‘You need to pay me now’: Contractor gets paid for 600 days of work in advance after writing a script to auto-complete 6000 reports in one day following boss's demands

Author image for Eleonora Bader
Eleonora Bader
Dec 25, 2023 7:00 PM EST

One contractor read the terms and conditions of his contract so well that he got paid 600 days in advance for completed work.

I want this dude as a mentor, where do I sign up? Let's start at the beginning… OP was contracting for a large financial services provider, where his team manager was promoted to a new division, leaving him and the rest of the team with bosses who did not know how to 'boss'. OP's job was to onboard new hires into all kinds of required systems for their daily functions. One day, OP's bosses sat him down in a meeting and made him sign a contract. They said 'Sign it, or walk'. OP did not want to be fired, but he was also really annoyed at the amendments he read on the contract…

They wanted him to guarantee so many requests a day for every team member that it seemed impossible. He offered, 'Why not scalar the ticket count and see who did what?' but he was met with red faces and a heated argument. So OP kept it simple, and he did what he does best…

Next, here is a story about an HOA who fought a losing battle with one of the neighborhood residents. It cost them money, their positions, and then even more money.

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  • 01
    "I got paid 600 days in advance for completed work..." RAC ENT
    via Canva
  • 02
    Want to log Sure, L OC everything I do? I can do that This was almost 10 years ago, contracting for a VERY large financial services provider. For some context - team manager was promoted to a new division, and the team (8 of us working across 2 shifts to cover international as well) were left with two "team leaders" (will call them M to run the show until the new Boy and PassiveGal,
    via u/Luigisa
  • 03
    manager was hired ( new mgr joined 6 months later, or early, depending on perspective, and probably because of me...). My job in a nutshell was to Onboard new employees into all the required systems for their daily functions, as well as setup their email and AD accounts for server access (which was dumped on my lap a month into my job "because I had prior experience", so said M Boy). I didn't mind the email and AD because it's literally 2 mins per
    via u/Luigisa
  • 04
    account, and didn't affect my central function by more than 20 mins a day (it'll make sense soon). And audits were 30mins a week. This all happened from a centrally shared mailbox. It's requests, so you can't determine how busy you are. On to the fun - almost before the door hit Boy the manager on the way out, M and PassiveGal call us in to a meeting room, and states that we MUST do no less than 10 requests a day, ALL to be logged on their call logging system, and
    via u/Luigisa
  • 05
    here's the contract amendments we must sign or be fired. Being a contractor, you'd think I would shut the hell up, but nope, I just can't do being kicked in the , so I piped up "I don't see how it's possible to guarantee 80 requests a day minimum for every team member to meet the requirement. Why not scalar the ticket count and see who did what?". His faced turned a deeper colour and he shouts at me to mind my own business, I don't know what I am talking about. Cue
    via u/Luigisa
  • 06
    my MC, which included calling my contract house manager (SassyNFunnyGal), explained what was happening, and after she could breath again from laughing so hard, she told me not to get her fired... I head back to my desk, knowing full well audits are about to start in a week, and I get multiple requests to make amendments on accounts to test Active Directory security. And LO, here it begins! I got an email two days later to prep for a
    via u/Luigisa
  • 07
    massive test - I am tasked to amend nearly 6000 accounts with new settings, and then change them back on request, with miminal impact to the users, during working hours, so I needed to do this quickly. Now, any tech worth his measure out there, will know, almosy ANYTHING is scriptable. I set it all up, called my mate at service desk and here's the "funny thing", he ALSO has a script to log multiple tickets.
    via u/Luigisa
  • 08
    Roll on D-day. I take the auditors call at 8am to make the change. I send the email to my sdesk mate, and he logs the tickets in a record 30 seconds, my mailbox BOOMS with 6k opened tickets. I run my script and 90 seconds later, bam, job done! I carried on with my core function. 3 hours later, auditor called me to revert. I ran my 2nd script, everything back to normal, called my mate to close the tickets, and a minute later my mailbox frazzled for a bit getting 6k closure tickets. It's at this p
    via u/Luigisa
  • 09
    back and start browsing all my meme sites (yes, joys of AD control, I gave myself unrestricted Internet access... A nice perk...). Anyhoo, in less than an hour, PassiveGal comes to me to ask what's happening. I simply state that the contract amendment they forced on us clearly means I don't have to work for 200 days. So I'll be sitting here enjoying my time off OR I can do it from home, either way, I'm "ahead of the curve". She walks away and
    via u/Luigisa
  • 10
    M Boy storms over demanding I get back to work, I repeat what I said to PassiveGal, he spluttered for a while, and he huffs off. True to my word, I sat at my desk doing nothing, but sadly it didn't last 2 days before the head of the dept called me in. After an initially aggressive start to the meeting on his part, I got to explain the sitch, I wasn't even to the good part and he drops his head into his palm, calmly listens to the story, asks me for a copy of the amendment, and thanks me for the
    via u/Luigisa
  • 11
    in the room, what would it take to grt me back to work. I decided to keep it simple - formally retract the stupid amendment, and pay me out for the time spent on the audit, which is 600 days, "as per the contract amendment". He blowfished for a few seconds, agreed, and I left for the day. Wake up the next morning to a HUGE jump in my bank account, with an email confirming I'll be back in the office, "please"?
    via u/Luigisa
  • 12
    I AM a man of my word, I was back at my desk, working as usual, and for some reason, M Boy and PassiveGal never came near me again, even when I shifted to another dept. Edit (in lieu of queries) - the actual verbiage of the contract is lost to history, and I apologise its misleading. The scope of the mandate was strongly worded to do "no more and no less" than 10 a day, not "at least".
    via u/Luigisa
  • 13
    revchewie 11 hr. ago "No less than 10 requests a day" The story doesn't add up. So you did 6000 tickets in one day. Tomorrow's a new day, time to do another 10+ requests. Reply Share Vote Luigisa OP 11 hr. ago The MC is I (mis)took their contract to mean Since I HAD to do 10 tickets a day, 6000 divided by 10 makes
    via u/revchewie, u/Luigisa
  • 14
    out to 600 days work I'd done in advance. That's why they had to pay me out for the days before I would need to start working again. Edit: they COULD have argued the "no less than", but my contract house stuck by my MC, subtly of course, because they scored out of it financially as well. Vote Reply Share
    via u/Luigisa
  • 15
    juiceboxzero 10 hr. ago Meh, the contract said you have to no less than 10 per day. It didn't say you ONLY had to do 10 per day. and pay me out for the time spent on the audit, which is 600 days
    via u/juiceboxzero
  • 16
    This is suspicious. Even if that's calendar days, that's still over a year and a half of wages. No company would pay that -- they'd fire you and bring on the next person, who would be trained and effective in less than a year and a half. 4 Reply Share Vote
    via u/juiceboxzero
  • 17
    Luigisa OP. 9 hr. ago. edited 8 hr. ago Accuracy of English is a debatable topic at the best of times. Yes, the wording on my part, on a situation almost a decade old, doesn't match the original wording, I apologise for that. But it worked out in my favour. Yes, they could have told me to leave, but as it's a financial institution of international foot-print, and reputational risk of ANY sort is heavily avoided and squashed under the cover
    via u/Luigisa
  • 18
    of darkness when possible,, plus the numb-wit made us sign on company letterheaded paper... The situation was iron-clad, even if they kicked me out 2 seconds later. Edit:saw even MORE irregularities (typing on a phone is limiting, and I should've checked). I wrote 200 days in chat to passive
    via u/Luigisa
  • 19
    gal, should have been 600, but hey, we all human and no MC is totally flawless... Alot of luck goes into them pulling off flawlessly... ↑ Vote (D) Reply Share
    via u/Luigisa
  • 20
    Iceroadtrucker2008 · 6 hr. ago I barely know what you are writing about Vote Reply Share DeusExBlockina - 6 hr. ago and Boss wants Smug their colleagues to do at least 10 reports a day Smugt writes a script to auto complete 6000 reports in one day and expects to be paid for the 600 "days" of "work" they did in one day.
    via u/Iceroadtrucker2008, u/DeusExBlockina
  • 21
    lostandfawnd. 4 hr. ago I'm not sure this makes sense legally either. "No less than 10 per day" Not limited to The new day would mean you have new work, so you did the 2 years worth of work in 1 day. Is there some other detail that means this is constrained to per/day rate? Vote Reply Share
    via u/lostandfawnd
  • 22
    Equivalent-Salary357 - 2 hr. ago Actually, "no less than" only sets the minimum number for each day, not how many equals a day's work. In other words, the 'number done' count would reset each day. Each day, OP would have to do at least 10.
    via u/Equivalent-Salary357
  • 23
    A side benefit of this is that OP isn't evaluated on consistent number of completions. Imagine doing 12 'requests' on Monday, 11 on Tuesday, 14 on Wednesday, 13 on Wednesday, then 12,000 on Friday because they could be scripted. Boss would be, "Why are you goofing off on Monday through Thursday?" Vote Reply Share
    via u/Equivalent-Salary357
  • 24
    Luigisa OP 4 hr. ago Someone else pointed this out. I replied in that one. Vote Reply Share lostandfawnd. 4 hr. ago Sure, but you said you misunderstood the terms. If you had to process (a minimum) of 10 per day, and got the job done sooner, there is no requirement of paying you for days not worked.
    via u/Luigisa u/lostandfawnd
  • 25
    Or are you saying the minimum part was incorrect? The terms here are important, and I think is messing with people's understanding of the outcome Vote Reply Share Luigisa OP 3 hr. ago Fair enough, yeah, not sure how people react to edits... Online is a fickle place, relatively new to posting here,generslly don't post
    via u/Luigisa
  • 26
    anything of import. The actual verbiage was we MUST do ten tickets a day, the "at least" was an addled brain's addition, trying to remember every detail. The strongly implied "no more, no less" in the contract was what I tried to explain. Spose simpler is better... Vote Reply Share
    via u/Luigisa

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boss contracting ticketing malicious compliance reports automate employees contract script tickets contractor malicious compliance reddit workplace stories team
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