Savvy employee gets $15,000 payout after being wrongfully terminated by maintaining a thorough paper trail: 'We didn't expect you to know the laws'

Author image for Jesse Kessenheimer
Jesse Kessenheimer • Writer and Editor
Jun 1, 2024 1:00 PM EDT

Never underestimate your opponent. 

Whether you're a professional boxer in the ring or an unwitting grocery shopper passing a Girl Scout cookie table, this is an important shred of wisdom to remember. Those Girl Scouts may look cute and naive, but they're plotting to cash in on your underestimation of their formidable wit. 

Like the foolish manager in our next story who seriously took for granted a hardworking employee with a contingency plan. Straight out of college and hungry for work, the original poster of this story (OP) took the first job at a call center that he could find. Being clever, he quickly rose through the ranks and received an honorary title and a new promotion. However, disaster struck when he befell a sudden injury that landed him in the hospital for weeks! 

Knowing that his boss would try to fire him for missing so much work, OP used his time in the hospital bed to devise a plan that would financially protect him in case his employer was as scummy as he thought. Scroll for the entire story of how one guy's diligent research proved to be a golden parachute when he was wrongfully terminated, scoring him a $15,000 payout as a result. 

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  • 01
    The only thing the HR lady said was 'we didn't expect you to know the laws'
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    Boss pays a lot for his fancy plans I had just quit my BA in economics (it just wasn't right for me) and quickly needed a job while figuring out what to do while paying my bills. I found one in a
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    callcenter. This center was a subcontractor for big companies - in my case it was the second biggest telco company in the country and they partially outsourced 1st and 2nd level support for DTV, internet and -
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  • 04
    phone services to the company i worked for. The job was ok, not very demanding, hilarious interactions with customers and nice co-workers. But i soon discovered, that management was just a bunch of inflated egos with glorious ideas but no talent.
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  • 05
    So after about a year i was promoted to supervisor (just a flashy title for solving the cases, no pay raise or other benefits). Apparently i did a good job because 3 month later i got I called into the office by the
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  • 06
    management team. Their plan was to form a training team and they wanted me to lead it. At that point, i still didn't know what i wanted to do with my career so i just said yes. And that's when the shitshow started.
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  • 07
    They gave me a contract with no detailed job discription, a fixed salary plus a monthly bonus which i can get by achieving certain milestones every month. When i asked what those milestones are they just said they will define
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  • 08
    them every month. Ok, fine by me. As a employee with fixed salary i also had to report my hours every month to my assigned manager, let's call him FR. So here we go. As i said before, they had LOTS of
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  • 09
    fancy ideas but no clue. I asked countless times what their plan was with that training department, what my tasks were, what my milestones are and i only got some WishyWashy speech about some grand ideas. In the end i
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    was tasked with all sort of nonsense - helping out with calls (best paid call center agent ever), designing signs for the center (where to find the toilet for example) and stuff like that. They actually gave me so much nonsense work that i had to work overtime.
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    But fine, i just do it, submit my report at the end of the month and figure out my life. There was just one thing that really me off: the bonus. After the first payment i noticed the bonus was missing. So i asked FR why. He
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    said that we never defined the milestones so i did not reach them. I am not stupid and i know my rights. Fact is, HE has to give me the milestones. If he does not, then there are none and i am entitled to the bonus regardless. I
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    could have made a fuss about it right then and there but i decided to be quiet and just go with his nonsense. But i made sure to forward ever important mail about my role, salary and bonus to my private mail.
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    So, this went on for about 6-7 month until i had a pretty big accident which kept me in the hospital for 2 weeks and then at home for another 6 weeks. The company had a habit of firing people after such a long absence,
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    which is illegal but hard to proof. So i knew that the moment i came back i would be fired. Sure enough, the day came and as soon as i walked trough the door (with my pretty sign on it) i saw FR
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    and the HR lady marching towards me. They escorted me into an office and told me i was fired immediatly because they decided to close the training department (that never really existed in the first place). In my country, the
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    notice period for both parties is usually 3 month but it is possible to let someone go effect immediatly. That means i still get 3 month pay but i am not allowed to work there anymore. I happily
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    signed the notice and they let me go to my office to pack up. Little did they know that i just went to prepare my farewell gift to them. I had already printed out EVERYTHING. Calculated my
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  • 19
    overtime and the missing bonuses. So 30min later i called the HR lady into the office and laid it all out. Due to the fact that they let me go immediatly, they had to pay me the overtime plus a
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    surcharge and of course all the bonuses plus 3 month salary. All in all it added up to over 15'000 $. The only thing the HR lady said was "we didn't expect you to know the laws" - i guess that was a slip up :)
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  • 21
    zeroingenuity • 3h ago "We didn't expect you to know the laws" is a full-blown admission of intentional criminal conduct. Tip off the labor department about them anyway (or rather, others in such a situation should) because for sure if they'll break the law and casually admit it, they're breaking other laws too.
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    RealUltimatePapo • 4h ago HR: We're sorry, but you're fired OP: Oh, that's OK
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