'It's the [21st century]'... Nobody had a fax machine': Company requires antiquated method for employees to get paid on time thinking no one would do it, but one heroic employee does it for them all

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Elna McHilderson • Managing Editor
Dec 11, 2023 8:00 PM EST

Ring ring! The 1980s called, they want their fax machines back… Seriously, who has a fax machine anymore? When is the last time you had to fax something? Now we have encrypted emails for private mailing, etc. Faxing? Come on, grandpa. Welcome to the 21st century. Everybody knows that faxing is antiquated. So why did this one company, as told by an ex-employee on Reddit, require employees to fax their timesheets in if they wanted to get paid on time? Sure, OP says this was in 2014, but even by then fax machines were a thing of the past. So there could only be one real reason—because they purposefully wanted to pay everyone late. They knew nobody had a fax machine and would just opt to get paid late because, really, they had no other choice. Until OP started working there because to the company's chagrin, it turns out he had an old fax machine laying around his house. When he faxed his timesheet over and STILL didn't get paid on time, that's when things started to hit the fan. He came through for his coworkers! (Unlike these coworkers in this other workplace drama story.)

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    Posted by u/carl0071 23 hours ago Employer only paid us on-time if we FAXED our timesheets SOC This happened about 10 years ago when I was working on the railways near London.
    via u/carl0071
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    I worked for an agency which supplied staff to the railways on an temporary basis. They were very old fashioned and as part of our employment contract they stated that our hand- completed time sheets had to be faxed by 7:00pm on the Thursday for us to be paid on the Friday.
    via u/carl0071
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    Time sheets that were emailed even before 7:00pm would result in wages not being paid until the following Friday. Obviously they chose the most inconvenient way as it was 2014 and nobody had a fax machine,
    via u/carl0071
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    so that they were able to legally retain our wages in their account for an extra week. But my printer at home had a fax machine built in that I never used
    via u/carl0071
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    So after my first week, I plugged in my printer to the phone line, faxed my time sheet to the agency and waited. The next day, I still hadn't been paid.
    via u/carl0071
  • 07
    So I phoned them and asked why I hadn't been paid but the response was explained in a dull voice by somebody who had obviously repeated the same sentence so many times that it had lost all meaning to her.
    via u/carl0071
  • 08
    "As explained in your contract, only time sheets that have been faxed to us are paid the next day. If you've emailed it, your wages will be paid the following week". "But I did fax it!"
    via u/carl0071
  • 09
    She gathered her thoughts for a moment before replying "Oh... err ok? Which number did you fax it to?" So I gave her the number I faxed it to which was correct. "Um... ok.. I'll just place you on hold" She came back on the phone a couple of minutes later.
    via u/carl0071
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    "Ok, yes we've got it. Sorry, I can't remember the last time somebody actually faxed their timesheet to us! I'll get that paid now"
    via u/carl0071
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    As you can imagine, I told my colleagues the following day and from then on, they all gave their timesheets to me to fax when I got home so they got paid on-time.
    via u/carl0071
  • 12
    At the time I wondered if they'd drop the silly fax vs email rule but it continued and so every week I'd fax in half a dozen timesheets to them.
    via u/carl0071
  • 13
    Bmore Creative. 23 hr. ago What's funny is there are also emails you can use to fax things, and receive fax. My office got one because people INSISTED in faxing us.
    via u/BMoreCreative
  • 14
    KingBretwald. 22 hr. ago I work in healthcare and have to use this. It's just so stupid.
    via u/KingsBretwald
  • 15
    Kura369 18 hr. ago IRS still requires faxing too
    via u/Kura369
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    AMonkeyAndALavaLamp 22 hr. ago edited 22 hr. ago I remember about 20 years ago I had a car accident and the company refused to take the statement in any way other than fax (the accident happened during a trip to a different province where the company didn't have an office), so I typed the
    via u/AMonkeyAndALavaLamp
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    statement, detailed the damages part by part in Word using font size 48 and used the fax/modem feature on a laptop for the last time in my life to send it over. When I came back the girl that
    via u/AMonkeyAndALavaLamp
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    worked at the insurance office in my town told me it took two rolls of fax paper to print the entire thing and she had to submit it to headquarters in a binder because it didn't fit in the standard envelopes used to send claim statements :-)
    via u/AMonkeyAndALavaLamp
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    pimblepimble 23 hr. ago Ye shall submit the timesheets upon the finest vellum. And woe unto those who do not deliver them, sealed with the Baron's wax seal, and delivered by a horse of good character that has shown loyalty to the King!
    via u/pimblepimble
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    afcagroo 19 hr. ago A few years ago I stupidly got roped into signing up for a timeshare. After I regained my senses a couple of days later, I looked into their cancelation policy. You could only do it two ways. One was a letter. The other was to send a telegram! I did not send a telegram.
    via u/afcagroo
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    dellaevaine 19 hr. ago I once was told by a medical office that I could only fax things to this one number and someone DROVE the file from that office to their office. When we walked into the office for the appointment, they literally had 3 fax machines in the office on their counter. When I pointed that out to the staff, I was told that they didn't know those machines were fax machines.
    via u/dellaevaine

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heroic coworker employee malicious compliance outdated work system coworkers 2014 antiquated system fax machines workplace just the fax Reddit work karma karma
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