''Seriously??': Employer's bathroom break policy goes viral after employee shares it online

Brad Dickson • Managing Editor

Mar 3, 2023 6:00 PM EST

Imagine finishing school and looking to enter the workforce for the first time... Your entire life, you've dreamt about the freedom and opportunity that graduating from school will offer you—what doors will open? Where will you go? What way will the direction blow you? The answers to these questions aren't nearly as exciting as you might have hoped… none, nowhere, and wherever you can find work—respectively. As soon as you throw that cap in the air, the student loan repayments start to tick; and then there's rent, rates, taxes, food, transportation, and insurance before you even get to sniff that paycheck. These costs are going to hold you still—exactly wherever you landed.

What's worse? In University, you had the freedom to skip lectures (when needed) and dip out of the lecture hall to use the restroom (when required). Now that you're tied to a desk, counter, or phone—you don't have that option. On top of everything else, your boss now wants to know the status of your homeostasis and the movement of your sphincters; hey, it's only a matter of time before we're all microchipped so they can farm that data.

That's what got this online community so fired up when images of this poster went viral. The poster describes an authoritative bathroom break policy in which workers need to notify their Supervisors before attending to their business. Hilariously, they're also going to somehow monitor your phone usage and dock you points for making too long of a pit stop. What, are they going to be standing outside with a stopwatch? What is this? Stock cars or Formula 1?

Keep reading to see the images, along with screenshots of the original thread and reactions. For more stupid workplace policies, check out this lunch invite that demanded workers pay.