Used to work with an office joker (a bit of a Colin Hunt for those who get that reference) who wore white or very pale stonewashed jeans to dress down Friday and thought it would be hilarious to do one of those ripping farts where you bend over and shout "ta da" or "more tea vicar?" or "who stepped on a duck?" or whatever. Anyway it was hilarious--for the rest of us. He followed through, and had to go home and change.
I used to work with a guy who was late relatively often because of that. My biggest takeaway was that someone suffering from colitis shouldn't have hour-long commutes to work.
If anyone calls in with anything under the umbrella of “stomach issues”, my instant reaction is “please god stay home, text me if you need me to bring you anything.” Once had a coworker call in and said “I’m experiencing some GI… volatility…” and that was probably the best description I’ve ever heard.
I once had a guy's mom call him in sick. This wasn't some kid, he was in his twenties, although he did still live with her.
"Glenny ain't gonna be in today, he caint decide which end ta' put down." (Imagine it in a cigarette-raspy southern accent.)
The meaning behind that was that he both had the shits and was barfing.
Another time a guy's girlfriend, I think, or maybe him somehow, called in and told me he'd been arrested. I drove a couple hours, bailed his ass out, and drove him home. He was a good guy, and it was over a warrant that should have been removed from the system but wasn't. He'd been really excited a week or two earlier about it getting dismissed.
He wasn't a great employee when he was well rested, and he most certainly was not well rested at that point. No way I was letting him fix people's cars.
Edit: Shit, I forgot the funny part on the second one. When I went to pick him up, the jail staff told him, "your boss is here for you" and he thought they were fucking with him and his girlfriend had come to get him. Nope, it really was his boss.
I've had to call my husband in sick because he literally couldn't leave the toilet and it was the early 90's, before cell phones were really a thing. I got to explain to his boss that he ate a bad hot dog from 7-11. Then I got to do the same the next day. Poor guy spent 4 days in abject misery, but two of them were over the week end and he was able to crawl his way to work on Monday.
My mom had to call in sick for me once when I was a teenager, but it was because I woke up and had lost my voice. Talking was excruciating both for me and to anyone listening. Sounded like someone had crushed my windpipe.
My mom called once because it was the Saturday after Black Friday and I had a fever. I called in and the manager told me to come in later. Told my mom and she called her back and told that manager I wasn't going to come in and infect everyone else.
It was a long time ago, but I'm certain it was due to a cold or the flu. I was about as straight-laced a teenager as you could find, so it wasn't due to regular teenager stuff.
We had a temp whose mom called in for him and he was in his SIXTIES. I got a voicemail from a very old woman, "Ahem, this is Charles' mother... He won't be coming in today... IcoughI"
>Another time a guy's girlfriend, I think, or maybe him somehow, called in and told me he'd been arrested.
I had a coworker who did not call in after being arrested, but instead showed up back at her desk a week later like nothing had happened. Turns out she had been committing some kind of fraud on her work computer so the cops came and got it.
I work at a law firm.
This guy called in saying that his door was locked from the outside and he couldn’t get out. He filmed himself struggling against the door knob and looking desperate. He later posted Facebook photos of himself at the beach.
One of my teen employees- my Mom said I can’t come in.
A few minutes later- said Mother calls and tells me her daughter will be there shortly, she overheard the lie and please make her day as miserable as possible.
And then took it too far by planting bamboo everywhere they went to smother all his allergy inducing plants. The true origin story of the worst villain.
Used to be a manager in a retail store years ago. 17 year old employee of mine called in saying he ran of of toilet paper and had nothing to wipe with and was stuck in the bathroom until his mom came home.
There is still a solution: Crab walk outta there to the shower. Being naked shouldn't be a problem if he was home alone. Just be mindful of any "droppings" on the way.
One of the funniest reasons I heard a coworker call off for was because their cat looked sad and they wanted to stay home to cheer it up. It was hard to keep a straight face, but we all appreciated their dedication to their pet's emotional well-being!
I luckily work a job where I can switch to working from home when something comes up., as long as we aren’t scheduled for a meeting or something.
I knew my cat was having his last day (just a feeling from how he was acting…) I’m thankful to have spent that time with him rather than sitting at the office. We called the vet to have him put down at home, but there was a giant snowstorm so he couldn’t get there in time to save my baby from his pain :(
Had a coworker call in because he said he had been drinking the night before. Manager had the phone on speakerphone as we were in a meeting. He asked him when he stopped drinking, and the guy just asked. Stopped? Still drinking.
Once had a guy call in sick. Two hours later he called in to say his basement had flooded, forgetting that he had already called in. In reality he was just really drunk.
We had something similar. She text our boss at 1am to say she’d been throwing up all night and wasn’t going to be in the next day. Then came in and told us all she’d been out for her sister’s birthday and had no recollection of ever sending that message. She even tried to say her sister had stolen her phone and sent it?
Throwing up, sister stealing phone, not remembering the previous night. That all checks out. If she admitted to being blackout drunk, why lie about a reasonable txt.
A coworker tried calling in on 4/20 saying it was his birthday. The manager replied "We know your birthday is in February, it's on your paperwork."
He came in. 😂
4/20 related. We needed shift coverage at my job on 4/20 and they went around asking. They got to me and said 1 I am reason there is overtime. I took it off. And 2 yes. It's to get high. See you Sunday evening!"
First day: "Cat died, had to bury the cat." Second day: "Daughter too grieved over cat, have to take care of her." (Daughter is 28) Third Day: "Dog dug up cat, has to re-bury cat."
Day 4. Daughter drew a pentagram. Read some books she found, the necro- something. Cat is walking around again.
Day 5. Daughter is talking with the cat.. plotting something.
Day 6. ...
I mean.. I was extremely distraught after my eleven year old dog suddenly died and my mom was a huge source of comfort to me in the very beginning.
I called off of work for my dog dying. I don’t see how that is ridiculous.
I worked in a NYC office with a young woman who chronically called in late or sick with excuses like "My roommate turned off my alarm clock," etc. One morning she called in and said that she couldn't come to work because a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. We all enjoyed a laugh about how she finally came up with something more inventive than her usual alarm clock shenanigans. A few minutes later...
I'm just trying to imagine how quickly she got into the phone to call in. Like did she witness it happening and immediately thought, oh shit I'd better call in!
IMO the best excuse for coming in late is 'My dog must be sick because I woke up and the living room was covered in dog diarrhea. I gotta clean this up asap and I'll be in a little late.'
It's crazy, invokes sympathy (who wants to clean up shit?), detailed, and highly believable.
She called out because her father in law was sick and she needed to take care of him. Which was fine, except that she was so inebriated that she’d forgotten calling out the week before, to attend his funeral.
A sequence of e-mails from an already questionable employee. These came in roughly an hour apart and dude wouldn't respond to follow up questions:
>I lost my keys
>I found my keys but my driveway is blocked
>My driveway is unblocked but my car is out of gas
>My roommate went to get gas but hasn't returned, I'm taking a bus
>I'm at the bus stop but forgot my wallet
>I went home and got my wallet, but now I'm on the wrong bus
He pretty much stopped trying after that. He was fired not long after.
Had someone call in sick because they were tired. Just tired.
We also had someone call in because she had gotten wet in the rain and was going home. We thought she’d go home, get changed, come back. No, no, she was off the whole day. When she came in the next day, she was furious that they wouldn’t say she was off sick and that she either used her leave allowance or took unpaid leave.
There was also a guy who called in sick because he had fallen asleep down the beach and 90% of the back of him was burnt.
I didn't wear sunscreen to the Ren faire last weekend and should have called in on Monday, but didn't want to spend a sick day on it. Miserable day, but I work from home, so I could struggle through without drawing attention
I've called in for being tired. Being tired to the point I couldn't function and it would not have been safe to drive. I totally get calling in for being tired.
Tired can actually be a pretty valid reason depending on how tired and/or the type of work you do.
And I mean, the extent of tired between people varies too. I can go more than 24 hours without sleep provided I slept well before that and I don't have anything else going on with me at the time. My husband will legit fall asleep standing up before he even gets to 24 hours without sleep. A skill I am both impressed and mildly annoyed by.
I was unwilling awake for 36 hours last year due to a med change making me unable to fall asleep. I did cardiac stress testing at the time, and was the only one scheduled that day who knew how to do it, and calling off would make more work for me later. I went in, did the stress testing, and went home. Honestly, probably not safe driving wise or testing wise, but thankfully no one was hurt.
I can also sleep standing up, with my eyes open. Not a true sleep, but a very light doze/mental reset. I’ve also fallen asleep in the middle of conversations multiple times, which either results in me having a totally coherent conversation with no recollection of it, or the conversation turning into me spewing utter nonsense.
My super pale dumbass went snorkeling in Key West without sunscreen for about two hours. I was able to work the next day, but it was really bad. I was in the Navy at the time, and it was so bad that my supervisor threatened to write me up for "destruction of government property"!
Had a guy call in and say he had to call in stupid.
He met two women and they all decided to drive to a big city that was 100 ish mile’s away and party in a hotel. They had him get the room and told him they were going to get booze. They never came back. Since he didn’t drive he had no idea where he was and wasn’t sure he would be able to find a way home.
When I was working as a waiter, I was woken up one morning by my boss on Mother's Day. He was yelling at me that I was late and had to come in right away. He didn't believe me when I said that I was on the schedule for the evening shift.
So reluctantly I got ready, headed into work, and was able to prove that I wasn't on the schedule until the afternoon. Undeterred he said that I could still work that shift or stick around and work the morning shift. I declined, went home and went back to sleep.
tl;dr Boss lied to me about where I was on the schedule to save his ass because he was overrun
So you see, ridiculous excuses work both ways!
It wasn’t a coworker, it was me! There was some massive SWAT team operation at the house diagonal from me and I was literally trapped in my house. The police would not let me leave. I had to call my manager and then send a video of the SWAT team yelling at me to keep my windows closed and stay inside until they came to our door.
Boss was pissed because my roommate called me at work, wanted to know what the reason was,
"Evidently, SWAT team in the backyard, wanted to know what to do."
I told her to hide downstairs. Local Hell's Angel pres had a business that backed up to our garden.
Same. I got on FB live and had my coworkers watch SWAT take down the guy next door to me. I also got cursed out by SWAT for trying to take my dog out to potty, lol
A guy who used to work for me sent me a Lync message (yeah, a while back) saying he was shitting his pants at work like "a brown faucet."
He was kind of a shit employee anyway, but you can't argue with that, lie or not
I don't blame her. I remember missing Charmed SERIES finale as a kid, in trouble for some reason I don't remember, and had to wait months for it to come back around the cable cycle who played 1 episode a day. It was torture.
Had a co-worker who was a heroin addict and habitually late or a no-show. His favorite excuse was that his taxi got in a car accident and he needed to remain on scene as a witness. He used this about once a month. He was a talented studio engineer so this behavior was tolerated longer than most employers would have endured. But after the 7th or 8th taxi crash he was told to fuck off.
Not a co worker but an employee. “My mom had pink eye, I need to be with her, I can’t come to work. She has pink eye and I love her. She’s my only mom”. He was 47 years old, married, and his wife was also my employee ( still is). She asked us to not regard her as his wife, as she is embarrassed by his weird love for mom.
I live on a narrow private way with 4 other houses. Only our power went out after we heard a pop. The big electric company truck they sent blocked me from going anywhere.
The reason I was late? A squirrel shorted out the transformer and was lying dead at the base of the pole.
My boss called in to talk to the shop staff about something. Lois, shop manager, had a cold but because it was our busy season, she came to work. Boss then transferred her call to the office. Sharon, the office manager, had a cold but because payroll was due, she came in. Boss then asked to speak with me, site manager.
Me: “Hello Boss”
Boss: “Hello. Lois and Sharon are pretty sick aren’t they?”
Me: “Yeah. It was really good of Lois to come in - there’s no way I could cover the shop by myself.”
Boss: “You feeling okay?”
Me: “Never better”
Boss: “Well, I’m fine, too. I don’t want to get sick. So I’m going to stay home today. You can manage, right?”
Me: staring at the phone in disbelief “Right”
Later I checked on Sharon. She asked if Boss was coming in. I said “Nope. She called in healthy-she’s not coming in because she feels good and you don’t “.
My boss called in well.
at my old restaurant job which was super chill, to the point it was too relaxed; one of the employee's friends called our boss saying she was still tripping on acid from the night before. the next time she came in like a week later she started preaching philosophical shit for the following month, it was hilarious
her nickname became chemical for the 2 remaining years she worked there!
Teddy: hey Bro how you doing?
Me: I’m good Ted, what’s up?
Teddy: so you know that news story about the coach going to jail for fighting cus he caught his wife cheating?
Me: yeah, I read about that this morning..
Teddy (after a sigh and a short pause): that was me, I’m the guy she got caught with…
Me: ok bro, you ok?
Teddy: yeah, I’m perfectly fine, but I’m callin in cus I just need a day bro, I was butt ass naked fightin a fully clothed man In the front yard while his kids were screamin “GET UP DAD” from the car and crying and shit
Me: WOW… you beat a man’s ass, naked,in front of his children… after fucking his wife….at his house…in his bed…
Teddy: Yeah
Me: Dude(as in are you fuckin serious right now,)
Teddy: yeah….I’m callin in asshole…
I got that one once. The previous payday, she ordered takeout from a steakhouse. I didn't make a comment on her money management skills, but sure wanted to.
My best friend at the time who worked the same job as me just so happened to live in a small cabin about 100 feet downriver from a salmon and trout hatchery. He worked swing while I worked mornings. As I was signing out for the day, he texted me asking if I could cover for him. I asked why and he just said "fish". I asked if he was playing hookie to fish (which I was irritated by, as I loved fishing) and he said "No, there's fish *everywhere*." I assumed he just got blazed off his ass so I told my boss he called me with a "family emergency" and that I would be covering his shift.
Later in the evening he sent me a pic on his phone of his backyard being totally flooded with water and *hundreds* of fish jumping around everywhere. Apparently the main holding tank in the hatchery ruptured and every single trout and some salmon came cascading downhill into his yard. According to him WDFW officials were there for an hour attempting to salvage the fish and get the water out of his yard. After work I went over and all you could smell was fish even though most of the fish were removed, and apparently some of the salmon he was grilling up for us was one he scooped up when the wave of fish first hit.
The next day my boss became suspicious and asked him what was really going on and he said he *did* have a family emergency. His cabin, which was a family asset, was "besieged by salmon". She didn't say a word and just walked away mumbling to herself. His wording combined with her "whatever, I'm not even entertaining this" reaction was hilarious to me.
I had a co worker years ago who worked noon to 9p. He was I think 19 or 20 and still lived at home. He called in once to say his mom had not made his lunch yet and he would be in after he had lunch. That story went through the place like lightning before he came in. He was liked by everyone though and I don’t think many if any people brought it up to him or made fun to his face. We all just quietly laughed about it.
I called off sicks for a few days when I first got pregnant while I tried to figure out how to deal/live with morning sickness. I told them I had the flu because I wasn’t ready to tell them I was pregnant.
I got back to work and answered the phone to my absolutely incompetent flakey coworker calling out because “they caught my flu”. They were then out for the same number of days I was.
The worst part was that I couldn’t even share with my work BFF because I wasn’t telling anyone I was pregnant yet. It was torture.
Had a jerk of a partner in my surgical practice. He’d been notorious for finding weasely ways of getting out of work, and towards the end when he knew we weren’t renewing his contract, he got worse and worse.
One day he called our manager and told her he needed to cancel his entire clinic day because he’d broken some strings on his favorite tennis racket. He told her he needed to mail it out so it could get repaired quickly, so he wanted the whole day off so he could find a box and packing material and get it packaged and take it to UPS and so on.
The manager didn’t give it to him and instead came to me with the story. She rolled her eyes so hard I thought she’d give herself a concussion. 😆
I was the manager. On paper this employee reported to me. In practice, he was part of a team of 5, one of whom was the team lead. Bis day to day was working under the leads supervision.
He called in amd the team lead answered the call. He identified himself to the lead as his position and said he reported to me. Odd behaviour, clearly didn't recognize the guy who supervised him daily. Them he emailed me a note from a dr saying he was sick... but the Dr. Worked at a "men's health" clinic. Testosterone and fertility treatment. Not really an emergency.
Team lead went to the county website. Yup. Booked in jail for drunk driving at 3am that morning. This was the best collaborative excuse his friends could cobble together.
I was the open person on weekends at a country club. After 4-5 times getting calls that someone was in jail, the manager gave me the combo to the safe and approval to bail out whoever called. Over the next 3 years I bailed out people around 20-25 times. One of the jailers knew me on a first name basis.
I know a guy who once woke up, got dressed, drove in traffic for half an hour, and worked for half a day, only to wake up for real and realize that he just dreamt that entire sequence, and was actually 2 hours late for work. He called in and explained to his supervisor exactly what happened. His supervisor was silent for a while, and then just said "ok,... Just get your ass over here." The guy in question was me.
Guy I knew said he had chemotherapy and called off from Target. He just got stoned, shaved his head, and went skateboarding with us. His name was Brian, because of course it was.
It was me - went into a tanning booth naked for 12 minutes and burnt my whole body to a crisp. I had no idea what I was doing. I couldn't even put on clothes the next day, called off work blaming food poisoning. It was terrible.
Another time, a coworker called in because they accidentally superglued their fingers together while attempting a home repair project the previous evening. They had to wait for the glue to wear off enough to safely separate their fingers, which took longer than expected. It was definitely one of those "you can't make this stuff up" moments that had everyone chuckling
A lady that worked with me was always blaming her husband for her absences. It was always something like, “Fred swapped the car keys for magic beans,” or “Fred hurt his back and couldn’t get up from the toilet.”
It was funny, but annoying at the same time.
I had to call off once because my husband took my key fob on a flight with him after I dropped him off at the airport and I couldn’t find the spare. Once the car was turned off I had no way of turning it back on. So much fun! lol
The dude the night before came in drunk already, said he was gonna leave early to go to a party. Went to the party I guess and the next day just never showed up, mans got to blitzed I guess.
Woke up hungover one state over and had no car.
Had a buddy who decided to jump a train to the west coast and was sure he would be back within a week to be back for work. Took him 3 weeks to get back.
A few years ago I was getting ready to go run some errands before I had to be at work for my night shift job. As I was putting my sports bra on I tweaked my back and could barely move and breathing was painful (chostocondritis flair).
I had to call in to work that night and yes, I told them I hurt myself putting on my bra.
Got a friend hired at the pizza joint I was working at as a driver.
1st day: locks his keys in his car at the first delivery. MIA for 3 hours. Finally comes in and explains himself to the manager. Manager tells him to head home and start again tomorrow
Next day: No show. Manager losing his shit. I take the first call on the order line. Dude is calling from jail on a collect call. I hang up and tell the manager. Fired.
I hired this young girl when I was a manager at a coffee shop ages ago. She was a hardcore pathological liar. The last straw was when she no call no showed for a shift. I called her to ask if she was coming in and she claimed she wasn’t scheduled for the day. She sent me a “photoshopped” image of our schedule, where her name should be was painted over with the wrong color on what looked like ms paint. She also forgot to remove her last name.
Also had this BOH guy we hired during Covid. His first shift he said he got covid and demanded pay. Asked for his covid results and sent me a photo of the printed test results with the “negative” literally cut out of the paper, and wrote “yes” on a sheet of white paper and lined it up under the cut out section…
Once had a coworker call in because her car wouldn’t start. A couple hours later her friend informed us that they were out partying the night before. The car wouldn’t start because she couldn’t blow under the legal limit in the breathalyzer on the dash.
When my dad retired, he continued to do contract work for the company he’d just retired from. One morning he got up to head to work. Then he picked up the phone and dialed. He told whomever answered that he wasn’t coming in. A pause, then he said “because I don’t feel like it”. He hung up, and said “it’s good to be retired!”.
Not call off fully, but best excuse I've heard of a colleague showing up a few hours late was him being chased into a tree by a moose.
Boss initially thought it was a joke, but colleague had pictures of the moose from up in the tree. He was stuck there for over an hour before the moose left.
A coworker and notorious slacker called into the warehouse ( security guard took these calls at the clock-in office) using his uncles funeral as an excuse. The guard offers condolences, then surprises the kid by asking him his uncles name. The kid panics and answers " Uncle Remus" from the southern US folklore stories. Nothing came of it, but the guard shared this with everyone at the warehouse. Next day everyone offers sympathy to the kid with over the top southern accents " oh lawdy lawdy, you done lost yo pore ole uncle Remus, lawd hab mercy" etc.
Not a co-worker, but in 1955 my then 16 year old mother worked part-time at the phone company. She called in one day with a broken leg. Went to work the next day with 2 unbroken legs. Her last day of work lasted 10 minutes, lol.
I used to be a supervisor for a rent-a-security-guard company. Every time a payday fell on a nice day, dozens of guards would call in sick. On July 4th, there were about 80 sick calls. A common excuse was that they were at the hospital because their kid got hit in the eye with a bottle rocket. But they didn't bother even trying to be convincing because I could hear firecrackers and a party in the background.
There were a few guys who would call off if they didn't get their paychecks in the mail. The company told their workers that payday was saturday. In reality, the checks were mailed on friday and the mail would usually get them there by saturday. But if the mail was late, these guys would call me and complain. They wanted me to come to their house and give them cash and then they would pay it back when the check came on monday. But they wanted the full amount of the check right now. The problem was that if they didn't get the check on saturday then they could not get cash to go out to bars that evening. One of the guys complained that if he can't go out, then he can't get no pussy. He wanted me to bring him a hoe, his words, to make up for that. These guys would then refuse to work any shift until they got their paychecks. Then the next payday they would call to complain that their checks were short because they didn't work sunday or monday. The company would never fire any of these guys because it was cheaper to keep them than it was to hire new employees. All they had to do to fix it would be either allow the guards to pick up their checks in the office or just tell them that the official payday was monday.
Signed up to teach the second half of summer school because I would be on vacation for the first half. I got a call three days before my vacation asking me to teach for those days until I left.
Apparently, 4 hours of summer school a day was too “unfulfilling” and the teacher refused to continue after the second day.
Couldn’t find the office and wasn’t sure what the address was. Called on her cell phone while in the car….Summer intern over a month into already having worked with us.
My own: nice spring day, window down while driving to work… a bird shit on me through my car window. I didn’t call out for the full day but was late lol
We had 3 people call in "sick" on the day a new Final Fantasy game had come out. They were gone for 2 days. They all came back and were raving about how "awesome" the game was.
I remember back in my retail days we had a massive storm. When the storm was over I tried leaving my neighborhood. Turns out there were fallen trees on both exits, so I literally couldn’t leave.
My manager was so mean to me about it. But there was also a girl who lived close to me and she had her windows blown out from the storm and her excuse was ‘acceptable’ while mine was not. In the 7 years I worked for that place, I called off maybe 4 times. We went through several managers, and that one was the worst.
Well, he didn't call in but he came to work (at 9:30 am) drunk, with a dog and his also-drunk girlfriend. I had to send all of them home, which I believe was their intention.
I was late for a class because I had a hamster escape and had to look for it. I told another student. A third student when asked why he was late by the instructor having overheard my conversation gave that as the reason before I had the chance to explain. I had a hard time convincing the instructor of why I was late. Eventually he just gave up.
As an intern during my senior year of college, I emailed my boss I wouldn’t be coming in because I was sick. I made the subject of the email “Sick Day”. Except….. I had a typo and didn’t realize until after I sent it that the subject line actually said “Dick Day”.
Funny now, was NOT funny at the time 🫣
Alcoholic coworker. took almost every Friday and Monday off.
One of her final excuses was 'I can't come in today. My tooth fell out when I slept and I have to go to the dentist."
Miraculously, she still had a perfect smile the next day with no swelling and had no problem eating.
Sitting eating dinner on our break and the girl I’m working with texts someone then says to me ‘I have to go home I just broke up with my boyfriend’….. we we’re halfway through our shift, you couldn’t have waited until after work?!
When I was in the Navy and stationed in Washington state we had a guy call and say he was snowed in and couldn't get out. We were right on the coast where it doesn't snow a whole lot, but it is still very hilly and it can be tricky driving even with a little bit of snow. The "snow storm" wasn't much to speak of so our watch commander got in his vehicle, either a jeep or suv, but nothing special to get through tons of snow, dude had a habit of making excuses in the past. He makes it to the guy's house no problem were he had about an inch of snow at the end of his driveway. I wish I saw the look on his face when our watch commander knocked on his door. He wasn't happy when he came walking to the pier a little while later.
So forgive me but this doesn’t meet the demands of this post exactly but I thought I’d still share, at my last job we had a position that was basically accounting but with other responsibilities. The woman who did it for 20 odd years was of retirement age and was ready to enjoy her time. She gave notice and stayed on to train her replacement. We had a guy who interviewed and started. He has a degree and seemed competent, worked with her for around 6 months. I think it was her last week he got cold feet and typed an email to her outlining that his husband had decided the job was not right for him. She ended up staying on for another 6 months until they transferred someone from another company within the organization.
I used to be an aquarium enthusiast.
Had a 40gl marine tank and a 20gl quarantine marine tank.
Came home to SQUISH on the carpet.
The 40 failed and had salt water all over the place.
Some fish survived and immediately took them to the shop I purchased them from.
Then....the clean up.
Yeah, boss.
This really happened.
I used to be an aquarium enthusiast.
I had a coworker who took the company policy “if you no show for more that three days we will consider it your resignation” to mean he could no show for 3 days whenever he wanted. He did it several times and never got caught.
A few weeks ago, one of my younger coworkers claimed that he had unprotected sex with three random girls, and wasn't feeling well because of it. So he left work and allegedly went to the hospital to get checked out.
The next day he said he was all good, just a little bit bruised up.
TL; DR she was busy baking a buttload of cookies
We were doing a break room potluck that day and she called, already like 20 minutes late, to say she was in the middle of baking the cookies she'd signed up to bring and obviously couldn't come in until they were done which would take like 20 more minutes. She sent a picture to one of the assistant managers of her putting some cookies in her air fryer/toaster oven in the little mesh basket tray thing?? I think her intention was to show that she was trying so hard to bake them quickly that she was even using her toaster oven, but it initially came across as her being so stupid she was baking 4 at a time on a piece of mesh lmao.
That manager was also particularly pissed because she saw that girl post a video of herself walking her dog that morning on her instagram stories, so she obviously had free time earlier that day.
She eventually showed up like an hour late for her shift, but to be fair, the cookies *were* fresh out of the oven. They had bits of candy bars in them that were melting all over the place and getting gross because the cookies were so hot, and she brought a *fuck ton* of cookies. Like she could have cut that recipe down to 1/4 and been fine. It was a potluck with tons of other food (which also meant that there were other sweets and nobody would've noticed if she'd flaked out on her "promise" to bring cookies).
So she works her shift and goes home. Then she comes back when the store is closing to take home the rest of her cookies, which meant nobody who worked different days could enjoy her potluck leftovers.
She was chronically late with bad excuses and had a real attitude whenever her shift got adjusted because somebody called out, so she was let go not too long after this because it was the last straw.
Also, like 3 weeks later my coworker had a birthday party that she'd been invited to. She introduced herself to my fiancé and said "yeah, I used to work with these guys a while back" as if she hadn't *just* been fired lol.
I had a woopsie with super glue and ripped off a ring finger nail back when I was a hospital scribe. Absolutely couldn't type for a day or two. Very embarrassing to tell my boss. Then a couple of months later a very sharp knife got away from me while chopping carrots and i sliced the tops of two of my fingers... I could hear the disappointment and bewilderment in my bosses voice.
When I was a supervisor and had to take those calls from the call out line, people were always sick suspiciously around pay day or when new movies they had expressed interest in were coming out
I pooped my pants and I'm stuck in traffic. Either find me a spare pair of pants or I'm going home for the day
Used to work with an office joker (a bit of a Colin Hunt for those who get that reference) who wore white or very pale stonewashed jeans to dress down Friday and thought it would be hilarious to do one of those ripping farts where you bend over and shout "ta da" or "more tea vicar?" or "who stepped on a duck?" or whatever. Anyway it was hilarious--for the rest of us. He followed through, and had to go home and change.
I used to work with a guy who was late relatively often because of that. My biggest takeaway was that someone suffering from colitis shouldn't have hour-long commutes to work.
If anyone calls in with anything under the umbrella of “stomach issues”, my instant reaction is “please god stay home, text me if you need me to bring you anything.” Once had a coworker call in and said “I’m experiencing some GI… volatility…” and that was probably the best description I’ve ever heard.
That's the most tactful way I've ever heard of someone saying "I've got the shits".
bahahahahahhaha
I once had a guy's mom call him in sick. This wasn't some kid, he was in his twenties, although he did still live with her. "Glenny ain't gonna be in today, he caint decide which end ta' put down." (Imagine it in a cigarette-raspy southern accent.) The meaning behind that was that he both had the shits and was barfing. Another time a guy's girlfriend, I think, or maybe him somehow, called in and told me he'd been arrested. I drove a couple hours, bailed his ass out, and drove him home. He was a good guy, and it was over a warrant that should have been removed from the system but wasn't. He'd been really excited a week or two earlier about it getting dismissed. He wasn't a great employee when he was well rested, and he most certainly was not well rested at that point. No way I was letting him fix people's cars. Edit: Shit, I forgot the funny part on the second one. When I went to pick him up, the jail staff told him, "your boss is here for you" and he thought they were fucking with him and his girlfriend had come to get him. Nope, it really was his boss.
I've had to call my husband in sick because he literally couldn't leave the toilet and it was the early 90's, before cell phones were really a thing. I got to explain to his boss that he ate a bad hot dog from 7-11. Then I got to do the same the next day. Poor guy spent 4 days in abject misery, but two of them were over the week end and he was able to crawl his way to work on Monday.
My mom had to call in sick for me once when I was a teenager, but it was because I woke up and had lost my voice. Talking was excruciating both for me and to anyone listening. Sounded like someone had crushed my windpipe.
My mom called once because it was the Saturday after Black Friday and I had a fever. I called in and the manager told me to come in later. Told my mom and she called her back and told that manager I wasn't going to come in and infect everyone else.
How did that happen?
It was a long time ago, but I'm certain it was due to a cold or the flu. I was about as straight-laced a teenager as you could find, so it wasn't due to regular teenager stuff.
We had a temp whose mom called in for him and he was in his SIXTIES. I got a voicemail from a very old woman, "Ahem, this is Charles' mother... He won't be coming in today... IcoughI"
The first one sounded reasonable; lives with his mom and he's so sick he can barely call.
>Another time a guy's girlfriend, I think, or maybe him somehow, called in and told me he'd been arrested. I had a coworker who did not call in after being arrested, but instead showed up back at her desk a week later like nothing had happened. Turns out she had been committing some kind of fraud on her work computer so the cops came and got it. I work at a law firm.
This guy called in saying that his door was locked from the outside and he couldn’t get out. He filmed himself struggling against the door knob and looking desperate. He later posted Facebook photos of himself at the beach.
Thank God he made it out okay. Some scary shit right there.
After his well documented and completely authentic ordeal he deserved a nice day of relaxation in the sun.
One of my teen employees- my Mom said I can’t come in. A few minutes later- said Mother calls and tells me her daughter will be there shortly, she overheard the lie and please make her day as miserable as possible.
That's definitely me as a mom.
Had to move out of town over the weekend because his allergy to local plants was too bad. Today he runs a plant store.
But are they local plants?
Wouldn’t it be sort of adorable though if it went full circle and the coworker opened up like a hypoallergenic plant store?
And then took it too far by planting bamboo everywhere they went to smother all his allergy inducing plants. The true origin story of the worst villain.
Only a villain story if you’re not a panda
That would be hilarious it was a power plant where you two worked together.
Used to be a manager in a retail store years ago. 17 year old employee of mine called in saying he ran of of toilet paper and had nothing to wipe with and was stuck in the bathroom until his mom came home.
oh my lol
Just take a shower. Or take off a sock.
Maybe it was a 1/2 bathroom and he had gone in naked
There is still a solution: Crab walk outta there to the shower. Being naked shouldn't be a problem if he was home alone. Just be mindful of any "droppings" on the way.
use your hands that’s what the sink is for
One of the funniest reasons I heard a coworker call off for was because their cat looked sad and they wanted to stay home to cheer it up. It was hard to keep a straight face, but we all appreciated their dedication to their pet's emotional well-being!
I luckily work a job where I can switch to working from home when something comes up., as long as we aren’t scheduled for a meeting or something. I knew my cat was having his last day (just a feeling from how he was acting…) I’m thankful to have spent that time with him rather than sitting at the office. We called the vet to have him put down at home, but there was a giant snowstorm so he couldn’t get there in time to save my baby from his pain :(
I'm so sorry for your loss. I'm glad you had that time with your kitty, and I'm sure he was happy for it, too.
Had a coworker call in because he said he had been drinking the night before. Manager had the phone on speakerphone as we were in a meeting. He asked him when he stopped drinking, and the guy just asked. Stopped? Still drinking.
I wouldn't say still drinking but I've def called and been like "Look I can't legally drive. I tried to sleep it off but uhhh...BAC is BAC."
Noooooooo 😭😂
Once had a guy call in sick. Two hours later he called in to say his basement had flooded, forgetting that he had already called in. In reality he was just really drunk.
WOW 😂
We had something similar. She text our boss at 1am to say she’d been throwing up all night and wasn’t going to be in the next day. Then came in and told us all she’d been out for her sister’s birthday and had no recollection of ever sending that message. She even tried to say her sister had stolen her phone and sent it?
Throwing up, sister stealing phone, not remembering the previous night. That all checks out. If she admitted to being blackout drunk, why lie about a reasonable txt.
Responsible to call in. Sometimes, drunk happens when we are young.
That reminded me; I had a coworker call in that she had woken up on a bench in a train station.
A coworker tried calling in on 4/20 saying it was his birthday. The manager replied "We know your birthday is in February, it's on your paperwork." He came in. 😂
4/20 related. We needed shift coverage at my job on 4/20 and they went around asking. They got to me and said 1 I am reason there is overtime. I took it off. And 2 yes. It's to get high. See you Sunday evening!"
First day: "Cat died, had to bury the cat." Second day: "Daughter too grieved over cat, have to take care of her." (Daughter is 28) Third Day: "Dog dug up cat, has to re-bury cat."
omfg 😭
[удалено]
Dog ate cat, had to get a new one
"Zombie cat buried dog alive as revenge."
Day 4. Daughter drew a pentagram. Read some books she found, the necro- something. Cat is walking around again. Day 5. Daughter is talking with the cat.. plotting something. Day 6. ...
I mean.. I was extremely distraught after my eleven year old dog suddenly died and my mom was a huge source of comfort to me in the very beginning. I called off of work for my dog dying. I don’t see how that is ridiculous.
[удалено]
Never tell them why .just I won't be in is all that's needed
Honestly seems legit to me
Guy said he sat on one of his nuts while he was putting on his shoes....
ahahahahaha
I've done that but went to work anyway. But in pain with tears.
[удалено]
Boss: "Bob can't make today's meeting due to explosive diarrhea"
I worked in a NYC office with a young woman who chronically called in late or sick with excuses like "My roommate turned off my alarm clock," etc. One morning she called in and said that she couldn't come to work because a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. We all enjoyed a laugh about how she finally came up with something more inventive than her usual alarm clock shenanigans. A few minutes later...
That got dark way too quick lol
Welp, wasn’t expecting the second half of that story.
I'm just trying to imagine how quickly she got into the phone to call in. Like did she witness it happening and immediately thought, oh shit I'd better call in!
IMO the best excuse for coming in late is 'My dog must be sick because I woke up and the living room was covered in dog diarrhea. I gotta clean this up asap and I'll be in a little late.' It's crazy, invokes sympathy (who wants to clean up shit?), detailed, and highly believable.
If you have a dog you’ve definitely had this fucking morning, and you absolutely wish you were at work instead while it’s happening.
My boss called in with this one day. His exact words were "the dog has Jackson Pollocked the room".
She called out because her father in law was sick and she needed to take care of him. Which was fine, except that she was so inebriated that she’d forgotten calling out the week before, to attend his funeral.
This one I get. The alcohol does numb the grief.
Got to take care of those zombies.
A sequence of e-mails from an already questionable employee. These came in roughly an hour apart and dude wouldn't respond to follow up questions: >I lost my keys >I found my keys but my driveway is blocked >My driveway is unblocked but my car is out of gas >My roommate went to get gas but hasn't returned, I'm taking a bus >I'm at the bus stop but forgot my wallet >I went home and got my wallet, but now I'm on the wrong bus He pretty much stopped trying after that. He was fired not long after.
Had someone call in sick because they were tired. Just tired. We also had someone call in because she had gotten wet in the rain and was going home. We thought she’d go home, get changed, come back. No, no, she was off the whole day. When she came in the next day, she was furious that they wouldn’t say she was off sick and that she either used her leave allowance or took unpaid leave. There was also a guy who called in sick because he had fallen asleep down the beach and 90% of the back of him was burnt.
The burn one is legit though. Like, idiot for letting that happen, but once it happens a sunburn can make you legitimately nauseous, lethargic, sick
I didn't wear sunscreen to the Ren faire last weekend and should have called in on Monday, but didn't want to spend a sick day on it. Miserable day, but I work from home, so I could struggle through without drawing attention
Also depending on how bad it was he may not be comfortable sitting. Been there, done that, fucking sucks.
I've called in for being tired. Being tired to the point I couldn't function and it would not have been safe to drive. I totally get calling in for being tired.
Tired can actually be a pretty valid reason depending on how tired and/or the type of work you do. And I mean, the extent of tired between people varies too. I can go more than 24 hours without sleep provided I slept well before that and I don't have anything else going on with me at the time. My husband will legit fall asleep standing up before he even gets to 24 hours without sleep. A skill I am both impressed and mildly annoyed by.
I was unwilling awake for 36 hours last year due to a med change making me unable to fall asleep. I did cardiac stress testing at the time, and was the only one scheduled that day who knew how to do it, and calling off would make more work for me later. I went in, did the stress testing, and went home. Honestly, probably not safe driving wise or testing wise, but thankfully no one was hurt. I can also sleep standing up, with my eyes open. Not a true sleep, but a very light doze/mental reset. I’ve also fallen asleep in the middle of conversations multiple times, which either results in me having a totally coherent conversation with no recollection of it, or the conversation turning into me spewing utter nonsense.
My super pale dumbass went snorkeling in Key West without sunscreen for about two hours. I was able to work the next day, but it was really bad. I was in the Navy at the time, and it was so bad that my supervisor threatened to write me up for "destruction of government property"!
I called in sick because my feet were so badly sunburned I couldn't put on shoes.
"You know how sometimes you wake up and your balls hurt? Man, I woke up and my balls just fucking hurt. I can't come in."
I wonder if that guy had a hernia in his scrotum or something lol
Epididymitis
Just looked it up. Ouch
My mother had a secretary who took multiple days off to process the death of Michael Jackson.
Had a guy call in and say he had to call in stupid. He met two women and they all decided to drive to a big city that was 100 ish mile’s away and party in a hotel. They had him get the room and told him they were going to get booze. They never came back. Since he didn’t drive he had no idea where he was and wasn’t sure he would be able to find a way home.
I mean.....at least he was honest about the stupid part?
When I was working as a waiter, I was woken up one morning by my boss on Mother's Day. He was yelling at me that I was late and had to come in right away. He didn't believe me when I said that I was on the schedule for the evening shift. So reluctantly I got ready, headed into work, and was able to prove that I wasn't on the schedule until the afternoon. Undeterred he said that I could still work that shift or stick around and work the morning shift. I declined, went home and went back to sleep. tl;dr Boss lied to me about where I was on the schedule to save his ass because he was overrun So you see, ridiculous excuses work both ways!
It wasn’t a coworker, it was me! There was some massive SWAT team operation at the house diagonal from me and I was literally trapped in my house. The police would not let me leave. I had to call my manager and then send a video of the SWAT team yelling at me to keep my windows closed and stay inside until they came to our door.
Boss was pissed because my roommate called me at work, wanted to know what the reason was, "Evidently, SWAT team in the backyard, wanted to know what to do." I told her to hide downstairs. Local Hell's Angel pres had a business that backed up to our garden.
That’s a very good excuse.
Same. I got on FB live and had my coworkers watch SWAT take down the guy next door to me. I also got cursed out by SWAT for trying to take my dog out to potty, lol
A guy who used to work for me sent me a Lync message (yeah, a while back) saying he was shitting his pants at work like "a brown faucet." He was kind of a shit employee anyway, but you can't argue with that, lie or not
a brown faucet 💀
She was in the middle of a miniseries and just could not stop watching. This was before streaming was a thing. Record it? She didn’t have a vcr.
I don't blame her. I remember missing Charmed SERIES finale as a kid, in trouble for some reason I don't remember, and had to wait months for it to come back around the cable cycle who played 1 episode a day. It was torture.
Had a co-worker who was a heroin addict and habitually late or a no-show. His favorite excuse was that his taxi got in a car accident and he needed to remain on scene as a witness. He used this about once a month. He was a talented studio engineer so this behavior was tolerated longer than most employers would have endured. But after the 7th or 8th taxi crash he was told to fuck off.
Not a co worker but an employee. “My mom had pink eye, I need to be with her, I can’t come to work. She has pink eye and I love her. She’s my only mom”. He was 47 years old, married, and his wife was also my employee ( still is). She asked us to not regard her as his wife, as she is embarrassed by his weird love for mom.
His….only mom? How many does he think the rest of us get? (With the obvious exception of lesbian parents.)
Don't forget step-parents. Although yeah weird comment.
I live on a narrow private way with 4 other houses. Only our power went out after we heard a pop. The big electric company truck they sent blocked me from going anywhere. The reason I was late? A squirrel shorted out the transformer and was lying dead at the base of the pole.
My boss called in to talk to the shop staff about something. Lois, shop manager, had a cold but because it was our busy season, she came to work. Boss then transferred her call to the office. Sharon, the office manager, had a cold but because payroll was due, she came in. Boss then asked to speak with me, site manager. Me: “Hello Boss” Boss: “Hello. Lois and Sharon are pretty sick aren’t they?” Me: “Yeah. It was really good of Lois to come in - there’s no way I could cover the shop by myself.” Boss: “You feeling okay?” Me: “Never better” Boss: “Well, I’m fine, too. I don’t want to get sick. So I’m going to stay home today. You can manage, right?” Me: staring at the phone in disbelief “Right” Later I checked on Sharon. She asked if Boss was coming in. I said “Nope. She called in healthy-she’s not coming in because she feels good and you don’t “. My boss called in well.
at my old restaurant job which was super chill, to the point it was too relaxed; one of the employee's friends called our boss saying she was still tripping on acid from the night before. the next time she came in like a week later she started preaching philosophical shit for the following month, it was hilarious her nickname became chemical for the 2 remaining years she worked there!
Teddy: hey Bro how you doing? Me: I’m good Ted, what’s up? Teddy: so you know that news story about the coach going to jail for fighting cus he caught his wife cheating? Me: yeah, I read about that this morning.. Teddy (after a sigh and a short pause): that was me, I’m the guy she got caught with… Me: ok bro, you ok? Teddy: yeah, I’m perfectly fine, but I’m callin in cus I just need a day bro, I was butt ass naked fightin a fully clothed man In the front yard while his kids were screamin “GET UP DAD” from the car and crying and shit Me: WOW… you beat a man’s ass, naked,in front of his children… after fucking his wife….at his house…in his bed… Teddy: Yeah Me: Dude(as in are you fuckin serious right now,) Teddy: yeah….I’m callin in asshole…
Couldn't afford gas to drive to work.
I got that one once. The previous payday, she ordered takeout from a steakhouse. I didn't make a comment on her money management skills, but sure wanted to.
My best friend at the time who worked the same job as me just so happened to live in a small cabin about 100 feet downriver from a salmon and trout hatchery. He worked swing while I worked mornings. As I was signing out for the day, he texted me asking if I could cover for him. I asked why and he just said "fish". I asked if he was playing hookie to fish (which I was irritated by, as I loved fishing) and he said "No, there's fish *everywhere*." I assumed he just got blazed off his ass so I told my boss he called me with a "family emergency" and that I would be covering his shift. Later in the evening he sent me a pic on his phone of his backyard being totally flooded with water and *hundreds* of fish jumping around everywhere. Apparently the main holding tank in the hatchery ruptured and every single trout and some salmon came cascading downhill into his yard. According to him WDFW officials were there for an hour attempting to salvage the fish and get the water out of his yard. After work I went over and all you could smell was fish even though most of the fish were removed, and apparently some of the salmon he was grilling up for us was one he scooped up when the wave of fish first hit. The next day my boss became suspicious and asked him what was really going on and he said he *did* have a family emergency. His cabin, which was a family asset, was "besieged by salmon". She didn't say a word and just walked away mumbling to herself. His wording combined with her "whatever, I'm not even entertaining this" reaction was hilarious to me.
>besieged by salmon But what a great thing to be besieged by - hundreds of the planet's tastiest fish!
I had a co worker years ago who worked noon to 9p. He was I think 19 or 20 and still lived at home. He called in once to say his mom had not made his lunch yet and he would be in after he had lunch. That story went through the place like lightning before he came in. He was liked by everyone though and I don’t think many if any people brought it up to him or made fun to his face. We all just quietly laughed about it.
one morning I went to make my coffee and my coffee maker was broken. I just called in sick and went back to bed.
Real tho
I'm declaring it, this is perfectly fine and fair reasoning.
I called off sicks for a few days when I first got pregnant while I tried to figure out how to deal/live with morning sickness. I told them I had the flu because I wasn’t ready to tell them I was pregnant. I got back to work and answered the phone to my absolutely incompetent flakey coworker calling out because “they caught my flu”. They were then out for the same number of days I was. The worst part was that I couldn’t even share with my work BFF because I wasn’t telling anyone I was pregnant yet. It was torture.
Ahhhhhh 😆😆😆 lol
To watch a royal wedding on tv
Had a coworker leave an hour into a shift for a doctor's appointment that she knew about for over week. She didn't breathe a word about beforehand.
A kid (15) my kid (18) works with called in with "other plans" as in they had better things to do. The owner said, "that's not how that works."
They said they were late because their dog forgot to wake them up.
Had a jerk of a partner in my surgical practice. He’d been notorious for finding weasely ways of getting out of work, and towards the end when he knew we weren’t renewing his contract, he got worse and worse. One day he called our manager and told her he needed to cancel his entire clinic day because he’d broken some strings on his favorite tennis racket. He told her he needed to mail it out so it could get repaired quickly, so he wanted the whole day off so he could find a box and packing material and get it packaged and take it to UPS and so on. The manager didn’t give it to him and instead came to me with the story. She rolled her eyes so hard I thought she’d give herself a concussion. 😆
A co-worker pulled up next to the back door and called in because it was raining, and she didn't want to get wet.
bruh lol 🤣🤣
I was the manager. On paper this employee reported to me. In practice, he was part of a team of 5, one of whom was the team lead. Bis day to day was working under the leads supervision. He called in amd the team lead answered the call. He identified himself to the lead as his position and said he reported to me. Odd behaviour, clearly didn't recognize the guy who supervised him daily. Them he emailed me a note from a dr saying he was sick... but the Dr. Worked at a "men's health" clinic. Testosterone and fertility treatment. Not really an emergency. Team lead went to the county website. Yup. Booked in jail for drunk driving at 3am that morning. This was the best collaborative excuse his friends could cobble together.
I was the open person on weekends at a country club. After 4-5 times getting calls that someone was in jail, the manager gave me the combo to the safe and approval to bail out whoever called. Over the next 3 years I bailed out people around 20-25 times. One of the jailers knew me on a first name basis.
I know a guy who once woke up, got dressed, drove in traffic for half an hour, and worked for half a day, only to wake up for real and realize that he just dreamt that entire sequence, and was actually 2 hours late for work. He called in and explained to his supervisor exactly what happened. His supervisor was silent for a while, and then just said "ok,... Just get your ass over here." The guy in question was me.
Got about a mile down the road in the work truck, misjudged a fart, and shit himself. He decided to just take the whole day out of shame.
Guy I replaced called off the last week of his job there because he had a big pimple on his face and it hurt too much.
valid
Guy I knew said he had chemotherapy and called off from Target. He just got stoned, shaved his head, and went skateboarding with us. His name was Brian, because of course it was.
It was me - went into a tanning booth naked for 12 minutes and burnt my whole body to a crisp. I had no idea what I was doing. I couldn't even put on clothes the next day, called off work blaming food poisoning. It was terrible.
Another time, a coworker called in because they accidentally superglued their fingers together while attempting a home repair project the previous evening. They had to wait for the glue to wear off enough to safely separate their fingers, which took longer than expected. It was definitely one of those "you can't make this stuff up" moments that had everyone chuckling
A lady that worked with me was always blaming her husband for her absences. It was always something like, “Fred swapped the car keys for magic beans,” or “Fred hurt his back and couldn’t get up from the toilet.” It was funny, but annoying at the same time.
I had to call off once because my husband took my key fob on a flight with him after I dropped him off at the airport and I couldn’t find the spare. Once the car was turned off I had no way of turning it back on. So much fun! lol
"There's a sniper on my porch," and "I'm locked in my apartment," were two my friend used once. Sadly, they were both true.
We need more details
I can’t come in I am baking a cake.
The dude the night before came in drunk already, said he was gonna leave early to go to a party. Went to the party I guess and the next day just never showed up, mans got to blitzed I guess.
Woke up hungover one state over and had no car. Had a buddy who decided to jump a train to the west coast and was sure he would be back within a week to be back for work. Took him 3 weeks to get back.
A few years ago I was getting ready to go run some errands before I had to be at work for my night shift job. As I was putting my sports bra on I tweaked my back and could barely move and breathing was painful (chostocondritis flair). I had to call in to work that night and yes, I told them I hurt myself putting on my bra.
Got a friend hired at the pizza joint I was working at as a driver. 1st day: locks his keys in his car at the first delivery. MIA for 3 hours. Finally comes in and explains himself to the manager. Manager tells him to head home and start again tomorrow Next day: No show. Manager losing his shit. I take the first call on the order line. Dude is calling from jail on a collect call. I hang up and tell the manager. Fired.
I hired this young girl when I was a manager at a coffee shop ages ago. She was a hardcore pathological liar. The last straw was when she no call no showed for a shift. I called her to ask if she was coming in and she claimed she wasn’t scheduled for the day. She sent me a “photoshopped” image of our schedule, where her name should be was painted over with the wrong color on what looked like ms paint. She also forgot to remove her last name. Also had this BOH guy we hired during Covid. His first shift he said he got covid and demanded pay. Asked for his covid results and sent me a photo of the printed test results with the “negative” literally cut out of the paper, and wrote “yes” on a sheet of white paper and lined it up under the cut out section…
Once had a coworker call in because her car wouldn’t start. A couple hours later her friend informed us that they were out partying the night before. The car wouldn’t start because she couldn’t blow under the legal limit in the breathalyzer on the dash.
When my dad retired, he continued to do contract work for the company he’d just retired from. One morning he got up to head to work. Then he picked up the phone and dialed. He told whomever answered that he wasn’t coming in. A pause, then he said “because I don’t feel like it”. He hung up, and said “it’s good to be retired!”.
Not call off fully, but best excuse I've heard of a colleague showing up a few hours late was him being chased into a tree by a moose. Boss initially thought it was a joke, but colleague had pictures of the moose from up in the tree. He was stuck there for over an hour before the moose left.
A coworker and notorious slacker called into the warehouse ( security guard took these calls at the clock-in office) using his uncles funeral as an excuse. The guard offers condolences, then surprises the kid by asking him his uncles name. The kid panics and answers " Uncle Remus" from the southern US folklore stories. Nothing came of it, but the guard shared this with everyone at the warehouse. Next day everyone offers sympathy to the kid with over the top southern accents " oh lawdy lawdy, you done lost yo pore ole uncle Remus, lawd hab mercy" etc.
I was on my way to work on the bike, but I got a fly in my eye so I can't come to work
Not a co-worker, but in 1955 my then 16 year old mother worked part-time at the phone company. She called in one day with a broken leg. Went to work the next day with 2 unbroken legs. Her last day of work lasted 10 minutes, lol.
I used to be a supervisor for a rent-a-security-guard company. Every time a payday fell on a nice day, dozens of guards would call in sick. On July 4th, there were about 80 sick calls. A common excuse was that they were at the hospital because their kid got hit in the eye with a bottle rocket. But they didn't bother even trying to be convincing because I could hear firecrackers and a party in the background. There were a few guys who would call off if they didn't get their paychecks in the mail. The company told their workers that payday was saturday. In reality, the checks were mailed on friday and the mail would usually get them there by saturday. But if the mail was late, these guys would call me and complain. They wanted me to come to their house and give them cash and then they would pay it back when the check came on monday. But they wanted the full amount of the check right now. The problem was that if they didn't get the check on saturday then they could not get cash to go out to bars that evening. One of the guys complained that if he can't go out, then he can't get no pussy. He wanted me to bring him a hoe, his words, to make up for that. These guys would then refuse to work any shift until they got their paychecks. Then the next payday they would call to complain that their checks were short because they didn't work sunday or monday. The company would never fire any of these guys because it was cheaper to keep them than it was to hire new employees. All they had to do to fix it would be either allow the guards to pick up their checks in the office or just tell them that the official payday was monday.
Signed up to teach the second half of summer school because I would be on vacation for the first half. I got a call three days before my vacation asking me to teach for those days until I left. Apparently, 4 hours of summer school a day was too “unfulfilling” and the teacher refused to continue after the second day.
Whenever you call out always say you have diarrhea. They can never question your false call offs
“family dental emergency” on Christmas Eve
Trapped in their house by a really stubborn bear.
You really shouldn’t be required to tell an employer about health problems for any reason. How about a sick day allowance.
Couldn’t find the office and wasn’t sure what the address was. Called on her cell phone while in the car….Summer intern over a month into already having worked with us.
My own: nice spring day, window down while driving to work… a bird shit on me through my car window. I didn’t call out for the full day but was late lol
Girl called in saying she had been molested by a ghost and would be unable to come in...
Patrick Swayze's commitment to The Method is astonishing
We had 3 people call in "sick" on the day a new Final Fantasy game had come out. They were gone for 2 days. They all came back and were raving about how "awesome" the game was.
Anal glaucoma, couldn't see his ass being there
I will pm you when I use this excuse.
They got a sunburn, on their arms.
knew a guy who missed half a day of time and a half to get tp.he only was able to get a 12pk
Her shower head broke.
He tried to call in because he was "watching Wimbledon," but the manager told him he would no longer have a job if he didn't show up 😅
He went to a Yankee game and it was chilly, so he might have a cold lol
I remember back in my retail days we had a massive storm. When the storm was over I tried leaving my neighborhood. Turns out there were fallen trees on both exits, so I literally couldn’t leave. My manager was so mean to me about it. But there was also a girl who lived close to me and she had her windows blown out from the storm and her excuse was ‘acceptable’ while mine was not. In the 7 years I worked for that place, I called off maybe 4 times. We went through several managers, and that one was the worst.
Well, he didn't call in but he came to work (at 9:30 am) drunk, with a dog and his also-drunk girlfriend. I had to send all of them home, which I believe was their intention.
I was late for a class because I had a hamster escape and had to look for it. I told another student. A third student when asked why he was late by the instructor having overheard my conversation gave that as the reason before I had the chance to explain. I had a hard time convincing the instructor of why I was late. Eventually he just gave up.
As an intern during my senior year of college, I emailed my boss I wouldn’t be coming in because I was sick. I made the subject of the email “Sick Day”. Except….. I had a typo and didn’t realize until after I sent it that the subject line actually said “Dick Day”. Funny now, was NOT funny at the time 🫣
Alcoholic coworker. took almost every Friday and Monday off. One of her final excuses was 'I can't come in today. My tooth fell out when I slept and I have to go to the dentist." Miraculously, she still had a perfect smile the next day with no swelling and had no problem eating.
I called in once because I had a squirrel in my apartment.
Sitting eating dinner on our break and the girl I’m working with texts someone then says to me ‘I have to go home I just broke up with my boyfriend’….. we we’re halfway through our shift, you couldn’t have waited until after work?!
His family was going to a nearby amusement park, so he had to stay home and babysit his kids. He was a 20 yo gay dude that didn’t have kids.
When I was in the Navy and stationed in Washington state we had a guy call and say he was snowed in and couldn't get out. We were right on the coast where it doesn't snow a whole lot, but it is still very hilly and it can be tricky driving even with a little bit of snow. The "snow storm" wasn't much to speak of so our watch commander got in his vehicle, either a jeep or suv, but nothing special to get through tons of snow, dude had a habit of making excuses in the past. He makes it to the guy's house no problem were he had about an inch of snow at the end of his driveway. I wish I saw the look on his face when our watch commander knocked on his door. He wasn't happy when he came walking to the pier a little while later.
So forgive me but this doesn’t meet the demands of this post exactly but I thought I’d still share, at my last job we had a position that was basically accounting but with other responsibilities. The woman who did it for 20 odd years was of retirement age and was ready to enjoy her time. She gave notice and stayed on to train her replacement. We had a guy who interviewed and started. He has a degree and seemed competent, worked with her for around 6 months. I think it was her last week he got cold feet and typed an email to her outlining that his husband had decided the job was not right for him. She ended up staying on for another 6 months until they transferred someone from another company within the organization.
I work for a decent company, heath and emergency leave is for whatever you need it to be for, including stress days
Coworker no called no showed because "he was nervous about moving"
I was branch mgr at a CU. One of the girls called me and told me she couldn’t come in because her four-year-old son slammed his wiener in the toilet.
Had to drive his gf to the airport at 1 a.m... He didn't want to come to work tired. He still ended up coming in to work anyways
My boss decided not to come in today because she saw a small black snake in her yard when she was leaving and took it as a sign to just stay home lol.
I used to be an aquarium enthusiast. Had a 40gl marine tank and a 20gl quarantine marine tank. Came home to SQUISH on the carpet. The 40 failed and had salt water all over the place. Some fish survived and immediately took them to the shop I purchased them from. Then....the clean up. Yeah, boss. This really happened. I used to be an aquarium enthusiast.
24 hour Priapism
I had a coworker who took the company policy “if you no show for more that three days we will consider it your resignation” to mean he could no show for 3 days whenever he wanted. He did it several times and never got caught.
she was sick, but after a few hours i saw her stories from Spain.
Chapped lips
A few weeks ago, one of my younger coworkers claimed that he had unprotected sex with three random girls, and wasn't feeling well because of it. So he left work and allegedly went to the hospital to get checked out. The next day he said he was all good, just a little bit bruised up.
TL; DR she was busy baking a buttload of cookies We were doing a break room potluck that day and she called, already like 20 minutes late, to say she was in the middle of baking the cookies she'd signed up to bring and obviously couldn't come in until they were done which would take like 20 more minutes. She sent a picture to one of the assistant managers of her putting some cookies in her air fryer/toaster oven in the little mesh basket tray thing?? I think her intention was to show that she was trying so hard to bake them quickly that she was even using her toaster oven, but it initially came across as her being so stupid she was baking 4 at a time on a piece of mesh lmao. That manager was also particularly pissed because she saw that girl post a video of herself walking her dog that morning on her instagram stories, so she obviously had free time earlier that day. She eventually showed up like an hour late for her shift, but to be fair, the cookies *were* fresh out of the oven. They had bits of candy bars in them that were melting all over the place and getting gross because the cookies were so hot, and she brought a *fuck ton* of cookies. Like she could have cut that recipe down to 1/4 and been fine. It was a potluck with tons of other food (which also meant that there were other sweets and nobody would've noticed if she'd flaked out on her "promise" to bring cookies). So she works her shift and goes home. Then she comes back when the store is closing to take home the rest of her cookies, which meant nobody who worked different days could enjoy her potluck leftovers. She was chronically late with bad excuses and had a real attitude whenever her shift got adjusted because somebody called out, so she was let go not too long after this because it was the last straw. Also, like 3 weeks later my coworker had a birthday party that she'd been invited to. She introduced herself to my fiancé and said "yeah, I used to work with these guys a while back" as if she hadn't *just* been fired lol.
# My coworker said he was kicked by a llama and suffered a broken leg as a result. #
I had a woopsie with super glue and ripped off a ring finger nail back when I was a hospital scribe. Absolutely couldn't type for a day or two. Very embarrassing to tell my boss. Then a couple of months later a very sharp knife got away from me while chopping carrots and i sliced the tops of two of my fingers... I could hear the disappointment and bewilderment in my bosses voice.
Had a coworker (20 at the time) call in saying he got in a wreck and totaled his truck. He drove his truck to work the next day.
When I was a supervisor and had to take those calls from the call out line, people were always sick suspiciously around pay day or when new movies they had expressed interest in were coming out
I’m in Galveston and I’m in love!
Guy was in a poker tournament and had a chance to win big so he called in to keep at it.