20 Business Practices That Are Unethical AF But Actually Pretty Common

    An intern is not free labor.

    Redditor u/Elaus asked the question: "What is unethical as fuck, but is extremely common practice in the business world?" Many users revealed shocking facts about how many businesses just choose to be unethical and stingy and pickpocket their own customers and employees.

    Male thief in blue beret and black mask stealing money from the purse of a young woman while she is busy with her phone.

    1. "Paying invoices late, especially BIG companies that pay a few months late. It kills small business and seems to be quite normal here in the UK."

    2. "Letting an employee go/easing them out of a job instead of addressing a situation they brought up."

    —u/androWanda

    3. "Doing illegal shit to make $20 million and then getting caught and paying a $5 million fine."

    4. "Signing people up for shit as add-ons to an existing bill and hoping they don't notice the extra charges."

    —u/marthewhite

    5. "Not including wage info in the job posting. At least post the range or minimum for the position."

    6. "It’s shady to give dedicated, long-term employees a measly 2%–3% annual raise (if any at all), while hiring less experienced people for the same (or higher) salary, than the experienced employee. It essentially punishes loyal employees."

    —u/SmthgWicked

    7. "Rocketing the price of stuff and then putting it on 'sale.'"

    A sale is happening

    8. "Consistently making salaried exempt employees work 10-plus hours overtime a week in order to avoid hiring more staff."

    —u/gnosis_carmot

    9. "Congress is immune to insider trading."

    10. "Using a previous salary against you. 'Oh, you make $40,000? Well, we'll offer you $50,000. That's a 25% increase in pay!' Your salary shouldn't be relative, it should be what the market value of the position is. If a job pays $75,000, don't pay me only $50,000 because I only currently make $40,000."

    —u/BoilerMaker11

    11. "Working when you are sick. I have heard stories of bosses forcing people to come in despite being extremely ill. Also, I just wish that it would be mandatory schedule length of at least two weeks if the hours are not the same every day. Mine changes weekly, and it's hard to plan anything."

    12. "Making you pay more for printing your own damn tickets at home."

    —u/ironmanmk42

    13. "A company having a business model that relies on charging fees for breaking its own rules without justification for them."

    14. "When online stores advertise their products at attractively lower prices, but you will never really be able to get the product for that price because they will add extra charges somehow."

    15. "Nominal weights and measures that don't match actual weights and measures. My company sells by the each, but each item has a nominal weight. We intentionally produce our product approximately 10% light to save raw material costs."

    —u/[deleted]

    16. "Fake promotions. There's a role you can apply for that doesn't have any extra pay or benefits, in which you do the same work as the role above that (which is higher paid) in the hopes that eventually you'll be the next in line to actually be given that next position. Except you won't."

    17. "Using unpaid interns as workers. They have the exact same tasks as everyone else, they work the same hours, even more because they think that if they work more they will be noticed and hired (they won't), and it's rare that their supervisor takes the time to teach them anything. They have to figure out things by themselves. Of course most struggle, and it's used as an excuse to not hire them."

    —u/shrekine

    18. "Careful (aka deceptive) wording. 'Up to 100mbps internet speeds!' means you get 5-6mbps, and 'up to' 100 for a moment here and there. 'Made with 100% chicken' simply means that real chicken was utilized as an ingredient at some point."

    19. "Government contracting. Building a thing to 'specs' but not entirely up to full functionality. Knowing the issues that can/will arise, doing nothing about it, and then making the government cut a whole different (and very profitable) contract to fix said problems."

    —u/lurch350z

    20. "Literally anything a corporation does that they can be fined for is taken into account as a business expense. If it's cheaper to pay an illegal dumping fine than it is to change the way they process waste, nothing will be done to stop the illegal dumping."

    —u/Byizo