There is only so much someone can take before enough is enough, especially at their job. While they may have allowed a supervisor to abuse them over the years, there is always something that crosses the line and tempers flare. It's not pretty and it's not fun, but sometimes it has to be done.
A Reddit thread recently asked people to share their craziest "fire me, if thou dares" stories, and it's safe to say that we've all experienced something similar. It's crazy what some managers and supervisors will do to their employees in order to save themselves. All posts have been edited for clarity.
They Took A Big Gulp Before Making This Remark
“I worked at a 7-Eleven. My coworker and I were classmates and were 16-17 at the time. The store closed for cleaning one night and was broken into, food and drinks were stolen, and I came to work with the owner and his daughter yelling at my coworker.
He was mad and wanted us two to be liable for the damages.
So he threatened to fire me and my coworker, but my coworker told him that he’d have to clean up with only his daughter, the owner mellowed out.
We quit a week later when we found out it was the daughter that let her friends steal and roughed the place up to make it look like it was a break in.
The place shut down a few years later because of violations.”
They Kept Giving Management Chances Until Enough Was Enough
“The first year at an old job, I essentially took over most of the tasks in my department which were previously held by other departments and was done badly because of it. This lead to a massive increase in productivity. I then found out I was paid significantly less than what others were making and others in my position across the industry were making.
I went to my boss and told them I had done all this work increasing productivity and I would like to discuss a raise. They said no.
I worked there for another year, asking for a raise every now and again until I was offered a job that paid double. It didn’t start for a couple months so I held on to that job until I was set to submit my two weeks. I asked for a raise again, thinking ‘Why not?’
My boss went off, telling me I wouldn’t get a raise and said some very colorful things about it.
It culminated with her telling me, ‘If you don’t like your pay, maybe we should evaluate your future at this company,’ to which I replied, ‘Already have, I took another job and this was your last chance to offer me what I deserve. I quit.’
Some friends later told me that my sudden departure caused a massive backup of work that ended with my manager losing his job.”
When Forced To Decide Between His Job And His Dog, It Was Easy To Make A Decision
“My dog became very ill quite suddenly and he needed to be put down. I was at work and I asked to leave half an hour early so I could be there for him.
When I asked my manager, she got annoyed and said there was ‘no way’ and that I should have told her earlier. I said ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t realize my dog was going to die’ in the most sarcastic way possible then walked away knowing she’d follow me. I then stood at my desk and typed my resignation up in front of her.
She gave me the time off.
No one was going to stop me from being there for my boy.”
They Had To Take Desperate Measures, But Did They Pay Off?
“A ‘manager’ threatened to fire me because I wouldn’t make some system changes that would have led the company very open to a cyber attack. I recorded a phone call with the manager where I explained the risk and that we needed someone more senior to sign off on that risk before I would make the change. He swore at me and told me just to do it, which was all captured on the recording.
He didn’t know I was recording.
At the HR meeting where he was going to effectively fire me, I insisted on bringing representation, and at the time, the policy said I could bring whoever I wanted. So I chose his boss.
The meeting started, the ‘manager’ cited insubordination and I just sat there. When they eventually said they were giving me formal notice, I just asked ‘Are you sure?’ He replied yes. My representative (his boss) at this point had said nothing.
It was at this point I played the recording.
I was asked to leave the room. I was called back 15 minutes later, apologized to, given a pay rise, and informed that the ‘manager’ would no longer be working on this client site. Or any client site we supported.”
This Teacher Couldn’t Believe What Was Being Asked Of Them
“I was a summer teacher at one of those Korean SAT prep schools that hire U.S college students for a summer, and then promptly work them to death (although I will admit the pay was pretty good). We taught from 8:30 am until 5:30 pm with an hour lunch but had homework to grade every evening. They were mainly focused on teaching English, but I was a math and physics major, so they had me teaching SAT math and college prep physics. No problem, or so I thought.
Then they decided since I studied physics, I should also teach their chemistry class. I tried to tell them I didn’t know much chemistry, but they insisted. So I worked my tail off, refreshing myself on all of the stuff before I taught it, while still teaching another Math and Physics class.
One day, in the middle of this, I got legitimately sick. I called in the night before, per the rules, and told them I couldn’t come in. I took one day off, sleeping in my apartment, and then dragged myself in the next day. When I showed up, they pulled me aside and said, ‘So, how do you plan on making up the time for the classes you’ve missed?’ ‘Excuse me?’ ‘Well, we didn’t have anyone to teach your classes, so all the kids are behind now. You have to make up the time. We figured you could just extend your morning class an hour for the first week (aka- teach over lunch) and your afternoon class could then start an hour early for the next week.’
‘Why didn’t you have a sub teach my class?’
Then they messed up when they said, ‘We don’t have a sub.’
‘Well then, no, I’m not going to skip my lunch because of your poor planning.’
‘We’ll fire you, and then you won’t get your plane ticket reimbursed.’
‘Go ahead. First, I followed the rules and gave you notice I was going to be out. Second, you just told me you don’t have a sub for my classes. That means if I leave, you’re going to lose all of those students that I’m teaching. That will cost you a lot more than the plane ticket will cost me.’
They hired a sub.”
All He Could Was Walk Out, What Happened After Surprised Him
“I’m sure everyone’s had that tyrannical boss who was so obsessed with power that everyone hated him and he felt like that was a sign that he was doing a good job, right?
About 20 years ago, I was working as a delivery driver at a Pizza Hut and they brought in a manager who couldn’t seem to get along. The area supervisor point blank told me that he was on his last leg and if he caused any problems they were going to let him go. I was kind of the lead driver, no title or extra pay, but I was the one who trained new drivers, and for some reason, this guy decided I needed to be taken down a notch. He just harassed me and was on my case constantly. Surely the office told him he needed to adjust his attitude, but I’m not sure if this guy was capable.
One day, I told him to get lost, I was more valuable to the store than he was, and if he really wanted to show ‘who’s in charge,’ he should learn how to do his job better. He flew into a rage, swept a big stack of lids off of a shelf and ordered me to rewash them and put them away. I just punched out and went home (it was the middle of the afternoon and I was the only driver at the time).
About 30 minutes later, I got a call from the supervisor telling me to come back because they were ‘taking care of things.’ Got back just in time to see him sulking off with his termination papers.
I don’t typically take pleasure in other people’s pain, but it actually felt pretty good. I hope he learned his lesson, but somehow I doubt it.”
He Was Calling Their Bluff
“I was elbows deep in an AT&T Unix machine that should have been replaced a decade before. There were parts strewn all over a desk when the client came in to see what was taking me so long.
Me: ‘You’ve got three dead fans, one of the power supplies has failed, there’s a bad CMOS battery and the video card is glitchy and refusing to allow the machine to POST sometimes.’
Client: ‘So how long is that going to take? Fifteen minutes?’
Me, laughing: ‘I can patch things up in a couple hours, but I’m going to have to come back in a few days with new parts.’
Client: ‘If you can’t fix it in the next half hour you’re fired. I’ll find someone that knows what they’re doing.’
I stood up, grabbed my tools, and started walking.
Client: ‘Where are you going?’
Me: ‘I told you how long it would take, and that’s longer than a half hour, so I guess I’m fired.’
My firing lasted about three more steps toward the door.”
Fool Me Twice…
“I worked for a hotel run by Guests Inc for a while, technically two different hotels, on the same property, masquerading as competitors. I was trained in every shift, I put in unpaid overtime, I did a lot of stuff that wasn’t in my job description and eventually got bumped up to assistant manager with zero pay increase. I then was put in charge of both hotels, training, tour groups and pretty much had to take all the shifts no one showed up for which was all of them.
They fired me after a woman complained when I couldn’t just make a room for her out of thin air. We were booked solid and she felt entitled as a reward member.
Fast forward a year, I’ve moved away and then back and had grown a lot. They offer me my job back because the manager that fired me is literally to the point of working 16 hours daily.
I agree, stupidly, under the promise that this time it will be different and I even got an apology for my dismissal last time. During that year a ton of policies changed and I had some rust from switching careers for a year but I was promised a list with all the logins, passwords and policy changes I would need.
I show up and was given nothing. It was a packed house and angry people all around but I survived. The manager tells me ‘he knew I could handle it’ when I confront him. Plays it off as all the sleep he’s been missing. Whatever.
The next night is worse. Packed to the brim and the online site is shoveling in reservations even though we’re booked solid. I’m having to turn people away as they literally booked the room on their phone in front of me despite the warning that I can’t refund it (third party) and I have no room for them. Then the card reader goes down, so no one who actually had a reservation can get into the rooms that are available and ready.
I call my manager, nothing. I call their manager, nothing. Head of housekeeping, nope.
At this point, another hotel nearby calls to ask if we have rooms. I know the woman working there and her husband is the one who previously trained me before getting fired for stupid reasons himself. I unload on her (not hateful) about all that was going on.
By the time my manager finally calls me back I have two different ex-employees (one my brother, the other my buddy who trained me) in the lobby helping me with the angry people and fixing the card maker. The only reason that hotel made any money past 8:30 was due to my brother.
Anyway, he calls me, half asleep and tells me to just deal. I at this point tell him he has 10 minutes to get here before I leave with people inside. He starts to argue that he’s an hour away to which I reiterate, 10 minutes, and hang up.
I’m trying to check people in and my team of hotel Expendables check which rooms are clean while he slowly starts calling everyone involved trying to keep me from leaving and under my orders, no one answers. 9 minutes later another employee shows up to cover until the manager can get there and we all stayed to help him sort the crazy mess as best we could. He wasn’t to blame so I didn’t want to leave him hanging. I left before the manager got there, took my uniform off outside and left it there. Never even got paid for the two days either.”
Racking Up The Sick Time
“Husband was having his gallbladder taken out and was having complications before surgery. I needed to leave early from work for about two hours and my boss threw a fit stating I couldn’t leave. I told her I had 300 hours of sick time I can use for myself and my husband and if she wanted to push I’d take all of it at once… Leaving no one but her to do my job. She said she’d fire me if I tried… I just looked at her and said I have to go I’ll send you my Dr’s note.
I wasn’t fired. I was actually awarded that year for job performance. And for clarification, I didn’t take all 300 hours. I just threatened to since I was protected by FMLA. I only took the day off, but I was tempted.”
He Just Couldn’t Let This Go On Any Longer
“A few years ago, I was the second in charge of our shipping department, making $11 an hour. The head of shipping had a mental breakdown, so I took over while he got help. About three weeks after he returned, the company released him because they didn’t like him and I could do the job.
When they told me they had released him, I asked if they were going to be interviewing for a replacement, or was the job just mine since I was number two. I was told they were looking, but I would have a chance to interview once that process started.
About six months later, I was still doing the guy’s job that paid around $50,000 for only $11 an hour. We had some issues with staff turnover and process changes because the warehouse manager thought he knew best. On top of that, they then told me there is no longer a shipping manager, just a shipping lead, which would be an hourly position. I asked about a raise, get told my review was in two months and told to just wait it out.
I waited for three, four months before I decided to act. Then one day, after a 14-hour night shift, I got a call from the warehouse manager telling me I had to come in RIGHT NOW. When I got there, he UNLOADED on me for things that were beyond my control, and mistakes other people made. We started yelling, and that’s when I told him:
‘I make $11 an hour doing this job, my former boss told me he got paid $50,000 a year to do. I don’t need this. Give me a raise or I won’t be back.’
I then went home and back to sleep. When I went back to work, I was met by the warehouse manager and operations manager. They said they appreciated ‘the hard work I’ve been doing, and are putting me on a salary starting at $45,000.’
I negotiated up to $48,000.”
Most Of Us Would Have Acted Like That After Working Three Months Straight
“I was in the military and was trying to take my vacation time before I lost the days. They denied my requests four different times and I hadn’t had a day off in two months after working 12-to-16-hour shifts most days. I was beyond done.
I was teaching some new guys part of the tasks for one job. Everything was fine, I went somewhere else in the hanger to do something else on the plane. This Quality Assurance guy that everyone knew was a pain came in. I did my stuff good and he never bothered me so I didn’t pay him any attention. He started talking to one of the new dudes.
He then asked to talk to me and pulled me aside. He then asked why I hadn’t told the new guy about some super obscure caution about water under a grate in the hangar floor. This was something that had nothing to do with our job, so it didn’t matter, he was just being a pain.
I was over the job and him, so I told him, ‘Listen Sergent QA, I’ve been denied my leave four separate times and I’ve been working for three months straight, so if you have a problem with the way I taught them, write me up. I don’t care, you can shove it. And you can tell my boss I said that.’
It was a little extreme, but I was pushed to the point. When I went back in, I knew I was in deep because the guy walked out of my shop head’s office and I got called right in. When I went in there, the shop head said, ‘I heard what happened out there, submit the days you want to take leave right now and ill approve it for you.’
That’s all I heard about it, I was shocked.”
There Was Fear And Pain But It Led To Something Greater
“I worked at a terrible retail boutique in college where I was able to work my way up to management. Their pay policies were illegal, and the idiot district director they hired staffed terribly. I worked open to close by myself multiple times.
I was swamped one day and finally had a chance to lock up and take a short break for lunch. But then I got caught and was told if I did it again, I’d be fired. I simply told them to fix their staffing issues.
Then they did it again. I locked up again and a customer called corporate. I was fired. I had the last laugh though because I threatened to sue them for violating employment law. And I did just that. It eventually turned into a class action lawsuit with more than 1,000 employees across multiple states received a multi-million dollar settlement for back wages.
This was what led to a complete life change for me, and I wouldn’t be as successful now had I just let them continue to abuse me.”
The Only Way To Stop A Bully…
“I worked at an unspecified telecom company a few years ago. I was a senior manager in charge of programming, third level support, and production support. A business unit bullied through code changes that just had to get implemented immediately without going through any testing at all. I refused to push it through, but the CIO overruled me.
A few days later, phone activations had ground to a halt, customers nationwide were screaming, and the CIO called phone conference after phone conference demanding timelines for when I was going to get this fixed. He kept screaming to get members of my team on the phone and explain themselves to him. I refused.
Finally, I snapped and told him that if he wanted me to fix HIS mistake I would need to get off the phone, go work with my teams, and the only reason they hadn’t walked out yet was that I was keeping him off their butts, but we would all happily go together.
The next day, QA and my team had the mess cleaned up and fixed for a clean rollout. This was all to avoid a 24-hour delay for QA/production testing.
I wish I could say that was the only or the worst time.”
He Left For The Night And Turned Off His Phone
“I worked a job where I was the only one who knew how to take apart, clean, fix, and put all the equipment back together, as well as complete all of the weekly and monthly maintenance.
One day, I had a boss tell me that I was doing a poor job and not doing enough and that anyone could do my job. If I didn’t step up, I would be fired as they had manuals for each piece of equipment.
That night, I took apart all the equipment (weekly and monthly stuff too), cleaned them, and then just left it apart for them to figure out that morning. Then I turned off my phone after getting home as I had the next day off.
When I turned it back on the next day I saw that I had initially received angry texts ordering me to return and put everything back together. This lasted an hour. Then came the texts saying I risked being fired. Then texts begging me to return. Then more texts trying to compromise with OT. Then an apology before nothing else for the rest of the day other than that the head boss wanted to see me as soon as I came in the next day.
When I came in the next day, most of the equipment was still not put together and what had been put together was put together haphazardly and would need to be taken out again then put back together again. I was immediately asked to be seen by my boss and their boss to explain myself the moment I was seen entering.
Once in the office, I told them that if they weren’t there to apologize then just fire me then and there or drop it and let me put all the stuff back together. They looked at each other and then told me that I could get back to work.
My boss never called me lazy again.”
He Came Back From Vacation And This Is What He Found
“I told my boss two weeks in advance that I was taking PTO on a Monday and Tuesday. She approved it, so I took the days off for a school event.
I came back into the office that Wednesday, and I was locked out of my account. I talked to the operations manager (my boss’s boss) who was the person who interviewed and hired me to see what was going on. He told me that my boss said I disappeared and didn’t contact anybody for two days. I explained it to him and he said no problem. I talked to my boss later in the afternoon and she was furious and started saying how I didn’t tell anybody that I was taking PTO and thought I just suddenly quit.
I don’t know what she was talking about because I told her two weeks earlier that I was going to be out those two days and I had the emails to prove it. At this point, I was the only person left on my team of four people who were there when I was hired. I was already planning on quitting within the next month or so as I had to move for school.
She had the audacity to threaten to fire me. I said, ‘if you feel like you need to let me go for your mistake, go ahead.’
I ended up working there for another seven weeks before leaving on my own terms.”
Guess Who Came Crawling Back?
“Worked for a newspaper, editing and actually putting the paper together. Arranging it all, placing stories and pictures where they need to be. Titling, quoting and sourcing everything. I was a one man team and used an overly complicated system that I figured out how to use really effectively. They treated me like crap, set impossible deadlines and berated me for not meeting them. One day the boss tells me to fully put a paper done by the end of the day, gave me no warning, I had no articles from the journalists and no photos from photographers. It was my job to collect it all from everyone and he wants me to do it in a single day? I told him no, if he wants it done, he has to give me more time. He tells me if I don’t have it done by the end of the day I’m fired. I tell him that this paper can’t function without me. He tells me I need to ‘take the day off and cool my temper’ and that he’ll do my job for me. Get a call an hour after I get home that he needs me to come in and do it and I can have as much time as I need. Promptly quit on that prick. Forget you and your crappy newspaper.”