Job-hunting is pretty much the bane of my existence.
Judging from the answers I got when I asked the BuzzFeed community to share their worst, wildest, and weirdest job application and interview experiences, I'm not alone.
Here are some of the responses I got that made me feel a little better about the trash fire that is job-hunting.
1. "I went in for an interview at a doggy daycare (dream job, right?!). When we got there, the guy said he had to go to their other location a few miles away and asked me to follow him. He didn't give me the address, and this was before smartphones, so I had no way to find it if I lost him."
"He drove like a crazy person, and it was so hard to keep up! I was afraid I was going to get pulled over. When we finally made it, I asked him if keeping up and not getting lost was part of the interview. I should've realized it was a red flag; it was one of the worst jobs I've ever had. Shortly after I quit, they lost a dog!" —rhiannonb42b0f7888
2. "As a jobless 24-year-old in 2008 that had to move back home and had tattoos and piercings, I had to cover up and take out the metal."
"I went on one interview that was at a business professional-type place, and everything seemed to be going well. Three interviews in, everything was still smooth, when the old woman asked if I had any tattoos or piercings. I thought that was pretty personal, and while I was vague with my answers, I told her that yes, I had some piercings done, but took them out. She actually stood up, asked me to stand up, and got right into my face. I did have some scarring from a lip ring and several nose rings, and she was looking at me so mean at that point that I told her I felt uncomfortable. She said, 'Well, with the scars, we won't hire you.' OK, BYE! I got a job a week later anyway, but damn...that was really weird. And that company ended up shutting down 5 years later, so screw 'em." —witchyribbon84
3. "I applied to be a hostess at a casino restaurant when I was 18. The application process was easy, but the interview was absurd."
"They brought me into a large classroom, and they had four interviewers in the back of the classroom, and they made me stand at the front. They asked me questions such as, 'If you were a tree, what kind would you be and why?' And, 'If you were a wild animal, what kind would you be and why?' Then we had to have a two-minute presentation on whatever it is that we chose. One woman assembled a cake, I sang a song, another man crocheted a hat, it was just bizarre." —cherrycolas
4. "I interviewed for a job at a nursing home, and when the woman interviewing me asked if I had any questions, I asked 'What is the most rewarding part of working here?' and she started telling me about her relationships with the residents there, and started crying."
"I thought it was kinda sweet that she had such a connection with these people, so I didn't think that was bad. That is until she started to get angry because she was crying, and said, 'Now look what you did; you made me cry!' There was no laughter or joking. It was so weird." —mariat4e50d731d
5. "When I was in high school, I applied at an Arby's, and they wanted me to sign a non-compete clause stating I wouldn't work at any other roast beef restaurant within 50 miles of an existing Arby's."
"Dude, it was a minimum wage job at Arby's, not corporate espionage." —brandim4f4855a85
6. "ANY online application where they first have you upload a resume and cover letter, and then make you type out your entire work history, education, experience, blah blah blah and throw in a little ~don't write see resume~ for zest."
7. "Once, I was using several recruiters to find a job. One sent me to an interview downtown. I showed up, and they said they didn’t have any interviews scheduled. They asked me who sent me. I told them, and they rolled their eyes, saying 'not again!' They offered to interview me anyway. I didn’t get the job."
"The next week, the same recruiter sent me to another interview. This time they were expecting me. The next day, the recruiter called me and said I got the job and would start the next Monday! I showed up Monday morning. They asked me why I was there. I told them, and they said they had not, in fact, offered me a job.
I stopped using that recruiter and fortunately found a job soon after with another recruiter." —aditson
8. "I applied for a research assistant position in a lab at a major university. The principal investigator mentioned that the job would require 60-hour work weeks, which is typical in science. But when I asked him about the salary, he told me he would pay me $12.15/hour even though I have a master's degree in the field, which, by the way, was not enough money to get by compared to the cost of living in the area."
"When I asked if I would be paid overtime for the 20 additional hours past a normal 40-hour business week, he said no, and that I would only be allowed to report 40 hours/week even though I would be working 60 (which is illegal!!!). I told him the salary was not reasonable, and he proudly told me that he once had a full MD working in his lab at a similar salary and that I could 'make it work' if I wanted to. I said no thanks." —lynalyve
9. "Not wild, just a bummer. I was super burned out and looking for a job last year. Got a call back from a real estate company about an admin assistant job I had applied for. The interview went so well — I connected so well with my interviewer on a personal level, and I was excited about the prospect of them potentially paying for me to get a real estate license."
"Then they asked how much I wanted. I responded, and there was a tense silence.
It was a phone interview, so I quickly pulled up the posting on LinkedIn that I had responded to so I could double-check the salary range to make sure I wasn’t asking for something egregious. There wasn’t one listed.
They wanted to pay me $15 an hour for an admin assistant job where they were requesting 5+ years of experience in a similar position. I had close to 10. So roughly $31K. I was making over $10K a year more than that in the job I was in already. I wasn’t even asking for more money than I was making, and the amount I had named as a starting point would’ve been a slight pay cut, but I was so miserable and desperate for a new job that I didn’t care.
Suffice to say, I didn’t take the job." —sayhellotojenn
10. "I interviewed for a job as a front desk worker at a local hotel. Not only was the manager quite late to the interview, but when he did show up, he told me he had to run some errands and we can do our interview on the way. I thought that was odd, but since I was pretty new to the whole job interview game, I agreed."
"As we rode in his truck, he started me asking questions — nothing about my past experience or my skills, but rather rapid-fire questions like 'Quick, what’s 75-39?' and when I didn’t answer fast enough, he would chide me in a teasing-but-not-really voice. It was like he was just toying with me. I could feel myself getting angry but didn’t want to blow the interview.
At one point, he left me waiting on a bench in a hallway while he got some supplies. And as I sat there, I had an epiphany: This is bullshit. He is being completely unprofessional, and I should NOT be put through this. I had made up my mind right then I didn’t want to work for this man.
As we rode back, he said he would need to see my social security card. I told him I don’t carry that with me. He asked, 'Well, how am I supposed to hire you without a social security card?' In a VERY demeaning tone. I responded, 'Well, why don’t we see if I even WANT to work here before we worry about that?' He didn’t say anything to that.
I finished the 'interview,' but I had no intention of working there. I found a job at another hotel with a much nicer boss. But I definitely dodged a bullet there, especially since I heard that as bad as that guy was, he was an angel compared to his father (who owned the hotel)." —Gaelicmaiden
11. "I had an interview that I thought went decently well, ended with the hiring manager telling me she would be sending me an email by the end of the week on if she wanted to move me along or not."
"I send a thank you email afterward, and not even five minutes later, I get a response with her attaching a link to a LinkedIn interview on how to dress for an interview. It was a Zoom interview, and I was wearing a grey, cashmere, crew neck sweater… anyways dodged a bullet. Lord knows she would have been a batshit boss." —madisonegold
12. "I was a freelancer, so every hour counted. I also had 5+ years of experience and great references, so most interviews were really negotiations about the hourly rate and travel expenses."
"I applied for a freelance job nearby and was invited to an all-day group interview that was going to include psychological tests and a team challenge. I guess they thought it was The Apprentice or something. I said I was working that day like any competent freelancer." —janes4c411b247
13. "I was never actually interviewed for a job I never accepted and got fired from."
"The interviewer spent the first 45 minutes talking about the company mission to Honduras and making care packages for the homeless before she started talking about the actual job. The more she talked about it, the more it turned out to be an MLM selling windows door to door. I immediately turned it down and thanked her for her time. I then followed up with an email in which she thanked me for my time. She never asked me one question about myself, my work experience, or my 12 years at a big box hardware store.
Three weeks later, I got a phone call from some guy reminding me that training started the following Monday. I told him I had turned down the job. That Monday, I got another call asking where I was. Again, I said I turned down the job. Every day after, I got a phone call asking where I was. Finally, after two weeks, they called to say I was fired for not showing up." —Ponygirl123
14. "I applied for a company that had multiple locations, and their website was very vague on which location each position was stationed at."
"I tried applying for a job I thought was near my house and got an email back asking to set up an interview. Set up a day and time, and the person never calls. I get an email from them saying something came up and asked to reschedule. Rescheduled the interview, and they didn’t call once again. I stupidly agreed to reschedule once again; on the day and time of the interview, it was 15 minutes past the time we agreed on, and I was about to email them saying I was no longer interested when they finally called. I decided to give them a chance and answered the phone. The interviewer is telling me about the company and the role; they mention that the job is at a location pretty far from where I live and not the nearby location I thought I applied for. I explain that the location is too far for me, and the interviewer says 'oh ok' and hangs up." —sarahickey30
15. "I was having particularly bad allergies, but I was determined to get this job at the headquarters of a national frozen yogurt chain. The interview was going really well. I could feel what I thought was a postnasal drip that I kept swallowing until it got too much. When I sneezed, I covered my nose, but it didn’t stop the blood from going everywhere. The lady interviewing me sat there for a moment before running out of the room screaming."
"Multiple people came in and started laughing. Turns out the lady had hemophobia (fear of blood). When one guy could catch his breath, he told me to 'just go' between laughing. Needless to say, I never heard back from the lady about the job. My family still laughs whenever we pass by one of the stores." —angelasorensen
16. "I was on a graduation trip to Europe with my family, and three days into the trip, I found out that I got a second interview for a job that had to be scheduled while I was still in Europe. I, being 21, naive, and desperate for a job, agreed to schedule an interview while my family would be in Cinque Terre, Italy."
"Unfortunately, as I went to show my S/O the interview confirmation email while he sat on the balcony of our AirBnB, I dropped my phone, and it SLID UNDER THE RAILING AND OFF THE 7th FLOOR BALCONY, so I didn’t have my phone for the rest of the trip. I made my sister agree to let me use her phone to do the interview.
Three days pass, and my family helps me find a random hotel lobby to do the interview — which went fine. This was my second interview, so I didn’t know the procedure for following up. I emailed them twice after the interview, while I was still on the trip and would continuously force my sisters to let me check my email on their phones (literally to the point where we got in a huge fight about it).
They completely ghosted me. I didn’t know how common it was to be ghosted after interviews, and I had put in so much effort to make the interview work that I was devastated. It’s been almost four years since the interview, and I still look back with frustration about the experience and how I wish I would have just skipped the interview and been more present with my family." —kas47
17. "I was recently going through the interview process with a company. I was already pretty sure it wasn't something I was interested in after they asked if I would go lower than what I was asking (I was asking for under $50K to start with)."
"For the next part of the interview process, they sent me a document and asked me to fill it out before the next interview. They were asking where my spouse worked, what my parents did for work, and what my spouse's parents did for work?! What does that have to do with anything? And especially for a job paying under $50K. I wrote back and said it just wasn't a good fit." —jennyfr0mthebl0ck
18. "I had a job interview where the person conducting the interview told me about the position, and then she got to the hours. The hours wouldn't have worked for me, so I had to turn her down. She started crying!"
"She said that she and her team had been trying to fill that position for months, and they were so excited when they saw my application! She cried all the way to the front door as she let me out of the building." —aaronh18
19. "Dunder Mifflin on wheels."
"It was 2008, and I was living at home and desperate for a job. I found a Craigslist ad, and after a brief phone screening, was told to show up the next day prepared for an all-day interview with no other details provided. I went and was told that they sold office supplies door-to-door at local businesses and that I'd be riding with one of their salesmen out in the field for the entire day. I hopped into a raggedy Honda Civic with a complete stranger, and my fears were validated on our very first stop. He tried to get an appointment with the owner of the business and became so aggressive with the secretary that she became visibly uncomfortable and told us to leave. The only commonality I remember establishing with him in the five hours we were together was the fact we had both seen the Lord of the Rings movies. They offered me the job in a way that tried to make it seem like they didn't take anyone off the street (they clearly did), and I turned it down." —benjaminstarr
And finally...
20. "I was offered a job by a regular customer; he called for a phone interview one morning with his wife while I was on my way to work. He knew a little bit about my life and was asking the typical questions until close to the end of our 40-minute talk when he asked me if I had any plans to have more kids, because according to him, 'I should have learned from my first mistake.'"
"His wife piped in and told me I didn't need to answer, but he cut her off and said, 'I know she isn't dumb; she's probably learned her lesson.' I almost crashed my car; I was so taken aback! Long story short, I took the job, and he was an ass the entire time. But I was a young single mom. What are you going to do?" —j41d50aad9
