'[Boss] gave me the power to cancel his vacation plans': 10+ Dramatic instant karma stories

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Remy Millisky • Writer and Editor
Jun 25, 2024 5:00 PM EDT

You don't have to believe in karma to appreciate the sentiment of it. What goes around comes around, and if you do good things, maybe good things will come back around to you. And if you're being kind of a grouch or a bad boss, well, that might come back to haunt you too. 

These people shared their best stories of instant karma at u/barrygibb's request, and there's a wide variety of examples. However, one of the main themes was people who got back at their terrible bosses. It seems like a lot of bosses give their employees a ton of responsibility, and therefore, quite a lot of power over the day-to-day functions of that workspace. A lot of employees try really hard to impress their bosses and work as much as possible, only to be continually berated instead. So when they decide to head out the door, they don't have a single care in the world about what'll happen to the business. They just know they're ready to move on and put their hard work into a role that they're more appreciated in. Their bosses will just have to deal with what karma has wrought! 

Next up, this retail worker shared what happened when they got even with a few of their worst customers, writing, "Feeling a spirit of pettiness overtake me, I fill the cart with M&Ms." 

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  • 01
    Cheezburger Image 10365607424
    via Jason Goodman on Unsplash
  • 02
    r/AskReddit Today I quit my job of 6 years, effectively canceling my boss' vacation plans. Reddit, what stories of instant karma do you have? I'm a fting terrible storyteller, but alright, I'll go first:
    via u/barrygibb
  • 03
    I've worked at the same company for over 6 years. I was a loyal, good employee with a perfect track-record. Over the 6 years I've only called in sick twice. I had the best results, the least amount of errors on paperwork in the whole region and quite possibly the whole country. My new boss decided that that wasn't enough. He minimized my hours (they get a bonus to keep labor low), expanded my workload and never had anything nice to say. He seemed to think ruling with an iron fist is the way to g
    via u/barrygibb
  • 04
    So today I resign my position with immediate effect, which in terms cancelled his vacation plans for next week. On top of that, there is no one to fill my position. As soon as I mouthed the words "I quit" you could see the terror in his eyes. He realized how fed he was without me and tried to do whatever he could to keep me for at least another week. I've never felt such a sense of instant karma as today. I never meant to cancel his vacation, but I wasn't going to put his needs before mine. I ha
    via u/barrygibb
  • 05
    **TL;DR:**Boss is a raging a clown that gave me the power to cancel his vacation plans. So Reddit, what amusing, funny or bizarre stories of instant karma do you have to share?
    via u/barrygibb
  • 06
    Pizzadude As the low man on the totem pole, I got to do all of the grunt labor and random tasks that required working on weekends and such... as a master engineer working in a 9-5 job... being paid less than a pizza delivery driver. Then my boss decided that I no longer got to comp time (leave early or whatever to get back some of the time spent working on weekends), because I was salaried and "it was part of the job." So, when I quit to go get my PhD, they realized that I hadn't used any vacati
    via u/Pizzadude
  • 07
    [deleted] Once quit a job to only then have the boss chase my jeep on foot screaming at me. He repeatedly called to get me to go back. Felt great.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 08
    Its Opposite DayHere I worked as a database administrator for a community center for one summer in university. Basically, I created a database for them to track who was donating to them and how much they were donating, and who was volunteering at the centre and for how many hours. Very simple work and despite being the youngest person on staff by about 25-30 years, I got along well with all of my co-workers except for my immediate boss who was a total bi....h.
    via u/Its Opposite DayHere
  • 09
    The next spring, I was applying for jobs and e-mailed my old boss to ask for a letter of recommendation. Much to my surprise, she told me that she didn't write recommendation letters "out of principle". I was pretty posed off about it because I was finding it very difficult to find a position and not being able to count on my most recent employer for a reference was a definite blemish on my resume.
    via u/Its Opposite DayHere
  • 10
    However, in spite of this, I managed to land a decent job. Lo and behold, my old boss e-mails me on day 1 of my new job, begging me to come in because she had somehow ignored all the warnings in the user documentation I wrote and moved some files around rendering it impossible for her to access the database. She asked if I would come in and I e-mailed her back and told her I already had a job and couldn't do it "out of principle", effectively rendering my entire summer at the centre a waste of t
    via u/Its Opposite DayHere
  • 11
    tl;dr Build database for company over a summer, boss won't write me a reference "out of principle", database breaks due to error between keyboard and chair, turn down boss' plea for help "out of principle", thus nullifying my entire summer's work for them.
    via u/Its Opposite DayHere
  • 12
    NewAlt I tried to explain to my company how they were breaking the law with one of their procedures. They didn't listen, said somebody up the line would have caught it. Later, illegally fired me whilst I was on FMLA leave. Was, statistically at least, their best employee at my position out of 500 people. They got fined 250K for the violation I brought up several times. I'm still unemployed but I go hiking all day and love my life. Have enough saved up to last me until I do find work. Fk em.
    via u/NewAlt
  • 13
    ZombiGrinder My stepdad is a driving instructor, I went to get my license pretty late (22), one day he was giving me a lesson and we were going over one of the possible courses that the test takes. While we're driving down a street in the suburbs a guy is tail gating the out of me... really gangster looking guy, looked pretty much exactly like scumbag steve now that I think about it...sideways hat and all. Every time I come to a stop sign I do a full stop, obviously, and he throws his hands in t
    via u/ZombiGrinder
  • 14
    As we're going down the street he says "OK, now in about 50 feet I want you to start slowing down a little bit and right when you are in front of that school zone, pull over to the right". So I do it, right after I pull over, the guy who is right p d at me now, takes off like a bullet. And about 5 seconds later a cop steps out from behind a tree and waves him over for going probably double the speed limit in a school zone. We laughed. Hard.
    via u/ZombiGrinder
  • 15
    Ihmh Was working a job where I was doing 90 hours a week but only getting paid for 40-45. Boss blew up on me over the phone, so I quit effective end of day. I finished up all of my work and he tried to sweet talk me into staying, but I held strong. Turns out he had to work 18 hours a day for the next two weeks trying to find a replacement.
    via u/Ihmh
  • 16
    erinnbecky Today I missed my bus to help an elderly woman with her groceries only to have a friend pass me driving and offer to give me a ride home.
    via u/erinnbecky
  • 17
    Lucavious I worked for Goodwill quite a few years back as a supervisor because my mother and I had really fond memories of treasure hunting there and I wanted to try and build up some management experience with a reputable company. I thought it would be my dream gig for a while even though I knew it would be hard work. Except it was anything but.
    via u/Lucavious
  • 18
    The manager was an alright lady, but her assistant manager was a tyrant. Every day she would threaten to fire the employees if they didn't do their work right. I took offense to this because as a supervisor I wanted my team to be in good spirits and wanted them to love coming in to work and doing good things for the mission. I wanted this to be a great place to work. But because every single day they were being told they could be fired, morale was rock bottom. People were afraid for their jobs e
    via u/Lucavious
  • 19
    I had a meeting with the manager, and I said "I don't want to step on any toes. I know you run a successful store and I really admire that. I would appreciate it if you could ask the assistant manager to tone down the firing threats because it makes my team nervous and I'd like to have a chance to improve productivity in my own way". She said she understood and I felt good about the conversation.
    via u/Lucavious
  • 20
    The next day she called me into her office where her and the assistant manager were both waiting for me. They asked me to lock the door. As soon as I did I got the most hate- filled verbal lashing of my entire life. They started screaming at me you think you can turn us against eachother? You are worthless. You just do your f---ing job and don't tell us how to do ours. Who do you think you are?? This went on for about 20 minutes. I'm a grown man and I nearly started bawling right there. I told t
    via u/Lucavious
  • 21
    I was the only supervisor they had on a team that required at least two. The manager and assistant manager were already working 60 hour weeks to make things work on a skeleton crew, and when I quit they were going to be working 80 hours each with no weekends until they had at least a month to find someone else. They told me how much of a scumbag I was for not giving two weeks notice and ruining their month. I wasn't really concerned about it.
    via u/Lucavious
  • 22
    DJRobOwen My Karma comes from my last few days at secondary school, we are all around 17/18 years old and have been in the same morning registration class for 6 years every single school day. Everyone seemed to be emotional about it, with most of the girls crying, even a couple of the guys. The head boy in our year, who was in our registration class, had a surprise, and had hired a bouncy castle just for us! Now I had always been the biggest guy in school, 6 foot tall and around 20 stone (300 lb
    via u/DJRobOwen
  • 23
    I pluck up some courage because this looked like so much fun, and I start bouncing and bouncing higher and higher, and then this p Paul pushes me when I am at my highest and I land on my side on the ground, which was thankfully grass. I slowly sit up in a little pain, and Paul is laughing his head off and pointing at me, trying to get as much attention so other folk can start laughing at my misfortune. I get up and go back inside and sit there on my own, while I think about how s school has alwa
    via u/DJRobOwen
  • 24
    Paul is still bouncing around like a and I get back on at the furtherest end of the bouncy castle, I get into a bounce which is timed slightly behind Pauls, and then I do the biggest jump I could, curled up into a cannonball and hit the castle floor with all my weight. Paul ended up bouncing RIGHT OVER the wall of the castle and landing hard on the other side, he was ok though, only his pride was dented, but everyone who saw it was in absolute hysterics. Everyone started to tell the story of Pau
    via u/DJRobOwen
  • 25
    AMathmagician es me I worked at a Kmart in high school. It was a small store, so I worked everything, electronics, stocking, cashier. You name it, I did it. I asked a woman and her son, about 12 or 13, if they needed help finding anything as I was out on the floor, and the kid immediately b out for annoying him. I ignore it, and go about my business. Right after that I get called to checkouts. As I'm working there, here comes the pair. The kid has gone all out back in the electronics area, with
    via u/AMathmagician
  • 26
    [deleted] Once quit a job to only then have the boss chase my jeep on foot screaming at me. He repeatedly called to get me to go back. Felt great.
    via u/[deleted]
  • 27
    [deleted] After I graduated high school, I worked as a pastry chef at this little French bakery/restaurant in a shopping center. Originally, I'd been a cashier for the bakery's front, but the former pastry chef had put his two weeks' notice in. The owner was scrambling and panicking, because there were only two bakers and the workload required them both. I volunteered to train with the departing man for two weeks and help his assistant as best I could until they found someone new, since I had so
    via u/[deleted]
  • 28
    whatever I needed, as long as the bakery case was filled and the orders were finished in a timely manner. I also am something of a workhorse. I loved this job so much, and at one point was putting in 50- 60 hours a week during the holiday season and not thinking a thing of it because it was so wonderful. The owner of the bakery loved my work. We were doing new cupcake flavors, choux-based pastries, and even French macarons that I would paint or draw on. The macarons especially were a hit in the
    via u/[deleted]
  • 29
    The owner and I became really close friends. I learned she was going through a divorce with the co- owner. She was in financial trouble, but he offered to buy out more of the restaurant and bakery. He would own the majority, but was still going to let her run the show. However, her husband decided he would now take over operations. I got my pay cut in half, my hours were sharply reduced and I was written up if I neared overtime. I was told I was easily replaceable, and my manager's card was revo
    via u/[deleted]
  • 30
    Fast forward six weeks- they've had FOUR bakers come and go, the cakes are very poorly decorated and the icing has this aspartame-like Diet Coke aftertaste as of last week. There's no manager and hardly any service, and a former coworker told me that he quit because they were handing out paychecks a week late- the owner was paying out of pocket because there was no money left in the business. Even more amusing: More than one customer had gone into a rage over the lack of macarons, and none of th
    via u/[deleted]
  • 31
    I was stopped at a red light waiting to turn right. I couldn't see if there was any traffic coming because of how the intersection was set up and the bus in the left turn lane so I was just waiting for a green. The person behind me clearly wanted me to turn because she was honking, yelling and giving me the finger. After a couple seconds she decided to drive around me and was immediately T-boned.
    via r/AskReddit

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boss workplace-stories jobs job bosses work coworkers entitled people karma workplace karma
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