This Guy Says He Was Fired By Text Message For Liking A Picture On Facebook

    Troy Garrod was apparently fired from a job he'd had for four years after he liked a picture of a wolf fleece.

    This is Troy Garrod, 27, from Norwich.

    On 20 October this year, he was reportedly at home when a picture of a fleece with a design that had five wolves on the back of it appeared on his Facebook feed. It had been uploaded by a colleague. He "liked" the picture, which, he told the Daily Mirror, around 70 other people from his work had also done.

    He told the paper: "I didn't know what the photo meant but everyone else who worked there was liking it so I just joined in."

    However, just days later he received a text message to tell him he'd been fired from his job at Bertrams Books, where he'd worked for the last four years.

    Garrod told the Mirror: "When I received the text saying I'd been sacked I couldn't believe it.

    "I felt really hurt and angry and all my former colleagues think what happened is ridiculous."

    The paper reported that the picture of the jacket had been uploaded to Facebook with the caption: "OMG I’m fucking crying.... I’m sure there’s a wolf fleece appreciation page pahahaha”.

    Garrod was reportedly told in the text message that he "bullied" the jumper's owner by liking the photo.

    However, he says he didn't even know who the fleece belonged to. He told the Mirror: "Sadly I think people being sacked like this will become much more common...I want to warn people to keep work and social divided on Facebook – be careful about befriending colleagues."

    It appears the Facebook post he liked was a reference to the Wolf Fleece Appreciation Society page, which has over 11,000 likes.

    It's full of creepshots of people wearing wolf jackets and jumpers.

    The Mirror reported Garrod was a full-time employee at Bertrams for years, but switched to work for a recruitment agency two months ago.

    The paper claimed that although he was in the same job at the company, "his legal rights were reduced to that of a 'temporary worker'", which meant he could be fired without notice. The employee who uploaded the picture is believed to have been suspended.

    A spokesperson for Bertrams told the Mirror, "We do not comment on personal matters," and a spokesperson for HR GO, the recruitment agency that placed him in the role, said, "The issue you describe is between the client [Bertrams] and Mr Garrod."

    BuzzFeed News has reached out to Garrod for further comment.