‘Our agreement doesn’t apply': Employee quits and gets reimbursed for $21,000 after boss insists they commute 200 miles a day for 2 years without compensation

Author image for Eleonora Bader
Eleonora Bader
Mar 1, 2024 6:00 PM EST

Too many bosses don't know or care to go through company policy. But a handful of them know exactly which rules will benefit them… and not their employees. You would think that a boss who purposely makes their employee drive 200 miles a day without being compensated should be fired. I find it hard to believe I'm the only one rooting for this dude's professional demise…

So what happened? This boss lied to his employee and worse, manipulated them into commuting 200 miles a day for 2 entire years without paying them a dime. He thought he could get away with it, but he was wrong. The truth always comes to light in the end. This employee inevitably found out and hatched a plan to get all their money back… But they had no intention of involving their boss. Let's just say that justice was served. Scroll down to read all about it, and then check out this engineering firm that lost a huge client after one of the higher-ups punished an employee by taking them off an important project. Can't say I'm sad about that one, either. You get what you deserve, I guess.

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  • 01
    "I bypassed my boss and got $21,000..."
    via Canva
  • 02
    Shady Boss lied about my position to keep me from policy-allowed benefit for years. I found out and it changed everything.
    via u/ClubWag
  • 03
    A few years ago, I worked at a big retail company and had for many years. Eventually I went through enough gradschool education to get my license to work at a higher level. Much more pay, more job satisfaction, more responsibilities, fancy title, but the job market was rough. I stayed on with my company to work in a 'floater' position, where I would cover a large area and work at all the stores within that area on a rotating but irregular basis. Eventually I wanted to get a staff position, where
    via u/ClubWag
  • 04
    have a single store assigned. The area was huge, the furthest store being over a 100 miles from my home, and that is exactly where I was assigned to train for the new role. It was a rough store, folks in my position were robbed and a ted at gi int, neighborhood was very unfriendly, volume at the store was among the highest in the state. Staff turnover was, as you might expect, extreme.
    via u/ClubWag
  • 05
    Well, after training I wasn't really being scheduled to float to other stores. Once a month, at most. I asked to be scheduled a little more diversely, since most of the stores in my area were much closer to my home and didn't require 4 hours of driving a day. Bossman told me that I was the only floater experienced enough to handle that store. I didn't buy it, but what can you do right? Well a colleague told me about the mileage reimbursement policy. Floaters working at a store more than 50 miles
    via u/ClubWag
  • 06
    over that 50 miles each way, can even include meals. So I filled a few of these out and sent them to my boss to sign. He didn't quite refuse, but he never actually signed and filed them. I suspect as soon as I left his office at our district center he tossed them out. Bossman tells me later that they must be "lost in the system." Eventually the same colleague showed me how to fax those same forms to accounts payable, bypassing the district bossman. So I started doing just that.
    via u/ClubWag
  • 07
    One day Bossman calls me in a panic. He wants to stop my filing the forms. I ask to be floated closer to home, but he won't budge. He needs me at that miserable store. He promises me he'll make me a staff role at that store if I promise to stop faxing those forms. Staff roles are a promotion and usually come with better pay and a few other little conveniences, so I agree. Bossman says there won't be a paybump right away, but that it'll come down the road. That never happened.
    via u/ClubWag
  • 08
    2 years later the situation at the store has become too toxic for even me. I ask to step down from the staff position to be a floater again and be allowed to float to other stores. Bossman says that I am already a floater, never was in a staff position, but that he can't let me work at other stores because it's better for me and the customers if I stay there for "familiarity." 'Floaters' do not get scheduled to stores exclusively, so I am being singled out because they are still desperate to cov
    via u/ClubWag
  • 09
    I'm livid, so I start looking. It took me months, but eventually I found an opportunity to make my dream career transition. I put in my formal notice and that's when the fun started.
    via u/ClubWag
  • 10
    Remember that whole mileage reimbursement policy? Well I kept meticulous track of all my shifts, and there is no statute of limitations baked into the policy, so I started filling out those reimbursement forms to retroactively cover every single shift from the past 2 odd years. I skipped the meal part since I didn't want to go through all that effort of finding receipts. I had a friendly store manager sign off on them, and I started sending them to Accounts Payable directly again.
    via u/ClubWag
  • 11
    I didn't fax them all in at once, but for each shift in my final 2 weeks I faxed a few dozen in (we still have fax machines in that line of work, believe it or not) I figured, what do I have to lose? Worst case scenario, Accounts Payable declines the forms. On my last few shifts I started getting the checks from accounts payable. Not added to my paycheck but sent to me directly. Mileage reimbursements are non- taxable income, so this was all tax-free money coming to me.
    via u/ClubWag
  • 12
    It must have taken a while for the charges to show up on a balance sheet, because a few weeks after my final paycheck I got a call from my now former Bossman. He wasn't happy. He got some big loss- prevention manager involved and together they started saying I was breaking some rule by requesting the payments. They specifically claimed I was ineligible because I agreed I wouldn't be eligible in a staff position. They then threatened legal action against me if I didn't remit the full amounts back
    via u/ClubWag
  • 13
    But I had the email chain from when Bossman said I was never staff, and always a floater. I politely referenced that email chain before letting them know firmly that because I was lied to, our prior agreement didn't apply and I was fully eligible all along. Corporate policy, as confirmed by HR, agreed with me, so I let them know I wasn't returning a single penny. In the end the reimbursements amounted to well over $21,000 USD, and I transitioned into my dream job. I
    via u/ClubWag
  • 14
    could say that I would trade that money back for the time I lost commuting to that miserable store (4 hours every shift), but all that pressure motivated me to making the best career move of my life. The great satisfaction of not only professionally surpassing my old boss, but getting to tell him that his lies cost him way more on the way out is almost priceless.
    via u/ClubWag
  • 15
    I also shared my story and method with MANY colleagues who were being told wrongly by the Bossman that they didn't qualify for this policy. Tl;dr: Boss lied to manipulate me into commuting 200 miles a day for 2 years without policy allowed reimbursements. I found out and quit for my dream job/career then filed reimbursement retroactively for a total of $21,000 USD
    via u/ClubWag
  • 16
    EDIT 1: Thank you all for the support and comments. As many of you correctly guessed, I was working as a community pharmacist. I do want to clarify that most of my coworkers (Technicians, Pharmacists, Front-end staff) and customers/patients were amazing people. Between them and my subscription to Audible with a long list of books I always wanted to read, it made the situation such that I could tolerate that commute for all that time. The job market for retail pharmacy was/is also very rough and
    via u/ClubWag
  • 17
    this and other ways and that also endangers patient care not to mention staff mental health. I spent more than 10 months searching before I found an opportunity and that involved me leaving the profession entirely. The District Manager "Bossman" and the store General Manager (who was fully complicit in the lie) are both still working for the company, last I saw.
    via u/ClubWag
  • 18
    The Moral of the story: Please understand your company policies and ignore any verbal agreements or HR-unsupported decrees otherwise. And be kind to your pharmacy staff, the job and companies are not always kind to them.
    via u/ClubWag
  • 19
    Techgruber 2 yr. ago . Not to this degree, but I've had to deal with onsite managers lying to me about wages and benefits as well. Sometimes it was to make their own budgets look good. Other times, it just seemed to be a personal quirk that they had to grind down people under them. 3.4k Reply Share Hammer Of TheHeretics 2 yr. ago Your employer is an ally of convenience, not a friend. Always look out for your own interests.
    via u/Techgruber, u/HammerOfTheHeretics
  • 20
    Barflyerdammit - 2 yr. ago I worked at a company where Director level jobs got an extra week of vacation, but weren't eligible for annual bonuses. I argued all the way up to C Level that I should get the extra vacation. They argued that my title was director but wasn't really a director (even though I had the second largest team). So, I asked for the annual bonus instead. They said that Directors didn't get bonuses.
    via u/Barflyerdammit
  • 21
    8 weeks later, I was gone after working there for 5 years. No one else in that job since has lasted more than a year. Bet that week of vacation is looking mighty cheap compared to the chaos that's been there since. 4.0k Reply Share
    via u/Barflyerdammit
  • 22
    02K30C12 yr. ago Life lesson: when a manager tells you they can't increase your pay now, but it's coming down the road, they're lying. 1.3k Reply Share
    via u/02K30C12
  • 23
    b_gumiho 2 yr. ago Not nearly as egregious as your horrible bossman, but at a previous company I worked at I barely had time to take off. I had banked something stupid like 300 PTO hours before the company switched to a "take what you need (b ¡t) policy" with the promise that banked hours would be paid out upon exit of the company (even more bs imho)
    via u/b_gumiho
  • 24
    A c-level had it out for me and forced me out by giving me a 0% annual raise. I fought it all the way to the top but he got his way and I found a job that gave me a 40% raise and then I got those banked hours paid out in full - which ended up being twice the amount of a raise I was originally requesting. Dont give me a raise? Sure. I get double the pay out requested anyways as well as a new job with a 40% wage increase. That c-level got pushed out eventually by me and my old co-workers anyways w
    via u/b_gumiho
  • 25
    sawskooh 2 yr. ago Remember: A promotion without a raise IS NOT A PROMOTION. 595 Reply Share zeroingenuity 2 yr. ago Not entirely true!
    via u/sawskooh, u/zeroingenuity
  • 26
    A promotion without a raise is how your company lets you know they want your resume to look good, so be sure to polish it up and show off your new title. A promotion without a raise is just your current boss increasing the payroll costs of your next boss - who you should start looking for. Reply Share 552
    via u/zeroingenuity
  • 27
    NONOOdz4U 2 yr. ago Sup, fellow pharmer! So CVS or Wags? Reply Share 697 Manleather 2 yr. ago Ahhhhh, now it makes sense. I'm here thinking someone was driving 100 miles to fold pants at Jcpenney or something and I couldn't figure it out. Reply Share 308
    via u/NONOOdz4U , u/Manleather
  • 28
    Atlas-Scrubbed - 2 yr. ago Yeah this is wage thief. I would report it to the state regulator. 119 Reply Share coldvault 2 yr. ago Exactly, they lucked out only paying OP $21k when they could've (should've!) been reported and sued -possibly class action, given that OP had to tell other employees. 51 Reply Share
    via u/Atlas-Scrubbed, u/coldvault

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management boss commute workplace-stories road micromanager quits malicious compliance reimburse driving policy compensation miles pharmacy work shifts pharmacist company agreement
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