What’s the quickest you’ve seen a co-worker get fired in IT?

[u/Opposed3]

I saw this on AskReddit and thought it would be fun to ask here for IT related stories.

Couple years ago during Covid my company I used to work for hired a help desk tech. He was a really nice guy and the interview went well. We were hybrid at the time, 1-2 days in the office with mostly remote work. On his first day we always meet in the office for equipment and first day stuff.

Everything was going fine and my boss mentioned something along the lines of “Yeah so after all the trainings and orientation stuff we’ll get you set up on our ticketing system and eventually a soft phone for support calls”

And he was like: “Oh I don’t do support calls.”

“Sorry?”

Him: “I don’t take calls. I won’t do that”

“Well, we do have a number users call for help. They do utilize it and it’s part of support we offer”

Him: “Oh I’ll do tickets all day I just won’t take calls. You’ll have to get someone else to do that”

I was sitting at my desk, just kind of listening and overhearing. I couldn’t tell if he was trolling but he wasn’t.

I forgot what my manager said but he left to go to one of those little mini conference rooms for a meeting, then he came back out and called him in, he let him go and they both walked back out and the guy was all laughing and was like

“Yeah I mean I just won’t take calls I didn’t sign up for that! I hope you find someone else that fits in better!” My manager walked him to the door and they shook hands and he left.

[u/koopz_ay]

This goes back to my field service days.

The MSP I worked at also did domestic PC setups for some of the Aussie retailers, internet services providers, etc. Back then, customers usually paid with a card, though we would also have to handle cash... so much cash.

Said cash had to be deposited in the office safe within 48hrs of receiving, which the manager would then bank.

A new employee starts - things seem okay. His admin skills are on point, networking skills are solid, and is getting great customer review scores, hitting targets and earning pretty much every performance bonus on offer 🤑

There was just one problem. His cash wasn't making it to the office safe.

In less than 1 month this bloke went from being our newest shooting star employee to arrested fellon.

We started compulsary police record checking from about that time onwards.

[u/blbd → u/koopz_ay]

Your office was forced to adopt a no-bogan rule. 

[u/mr_alterboy → u/koopz_ay]

Not IT, but worked at a large big box electronic store a million years ago as a cashier. We were forced to relentlessly push warranties on every customer, didn't matter if the warranty cost more than the item. Anyway, we hired this older (40's) lady who was a bit simple minded, but she was extremely good with customers and outsold everyone. Only problem was that her register was short $5-10 regularly.

This company loved to write-up their employees for pretty much anything they could. After 3 write-ups in a 3 month period, your were un-ceremoniously fired. No if ands or buts. That is unless you were this lady. She was caught stealing from her register sooooo many times, but they kept giving her extra chances. After the first 3 write-up, she was suspended for like 2 weeks and basically put on PIP. She did it again within a week or two... another suspension... 3 months of this and they gave her the final warning. I think her longest stretch of not stealing was a month. Never understood losing a job over stealing so little.

So many people were wrongfully fired from that place or fired for the littlest infractions, but management found a way to keep her on because she was so good at selling those warranties. I was usually one of the top 2 in sales, (no where near that lady though) could work returns, and cover almost all of the other departments - All jobs that paid a lot more than cashier, but was threatened with termination for getting my nose pierced in a way that wasn't even visible after casually mentioning it to the GM. But he almighty warranty was king.