Work rants- bring your worst clients, customers, and coworkers.

The BBQ Pit
41

On my planet, it’s perfectly acceptable to respond to “Thank you [for buying this coffee]” with “Thank you [for making this coffee].”

But then there is apparently less rage on my planet than on yours.

My workie rant? Okay. Moocher coworkers: If the luncheon being put on is not for your group, do not go down and help yourselves to the food. The caterer at our Institute charges for future lunches based on the amount of food a group consumes. They count the number of “plates” eaten and each plate costs X dollars. The luncheon is for conference attendees (and employees who are putting on/teaching the conference), and the per-plate cost of the luncheon is built into the conference costs. When you help yourself to a literal free lunch, the conference costs go up. So FYI: The lunch is not for random people who happen to work in the building. Buy your own damn food.

42

I swear the pollen load, full moon or something is making people batshit lately.

Our best technicolor meltdown yesterday was a sweet (ha!) young thing who went ballistic all over the staff, me and probably the mayor–because she won’t get a library card where she lives. She doesn’t live in my city but we have reciprocal agreements so we’d honor the card from her home city. But NO! Huge personal insult to her precious little self.

She was told, repeatedly and patiently, that card privilges are paid by property taxes. It’s state law. We can’t just give away cards at whim. Law, y’know? Piffle, she had to scream abuse at us, one after the other. Fortunately we’re very good at warning each other when a real asshole is on the line. She had a little audience of fascinated listeners as we’d scramble from office to office as she worked her way up the chain.

“I USED to live here, I paid your salary! I don’t have time to get a card from City X. (Where she lives, mind…and it’s maybe 15 miles away.) You people are all losers and LIARS! You’ve insulted me and you’d better fucking well apologize, RIGHT NOW. I want you to apologize, right now, and if you don’t I’ll have you fired! You are so STUPID. You either give me a card, RIGHT NOW, and you fucking APOLOGIZE, or I’m telling the, the, MAYOR and the newspaper and none of you worthless, stupid LIARS will ever work again!” Each person would listen, explain, try to soothe and finally advise her the conversation wasn’t going anywhere so they were ending it.

She finally ended up with me and sure enough, she still had steam. By that time she’d been screaming like a factory whistle for at least 45 minutes. Gotta admire her stamina; the vile bitch has great capacity for rage. And good lungs.

I let her spit venom at me for a bit while I explained what she’d already heard a dozen times then finally got rid of her. Told her she should scream at the state legislature if she thought that would get the law changed. My parting word was that nobody is permitted to abuse the staff and if she ever behaved thus again, by phone or in person, she would be turned over to the police.

Then I told her to have a nice day.* And hung up on her ass.

I don’t like that phrase but damn, it felt good under the circumstances.

43

What a strange choice for a user name.

Oooooh…

44

Was your t-shirt pulled over your head when you typed this? I definitely think you need out of the caffeine business. :slight_smile:

45

Isn’t that the trademarked name of the Congressional Record?

46

How about my cube naighbor, L. L only like to talk on the speakerphone, with the volume high enough that I feel like they are yelling in MY in my ear. AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHGGG!!

Oh wait, we fixed it by taking about her phone and stuffing the speaker compartment with paper towels. Now she can barely here it a foot from her desk.

Never mind.

I agree.

47

Dear Client:
Yes, you have to pay your bill now. I realize that you will be coming back for a progress check in a few days, but if I let you leave this clinic with a $7,000 bill unpaid, my supervisors will have my head. No, I can’t just charge it to the card you used before, because our systems don’t save card information. Its for your safety, so your credit card information can’t be misused. Really, after acting like such a twit, do you want me to have access to your card with (as you claim) $20,000 on it? I thought not.

48

A variation on this theme: Those who sign up to bring a bag of paper napkins to a pot luck, then jump to the front of the line and go back for seconds and thirds. Or those who bring the cheapest, most undrinkable generic sodas, then take them all back home, unopened, after the fact. Or those who sign up to bring cookies, then toss a $2 bag of fake Oreos on the table.

Not that it bothers me any longer - I opt out of these fiasco events.

49

I’s a tossup…

My cube neighbor hasn’t gotten used to farting in the new Aeron chairs. He doesn’t realize there’s not a slab of foam rubber to absorb (eww!) and muffle the sound, and the farts just blat right on through the mesh. Fortunately, the airflow is away from me, so all I get is the sound.

Across the aisle is a guy with some sort of sinus problem that gurgles and snorks all day long like a church potluck percolator. UGH!

Several rows away, there’s a woman that laughs like a braying donkey. Loudly and often. This is work - what is she doing that’s so damned funny?

50

Renters. Can’t work with them, and it’s not good business sense to preemptively tell them to fuck off.

Okay, so. You’re two months behind on the rent, and you haven’t ever paid on time. You’re starting a new job this month. Is this the same job you just started last month? Oh I see, your old car broke down and the new car took all your disposable income this month. I understand that your job doesn’t provide health insurance, and you’re still paying off an emergency rectal craniectomy.

We’ve cut deals, reduced late fees, changed the payment schedule, yet every rent check has been late. We’ve taken you to court to evict you, which you opted to not attend. Your door has been red-tagged by the Constible, warning of impending legal actions to remove you and your belongings, from the property. We’ve been in phone contact with you weekly, though the last couple weeks we’ve had to leave voice mails on your cell phone (which number you volunteered when you filled out the rental application form) because you’re not answering your home phone any more. We’ve called your employer (rental application form) and family (rental application form) to verify that you’re still alive and in town. Over the past two days, we’ve posted notices on your inside front door telling you that we’re arriving today, with the Constible, to haul your ass to the curb and change the locks.

What’s that? You’re surprised when we arrived? Okay, go ahead and call the cops. Or you could talk to the Constible here on the porch with us.

Okay. You noticed that we have a law enforcement officer with us already, and he is not going to arrest us. You’re going to sue us now? Like you were so interested in going to court the last time that you never showed up?

And now come the water works. Actual tears are flowing as we listen to your story about how you could pay everything right now except that just today you had to pay the electic company $1500 so they could turn your electricity back on. About how you just started this new job working for your brother and the first paycheck won’t arrive for another eight weeks. About how you and your brother were orphaned fifteen years ago.

I know it makes me a bad person, but hearing the last parts of your sob story made me feel better about stuffing your goods into grabage bags and dragging them to the sidewalk. It helps me feel better about never getting the $2400 you owe us, about having to burn up my vacation pay from work, and about indefinitely putting off my trip where my parents see their granddaughter for the first time, because of you. It helps, just a little.

But then I see what you’ve done to the master bathroom.

Dipshit.

51

On the other hand of that arguement Subway Prophet: I’ve been a reliable tenant, I’ve done nothing to damage the place. I’ve rarely needed anything fixed. When I called, it was of potential damage to the rest of the building caused by the torrential rains. I’ve heard you moan and groan about how hard it is to find good tenants that will pay on time and will stay for more than a year or so.

So what do you do then? You raise my rent every year by 10-20%, encouraging me to look elsewhere for a domicle. I can appreciate my continued existance here will cause some wear and tear, but stop whining about the reliability of renters while discouraging them from staying.

52

Yep, that’s a dumb, though common, landlord. I’m amazed at the number I’ve encountered who can’t figure out how to keep a good tenant, or why it’s so important. It’s not rocket science.

53

We have very good tenants and their lease is up at the end of May. We are not planning to raise their rent, and if they sign another lease, we’re buying a new TV for them (it’s a furnished apartment.)

54

Good for you!

55

My close friends (man and wife) have been landlords for almost 30 years. They’ve had a few tennants skip out on leases. They have gone through the motions to get judgments against them…pretty easy, because as you observe, they never show up in court.

Eventually, 5-10 yrs. down the road, the deadbeat goes straight, and wants to buy a house…maybe a fancy new car, or a college loan. And danged if they can do so until they clear up this outstanding debt on thier credit report, now even better than the old debt with interest, leagle fees, etc.

56

Dear asshole clients:

When we prepare an analytical report, it is not meant to be a report for submission to the EPA. It is to be included as an appendix to your report. Therefore, if changes are required, WE DON’T HAVE TO DO A FUCKING AMENDMENT. The EPA report has not been finalized. We can do whatever the fuck we want until then. But for some reason, you assholes push us to complete our report, don’t review it until AFTER it is signed, and then find idiotic little changes to make and then insist on us preparing amendment after amendment, which costs us time and money and are an extreme pain in the ass and TOTALLY UNNECESSARY and make us all look like idiots to the EPA. Amendments to an analytical report? You all are fucking idiots. Which is why, I suppose, you work for the fucking goverment. I can’t wait until we are rid of all your studies because we are never accepting work from you again. We don’t need your business, you retarded asswipes. P.S. Your QA can go suck a tailpipe, they have no fucking clue what they’re talking about.

57

fetus: I feel you on the Frappucino thing. Nope, we don’t have 'em. Never have. Never will. Would probably get sued into oblivion if we tried. You can get them in the drink section of the convenience store, though, if it means that much to you.

I haven’t really had any problems with the customers so far, but my coworker K… Oh that girl. I don’t know if she’s borderline, if she’s a hypochondriac, or maybe just a compulsive liar. She calls in sick at least once a week. She’s crippled from a car accident. She had her wisdom teeth out and now her jaw is broken because it was weak from the surgery. She has laryngitis. She has tonsillitis and mono. She’s pregnant. Oh, wait, she’s not pregnant, but she thought she was, and it would have been awful, because the evil boyfriend of the week just dumped her / keeps nagging her about the pills she’s been taking and just because she’s a vicodin addict doesn’t mean he should nag her / put a gun to her head and threatened to kill her unless he let his four friends rape her while he watched. Also, all the male customer sexually harrass her. All of them. All the time.

I mean, if she’d just stretch the stories out a bit, maybe put a few weeks between them, I could maybe believe she’s just the unluckiest person alive. But when it’s all in the span of a month, I start to find myself just the teensiest bit doubtful.

58

No shit. I’m glad I have a decent job, and know that working in food service or retail tends to suck ass. Here I thought I was thanking the worker for polite, good service; I mean hell, I’m getting some kind of goods or service out of the deal, while I’m just Jane Random Customer to the worker who nevertheless smiles and treats me like I’m gold. Whoops, I guess they don’t like being thanked, what the hell was I thinking? :smack:

59

Reading the SDMB?

60

For the love of God, it’s a storyboard. A Storyboard. It’s not a goddamned animation. It’s what the animation is going to look like. No it won’t ‘pop’ when you mouseover it, whatever the fuck ‘pop’ means. It’s a JPEG. Use your fucking imagination (like you have one). And stop putting things in quotation marks just because you’re an idiot. ‘This’ doesn’t make any ‘sense.’

Oh, the picture’s too light? You want it color corrected? I don’t know what the fuck that means. It’s too dark now? You know what, I didn’t take the fucking picture. I don’t know who took the fucking picture. I don’t know why you’re telling me ‘sigh, I wish we had better pictures’ because that’s NOT my goddamned JOB. If you want a better picture, hire a goddamn professional photographer.

And that is the way we fucking had it. Remember the first design, the one you criticized so goddamn much? Oh you want it back? Fuck you.