'[He] changed his job title to Ninja Computer Wizard': 15 Odd circumstances that led employees to get fired

Author image for Remy Millisky
Remy Millisky • Writer and Editor
Jul 17, 2024 5:00 PM EDT

When it comes to the pizza delivery driver who was fired because he couldn't find the house and just ate their pizza order instead… I understand where he's coming from. I'm not saying he did the right thing, because there's a family out there who ordered pizza and didn't get it. I just think he's relatable: it's hard to follow directions sometimes, and it's easy to get lost, and well, pizza is tasty. He probably got paid for one shift, and got to eat a free pizza in the meantime. He's an agent of chaos, as a lot of these people who got fired seem to be. 

One person asked managers to explain their "favorite firing" moments. Getting fired can be a terrible experience for employees, so firing a person who really deserves it must feel so righteous. When you get to show the door to the worker who's constantly late or who antagonizes their coworkers, it must be a good feeling. You can check out a bunch of these great stories below. 

Up next, beat the heat with some mildly infuriating moments of summer, like one person who complained, "One of my four children dumped a half gallon of milk in the freshly filled pool."

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    Cheezburger Image 10375343104
    via kate.sade on Unsplash
  • 02
    Firing managers of reddit, what was your favorite firing?
    via u/[deleted]
  • 03
    Earhorn Jones I had a repo man working for me who was enormous, and had some anger issues. He'd stopped making his daily runs, and was turning in false trip reports. I called him into my office to discuss the situation with him, and it rapidly turned into him yelling at me, including phrases like "you're not my dad!" Weird. I know.
    via u/Earhorn Jones
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    Anyway, my boss came in to try to calm him down, and told him to go home, and then come back the next morning to discuss the situation. As soon as the repo man was gone, I told my boss. that I was firing him if he came back. My boss told me that he'd take care of it because thing would get to messy if I did it (which may
    via u/Earhorn Jones
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    have been accurate at that time). I was instructed to stay home the next morning so that the boss could talk to the repo guy. I came in at around 10:30AM, and there were three cop cars in our parking lot, and as I walked up to the building, our repo man was being dragged out in cuffs, and cursed out one of our salespeople who just happened to be walking by.
    via u/Earhorn Jones
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    When I got inside, I found the boss' office thoroughly trashed, with chairs and paperwork everywhere. I'm sure glad that I wasn't there to make things messy. The repo man called another manager who was a friend of mine looking for a job the next week.
    via u/Earhorn Jones
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    Or... Used to manage a pizzeria. Had a shift leader that told me he needed to leave because his son went to the ER. This was like 10 minutes into his shift. I let him leave and closed the store myself. His wife came in to pick up his paycheck a few days later and I asked if everything was ok with their son after the ER visit. She had no idea what I was
    via r/AskReddit
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    job, though, and I knew she had another full-time offer with the other company she was freelancing for. She'd been holding out to work at my company, and was at risk of losing the other offer while she was waiting to see what my company would do. Of course they hadn't told her they weren't going to hire her, they instead asked me to imply that she would get an offer with a good enough holiday push. They
    via r/AskReddit
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    were going to say any amount of work she did wasn't enough to get the offer, and let her lose a real offer in the meantime. I essentially pulled her into an office and told her it was in her best interest to accept the other offer and to quit on the spot. I was pulled into a room with the CEO and some others to justify why she'd quit after talking to me, but I just couldn't have
    via r/AskReddit
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    it on my conscience. She took the other job and we made it through holiday without her (I managed the team she was freelancing for, so I absorbed most of that extra work, but I'm so glad I chased her away instead of lying to her).
    via r/AskReddit
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    boatsbeaton Had to fire an IT support technician because he stole an admin username/password, logged into Active Directory and changed his job title to Ninja Computer Wizard.
    via u/boatsbeaton
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    C P Queen My bf's story He fired a lady in her 50s at Walgreens because instead of patiently going through this customer's intense coupon book, she became extremely frustrated and just told the customer to leave. So she essentially allowed a woman to walk out
    via r/AskReddit
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    talking about. Fired him 10 minutes into his next shift. Pro tip: make sure you get your SO on board when telling your boss your kid went to the emergency room to skip out of work.
    via r/AskReddit
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    Edit: The dude was generally to begin with, but I didn't think he would stoop that low... He admitted he lied when I called him on it, only after that was he fired. Make sure you give an excuse that doesn't merit a follow up question because a toddler in the ER certainly does.
    via r/AskReddit
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    neums08 Oh I hope I'm not too late. We had a contractor at my old job, call him Jay, who was basically leaving for most of the day and working on other clients' projects on our company's time. The day he was supposed to be canned, Jay's company's manager came by with an ice cream cake as a "thanks
    via u/neums08
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    for your business" treat for our team. Our manager put the cake in the break room, sent out an email to draw people out of the cube town, and used it as a cover to confiscate Jay's laptop and out of the building. him Jay's manager inadvertently provided ice cream to celebrate his firing. It was delicious.
    via u/neums08
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    atworkkit I "fired" this girl without the permission of my company once. Essentially I had been told to hold on to a freelancer through the holiday push, utilizing her desire to get a full-time role to ask her to sacrifice her own Christmas to make up for all the extra work of the season (e-commerce). I was informed that we weren't going to offer her a full-time
    via u/atworkkit
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    of Walgreens with upwards of $200 all because she was too lazy to enter her coupons. Edit: she was a closing manager as well
    via u/atworkkit
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    dissemblinga I fired my best friend in high school. He knew it was coming though. The night before we had been hanging out at the arcade (it was the 80s), and when we went to leave, his car wouldn't start. He was scheduled to work the next day, and told me that night he wouldn't be in as he had to work on his car.
    via u/dissemblinga***
  • 20
    Next day comes, I'm opening the restaurant and he didn't show up. I called the manager, she said he's fired, I called him, told him he's fired. He picked me up after work and we hung out some more. Easiest firing ever.
    via u/dissemblinga***
  • 21
    Goin2Dsnyland Many years ago I fired a teenage employee for going. into our address database, looking up his friend's phone numbers, and changing their name & address to something awful/juvenile. Great fun, until he accidentally processed a live order for "Mr. Big's Disposable Douches", who lived at "123 Cotton Pony Lane".
    via u/Goin2Dsnyland
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    The best part? I had to fire him that day. It was December 24 - Christmas Eve. Merry Christmas - you're fired! Love, Ebeneezer.
    via u/Goin2Dsnyland
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    pylontoes I used to manage a paintball field while I was in college. The owners were happy to pay me fairly, because all the other employees were 14 years old and could be used as minimum-wage slaves. Ergo, I saw a lot of dumb from kids at their first real job.
    via u/pylontoes
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    I left a new hire alone to take a group out on the field, and when I came back he was beside himself to show me the COOLEST THING he's discovered... He proceeded to pour hand sanitizer on the plywood. counter, and light it on fire. A plywood counter, in a plywood hut that is filled. with compressed air tanks, and surrounded by dead
    via u/pylontoes
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    grass and dry forest in the middle of a bad forest fire year. I couldn't get him out of the shack and off the property fast enough.
    via u/pylontoes
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    B outofwhatever This isn't necessary a "favorite", but it happened. Several years ago I was a bank branch manager. I was being transferred to another branch across town and had to fire a teller on my first day in the branch. About a month before, the teller had cashed out a bad check for a few thousand dollars, he didn't check the correct ID and let the money walk out
    via u/Bl***outofwhatever
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    the door. Shortly after, before the mistake was found out, he was in a car accident and had to miss a few weeks of work. He was due to return to work the same day as my first day in the branch. My regional manager had told me about the situation, but they couldn't fire him because he
    via u/Bl***outofwhatever
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    hadn't been back to work since they found out. So, that morning, I came in, said nice to meet you, come sit down, you're fired.
    via u/Bl***outofwhatever
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    me... I fired another pizza delivery driver to be clear I had no authority to fire this person no one in the store at the time did. Was his second shift we were swamed and he was taking forever.
    via u/me_suds
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    Eventually he disappeares for two hours and comes back says "couldn't find it so I just ate the pizza" I told him get the out and never come back. Everyone on the store witness this and his excuse so the firing stuck
    via u/me_suds
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    XaqFu Firing the guy that was stealing a lot from me. I couldn't figure out why my profit margin had dropped 5%. I never considered anyone stealing. Then a woman came in because she was overcharged. I gave her the money she was owed. Then I looked into it further. That day's sales report should have been over the same amount as the
    via u/XaqFu
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    overcharge. It was not. I then set several employees up by loading the drawer with an extra $20. His drawer was the only one to show no overage. I then caught him on camera. After figuring out who it was, I kept hearing stories from people about his strange behavior. Why the they didn't say anything before then is beyond me. I still have the footage on my
    via u/XaqFu
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    phone. If anyone called me out about firing a well liked individual, I say nothing. I just show them the video. Their faces are priceless.
    via u/XaqFu
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    gil... I worked for a security company for over two years before quitting to become an EMT, this being last year. My last five months on the job I was promoted to third shift supervisor. We were contracted out to a large factory that also had a janitorial/ maintenance company contracted out as well. Whenever any employee was to be fired,
    via u/gil_beard
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    they would be brought out to our guard shack in front of us to be told the bad news where we in turn would them to their vehicle. So there's a young guy, we'll call Jay, that works for the janitorial company and he's probably the laziest employee in the whole plant. Today was the final straw for his supervisor since he sent Jay to clean the north end locker rooms and he spent the entire shift sleeping
    via u/gil_beard
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    instead. They call Jay into. the guard shack, tell him he's fired, and I stand there ready to him out. Right after Jay heard the bad news he does an about face, walks right past me, and stops at the front desk to ask my security guard if he can have an application for our company. His former boss and I yelled "No!" in complete unison. I got to fire someone before they were even hired.
    via u/gil_beard
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    RhinoSmokn Can't say I enjoyed firing anyone but the most memorable was the girl who after being fired, locked herself in the boardroom and refused to leave the premises until we paid her off. This was a small company with no security and instead of getting the police involved we gave her about $200 or so and she left in peace...
    via u/RhinoSmokn
  • 38
    Fu... In our Deli we had a girl named Jesse, who worked for us for about 8 months before she realized she wasn't going to get the experience pay a HR promised her and decided to get another job. But she wanted to stay on board with one foot in the door, just in case what she had didn't pan out so well, so asked to work one day a
    via u/FusRoDoodles
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    week. This was fine by us, she was a good worker and we could use the extra help, so she decided to work Sunday evenings. It soon became clear that Jesse really wasn't feeling it. Her work ethic dipped, she spent more time on her phone, and she called off. One night she asked to go home early, and when a manager wouldn't let her because the rest of the staff
    via u/FusRoDoodles
  • 40
    would suffer for it she just left anyways. The next week she came back and we told her she couldn't behave like that, it's unfair to her coworkers, but she blew us off like it was no big deal. The next week she doesn't show up at all. We call her and she doesn't answer, so we assume she's finally done. I tell management to make moves to terminate her (we usually don't bother
    via u/FusRoDoodles
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    with formalities, but I was a bit miffed at how she had so easily disrespected her coworkers and tired of her BS.) Almost two whole months pass without any mention of Jesse, when suddenly one day I get a call from the front office. "Um, Jesse's here asking for an override to clock in." I go up front and yep, there she stands in her uniform, ready to clock in. I
    via u/FusRoDoodles
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    burst out laughing and told her she doesn't work here anymore, andto my great shock she's actually off! She says the deal was she would work Sundays. Uh, yeah, and you haven't called or shown for the last 8 in a row. She tries to call the Union, who tells her that more than 3 no call no shows in a row mean voluntary quit, we were free to terminate her and she
    via u/FusRoDoodles
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    couldn't fight it after the third week. She got so flushed and angry and said "That's not fair! I didn't know that!" Watching her storm off was pretty satisfying. Learning she had her hours cut from her new job and wanted to come back from a coworker close to her was even better. Folks, moving up is great, but don't burn your bridges.
    via u/FusRoDoodles

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