Recently, an employee went viral for sharing text messages exposing the time her boss demanded she come in during her pre-approved time off:
As you can imagine, the exchange did not go well, and the employee ended up quitting.
Curious about other similar experiences, we asked the BuzzFeed Community to share times when their bosses issued the same ultimatum: work or be fired. Here's what they said:
Some responses have been edited for length/clarity.
1. "One time, I asked for three days off in a row to travel with my family. I got it approved several months prior. Of course, day ONE that I'm off, we're already eight hours away from home, and my boss tells me I have to come in because three people called out that day."
"I told her I was very, VERY far from home. She said I was irresponsible...for traveling...during my time off? She demanded I come in the next day. I quit then and there. She calls again the Sunday I was supposed to work, asking me when I was coming in, saying I would be written up for being late, blah blah blah. I said, 'What part of I QUIT did you not get?'"
2. "In college, I worked as a server at a restaurant. One day, I was scheduled to work a double. I woke up to 2+ feet of snow, so I told the manager I wouldn't make my shifts because it always takes a few days for the plow to come down my road. He threatened my job."
"I told him I couldn't break the laws of physics just to work at what was clearly going to be an empty restaurant that day. He didn't fire me, but I quit soon after."
3. "My wife and I hadn't taken a serious vacation for several years. I requested time off from my manager at least three months in advance. Both he and HR approved, so we made reservations for a package trip. Everything was fine until just a couple of days before we were set to leave. My manager put his head in my office and said, 'We really need you to change your plans because there's an important meeting next week.'"
"I explained that my wife and I were well beyond the cancelation period for the package and we'd lose a couple thousand dollars. I asked if the company would be willing to offer any compensation given the circumstances. He said, 'Oh, we really thought you'd be a good soldier. You know, take one for the team and all that.' I looked straight at him and said, 'Gotcha. I'll send everybody a postcard' and turned back to my desk. I expected there would be consequences, but he never brought it up again."
4. "My boss wanted me to work on my graduation day. He literally said I had to either come in or I could not continue to work there, so I quit."
—kuro
5. "I worked for Walmart years ago. My brother was getting married December 10th, so I just needed a weekend off (and he was also deploying shortly after). My douchebag store manager tried to deny my time off because 'it was too close to Christmas.'”
"It took both myself and my mother calling corporate to get the three days off. And corporate initially didn’t want to take the complaint because I skipped over the chain of command. My manager was eventually fired from the company for stealing money."
6. "Back in the day, I worked at a certain popular coffee spot and had a manager that forced me to come in to close despite having food poisoning. I was literally running to and from the bathroom to throw up all night. Nobody else could cover."
"My manager SHOULD have taken the shift but just didn’t want to. This is the kind of shit that causes people to leave.
The next day, I started looking for a new job and put in my notice less than two weeks later. I otherwise liked the job well enough; I loved working with my best friend, but that manager was so shitty that our store had the second highest turnover in the state."
7. "When my mom was in college, she worked at a fast food place. She got time off approved to go on vacation, but they asked her to find someone to cover the shifts she was originally scheduled for, so she did."
"While on vacation, she got a call from the manager, who said she needed to come back because they fired the girl that was covering her shifts. She said she couldn’t 'cause they were on vacation, so they gave her an ultimatum, and she quit."
8. "I was sick as hell. I couldn’t move because my body was in pain. I was coughing, sneezing, and throwing up, so I took two days off. I was supposed to work on the following Thursday (Thanksgiving), and receive double time. I would have made almost $50 an hour, but I received a text from my boss saying that I would not be receiving holiday pay because I took the two sick days and too many people called off. I quit immediately."
"That last text was just my breaking point. No holiday pay because I'm genuinely sick and other people decided to call off for Thanksgiving? Fuck that."
9. "I worked at a restaurant and had already put my two weeks in. Angry that I got a better job, I guess, they tried to get me to come in on a day off I already had approved months before."
"My manager said that now that I had quit, my time off was no longer approved. Not sure how someone could be stupid enough to think I’d give up a day off for a job I had already quit, but of course, that backfired, and I left in the middle of my notice."
10. "One time, I started throwing up during a shift at a pizza place, and my crappy manager screamed at me instead of just making the pizzas herself."
"I'm sure customers didn't want pizza made by someone who was actively sick. Well, I was 17, and I quit shortly after that."