If you accidentally break something at work is it proper/legal for your boss to make you pay for it?
Backround: I accidentally dropped a picture frame (framing the infamous: We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone) and the glass broke. I put ‘frame’ on the board where we list things we need from the office supply store. My boss FREAKED OUT! She said it isn’t her place to replace things I break. I was told to replace it myself.
I don’t care about the money. It would cost two bucks tops. I guess I am just irritated that she would make a deal of it.
It’s all a matter of perspective. Here in Minnesota, my boss has the right to fire me at any moment for no reason whatsoever, so whether or not I have to pay for stuff I break is kinda trivial. If I break something, I pay for it.
Of course; it’s legal, proper, and appropriate. Now, in places where a certain amount of breakage is expected, and replacement cost is high (dishes in restaurants, glassware in laboratories, stock in retail stores), I’d say that it’s an expected expense.
I’d also say that your boss is probably angry that you didn’t express any remorse for breaking the frame.
I think it depends on the circumstances in which the damage occurred, and the severity of the damage. Businesses regularly eat the cost of repair or replacement of large, high cost items which were damaged (or had damages exacerbated) by employees. (I’m thinking computers, copiers, office chairs, cash registers, etc.) Unless there was some maliciousness involved, this is considered the cost of doing business.
If this was a cheap frame, why not replace it yourself with one with a shatterproof plastic insert rather than glass. Head your freaked out boss off at the pass, and keep the same trouble from happening again to any of your poor coworkers?
Well, I haven’t broken anything in recent memory, but if I, say, accidentally pushed a monitor off a desk, the company would replace it. When I had my own company, I didn’t make employees pay for stuff that got broken in the course of their activities. The thought would never have occurred to me.
<Too bad it wasn’t the equally infamous 'You Break It, You Bought It>
LOL! At least then I would have known!
Thanks for all responses. I guess I was just rubbed the wrong way about the thing. She asked me to make the sign. I did. I just dropped the thing in inserting the paper. It was an accident.
It is true I was not terribly remorseful for breaking the frame. I apologized to the boss who was there at the time, and his response was, “don’t worry about it.” I then swept up the glass, tended to my papercut-which was the reason I flinched and dropped it-and forgot about it until she became enraged.
(devil’s advocate…maybe I will buy TWO frames. One for the We refuse… in the customer area, and one that says, “You break it, you bought it” for the employee area…har har)
If you check the labor laws in your state, you may find that it is indeed illegal for employers to charge employees for such things. Obviously, if you bring the government into the picture, it doesn’t enhance a harmonious working relationship. But freaking out over a buck or two doesn’t promote harmony either.
A good employer would not risk alienating a good employee over such a trivial matter. She stands to lose immeasurably more than the cost of the frame by being so petty.
I was transporting an old IBM PS/2 Model 60 (an old tower-style PC which really makes you appreciate how “mini” the current “mini-towers” are) from its former user’s office to storage in preparation for transfer to a salvage dealer. It was on top of a pushcart, steadied by my free hand.
I approached the elevators and reached over with my free hand to push the button as I came to a stop.
You know, inertia’s a funny thing. You hardly ever notice it in daily life because so much of what we do every day has friction to keep it from having much effect. The sides of this model 60 were smooth metal and the top of the pushcart was smooth metal. Smooth metal on smooth metal, alas, does not generate much friction.
There were two pieces of good news for me in the next few seconds. One was that the computer was being surplussed anyway. The other is that there was no one around when this 50-pound hunk of worn-out equipment smashed to the floor.
It’s illegal for employers to make employees pay for stuff they break where I am… though they can fire you for it no problem. I remember all kinds of bits from numerous TV shows when I was a kid about the poor downtrodden working Joe that barely brushes and knocks over an expensive peice of machinery that was perched precariously on the edge of a table or something and the boss yelling “That cost $XXX- and it’s coming out of your salary!!” - won’t happen in many places.
Hmmm, what better way for a company to completely replace their entire stock of equipment for free than for the boss to set it all up domino-style right in front of a main door, have the first employee open it and start the chain of destruction, then make him/her pay to replace everything; muhahaha!
