropriate. Nobody dyes their hair or gets their lips done hoping others will notice and comment. It's fine to say "your hair looks great" or "you look really well at the moment" but specifically pointing out that someone's "had something done" is unnecessary and could come across as bitchy, especially in front of others.

Job at a cookie shop in city centre and kiosk in a station.

Not wearing the straw boater hat. (Regularly got told off for this and didn’t care)

Not wearing my name badge.

Talking to passing friends (no customers present)

Giving customers ‘too large’ ice cream scoops.

Giving my younger sibling and their friends broken or stale cookies - to be fair to my work, they did come by quite a lot!

Icing mildly lewd messages on a giant cookie, at customers’ request.

Getting icing on my apron (daily). Loved icing those big cookies!

Flirting with a boy working at another outlet (no customers present).

Mopping the floor badly.

forgetting to freeze dough and leaving it out overnight: the whole batch was chucked.

I was basically Steve Harrington or Robin at Scoops Ahoy with less autonomy, russians & monsters.

Like to think was one of the better workers there, but perhaps not. Manager was a cow but probably long suffering!

My manager kicked off because we couldn’t possibly be working cause they couldn’t hear us typing, and then going to the toilet was a bone of contention too. The manager was THIS close to getting her arse handed to her at that point , I was actually miscarrying but choose not to tell anyone.

This manager is barely seen, and when they do come to the office, it’s late and non stop chatter. Cheek.

Tbf I agree that's a nice one. It's more when people say things like 'Have you lost weight?' and 'Your hair looks much better like that' that I think it's dodgy ground when talking to workmates.

For allowing someone to put a meeting in my execs calender and not declining it. I was on annual leave 🙄

Oh was it fuck

At our work,our wages go up every year in line with min wage but they get you to fill in a form for their records and then you get pay rise based on the amount of points you get

Bitch manager (who hated me) sat and filled in the form through gritted teeth and then told me I was getting a pay rise

'How nice,how much?' I asked

'2p an hour' (shed deliberately downgraded my points and full points where only worth about 10p an hour)

I got into trouble for telling her to keep it!

Apparently I really upset her with 'your tone of voice'

She was moved not long after to another store to kiss the main managers arse,gotta keep moving up that greasy pole

I did get 7p an hour after that after I complained and threatened to leave

I got told off for wearing mules at work. I worked on the 26th floor. There was a fire drill. I whipped off my 6 inch heels and replaced them with the mules. Basically so I didn't kill myself walking down 26 flights of stairs. Apparently the heels were more appropriate for the occasion.

Twat of a place filled with twats.