Tales of Epic Bridge Burning

[Killtodie]

So I got a good story to share on how I quit working at Geek Squad back in 2008.

 

I worked at Geek Squad for close to 3 years. I got up the ranks fast and got an awesome raise. But after a while I was bored in my position (CIA Sr. one step below supervisor) and kept applying for other open positions in local stores. After getting rejected about 6 times for BS reason I soon realizes the HUGE “under the table” politics of Best Buy. They only seem to promote ‘friends’ of friends and for a regular kid like me who wasn’t in huge favors with anyone I kept getting rejected for positions that were given to morons who failed at them rather quickly. I thought enough is enough, time for a new job, although I liked my store and coworkers, my manager and supervisor hated my guts and made my work difficult. I would get written up for the most ridiculous things, like crumbling a piece of paper in ‘angst’ and throwing it on the floor in front of a manager, not a customer. Although their threats to fire me or discipline me further had no strongholds, I was their number one tech, I kept the place in line, I did all the wire management and aside from my supervisor handled difficult customers. So I talk to my close friends who at one point worked with me at the same store all quit and started to work for a simpler PC tech repair store and they seemed much happier. No pissed off customers to deal with, no 7am meetings, no corporate BS.

I turn in my two weeks. I don’t act any less responsible. I do my job; finish all my work, like nothing changed. But I feel a LOT better. With just over a week to go and 6 scheduled days left I decide to have some fun. It’s a Saturday night, the slowest day in retail, I go for a lunch and pick my self up a pint of Jack Daniels. This wouldn’t be the first time I drank at work. A bit ago I used to always carry a flask with me, for those ‘difficult’ customers. I just really needed to take an edge off. That and I did many overnights, when our PC queue was too high and we needed to knock em down. The two supervising managers would play poker in room and we bust out a bottle of some cognac that a happy customer left for one of us. Anyway, not the first time I drank at work. So I empty half the bottle in a big swing in the back and mix the rest with my Coke. Two hours left in my shift, I’m not closing. The fun starts.

I get a good kick of it in about 10 minutes going on an empty stomach, I belch and smell like what I just drank. The store GM is walking around trying to talk to me, I’m trying to keep my distance. I help out a few customers who give me a ‘look’ but since I’m super cheerful and help em out fast they wink and leave. Nothing bad happens until… This one worker comes in who has been with Best Buy for about 15 years and only works about 2 hours a week so he could keep this employee discount, he is best friends with a manager so no one say anything and he doesn’t care about anything. I generously offer him my Jack and Coke, as I did to a few other fellow Agents, some refused, some joined in on the fun. Nowhere near as much as I had. Anyway, I don’t remember the rest of that day until Monday. Come in like it’s a normal day. The GM approaches me and say “We need to talk” I avoid him for the rest of the day.

Tuesday, I come in for a closing shift. 30 minutes in I get called into the office. My manager and one other are sitting at a desk. Someone talked. They ask me to sit, I do. They show me a piece of paper. It’s a voluntary separation notice. They want me to leave now. I ask why, no explanation is given, I am encouraged to sign. I do not, I explain that I have no been slacking off (completely ignoring that I was piss drunk the other day and can’t remember much else) and that I wish to finish working the remaining days as my new job doesn’t start for another week, that I don’t wish to lose my remaining scheduled hours and that I wish to keep my employee discount till than because I haven’t bought what I wanted to yet. They ask me to give them a minute. I leave the room. About two hours go by before I hear anything else. I go back to work as if nothing has happened. I get approached again. Same room, same piece of paper. I am told this time that if I sign and leave the store before my shift ends not only will I get paid for my remaining scheduled work days (over 40 hours) my employee discount would remain in effect for an additional two weeks, I would obviously receive my remaining vacation time AND they are even going to give me my sick days. I sign. I grab whatever tools I brought into the store, close out my email and leave. I am done with Geek Squad and Best Buy. Home free!

 

Moral here? Drinking got me 3 weeks of pay for doing nothing. It was an epic quitting. I have a lot of friends that still work at Best Buy and they all know about this, I even had a small following on Facebook as far as Nevada! My reputation basically precedes me. I got to a Best Buy one hour out and they know me there. Well, that and I also caused a HUGE Charlie-foxtrot back before Geek Squad had any data security and pretty much caused a whole revamp of how they treat customer data with dedicated backup station, encrypted flash drives, ban on outside flash drives and a log of who uses that station. This was way before you ever heard of any Agent stealing data. I was the original Agent to cause trouble. (I didn’t steel anything, more of a victim of circumstance that caused huge embracement to the store and possibly a multi-million dollar lawsuit, let’s just say that you should label a disc before burning it, especially if it contains unpublished material. Also bad when a customer calls another customer and says “I have your data”)

Anyway, that is how I quit. Soon after the PC repair queue went from a manageable 14 units to over 40. I was their top dog, I could multitask mad, I close out more units than I bring in. All the other Agents know how to do is bring in one unit after another and not actually repair them in time. As of right now 90% of the people that worked at that store are gone, two of the six manages aren’t there anymore. If I want, I can go get a job at Best Buy again, although I never will. And it’s a good thing I quit when I did, after that it all fell apart, new stupid pricing came out making things more expensive, they removed the senior position and a pay cut for those and more corporate BS.

I’m happy at my new job, I ended up quitting that other tech place, the owner was too much of a douchebag. Trying to charge 100% markup on cheap parts. I can’t deal with such douchebaggery.

Who’s got a good story?

[boostdquest89]

Wait, so you shared a half pint w/ some people, and you were "piss drunk?"

LOL.

[Killtodie]

by pint I mean an actual pint 500ml. I didn't share, I shared a few sips of my Jack and Coke mix. I chugged half a pint and mixed the rest. I drank about 85% of it. Edited October 27, 2009 by Killtodie

[dmyers151]

I got a good one for ya.

 

When I first graduated college I got a machine operators job a a CNC machine shop in NJ. I put in my time (about 8 months) and eventually made my way up to Quality Control manager. In this position I was the only guy in the shop that could run the QC equipment with any sort of precision, I became the go-to guy. Anyways, things started to get slow and they began pulling me from my office to operate machines. After a while things picked back up and they had me running two machines and expected me to maintain 100% on them while also maintaining my QC responsibilities. When my performance started to slack, I began being attacked from three sides, engineering manager wanted 1st run 100% inspections & prototype inspections, manufacturing manager wanted in-process inspections for all the machines (15 of them), and the floor manager wanted my machines running at 100%. Needless to say, it all came to a head one day. I typed out an email that went something to this effect:

 

"Everyone,

Due to conflicting views between myself and management, pertaining to my duties as QC manager, I am terminating my employment here at xxxx Machine, effective immediately. I cannot be expected to maintain 100% on two machines while keeping up with my QC responsibilities. I appreciate the opportunity you have given me.

-Dale"

 

I told the floor manager I was going out to lunch, went to my office, typed that up, grabbed my tool box, and walked out to my car through the shipping department so as not to be questioned. They called me several times in the coming days looking for reasons and this and that, I pretty much told 'em their operation was BS and I wasn't gonna be their slave anymore.

 

That's how you properly set a bridge ablaze.

[RWDAddict]

Ah Best (crap) Buy. I've worked there on two seperate ocassions and both times blew. Seasonal both times one time before Circuit city then again three years later. Heck that's another story in itself but I'll stick to my Best Buy days. So I went in there looking to be the car audio manager as I was the Sr back over at Circuit City. All the BB had open at the time. After the interview with the manager he wanted to put me in Home Theatre giving him a blank stare for a bit he then said "that's where we put all of our top dogs" to which I smiled, it was flatering. The problem being I hadn't a clue other than a personal passion/hobby about home theatre. After that he went on about my hourly rate which he said he would of loved to of paid me more but there was a pay cap on seasonal help. Well long story short soon after Christmas (first week in January) I decided this wasn't the job for me. The reason being is they fired the car audio manager and set the digital imaging manager to manage both. This happened the last time I was there too. So if that's how they run things on two seperate occasions I wasn't going to stick around for it to happen to me as well. So I knew for a fact that I was making more than everybody there but the Sr. of the dept. Naturally I was slacking for the remainder of January making sure the other reps minus the managers noticed my laziness. At the end of January I told all the reps how much I made, just casually of course, and man did I get them pissed. They were saying things like "man F this place, i've been here for two years and making $2 less than you". Things in that general manner so when I left I hear from a person I befriended in there that four other reps left shortly after. Just doing what I can to screw Best Crap as they have me and others in the past.

[on3 racing]

best buy was one of the worse places i ever worked!

[Edde]

Best byte is one of the worst places I've ever shopped. Can't imagine working there.

 

I've never burnt a bridge intentionally in my life. Got fired a few times. Being a wake n' bake long hair back in the day seemed to be a problem to folks.

[Chad]

I grew up in a small town, and currently live in one also. I've never had any such stories, and I've had plenty of opportunity. As a result, I've had many nice supprises from those I'd have loved to "burn". In a small town, you learn not to burn bridges. What goes arround comes arround, and it does so much faster in a small town.

[mistapickles]

Let me start off by saying that I am lactose intolerant....LOL

 

I had a job where I was paid under the table when I just got out of high school. It was an office job where people would respond to newspaper advertisements for home rentals. We would then sell them listings of rentals in their area. Well there was this chick who was notorious for answering the phone and putting people on hold so that she would get all the calls. She would be on the phone with somebody and as soon as another line would ring, she would say "please hold" to the person she was talking to and answer the other line put them on hold then go back to her other line. Needless to say all of us other employees would complain, because she'd have like four lines holding and the rest of us would be sitting there with our d**ks in our hand. So the rest of us complained to the manager who said he would talk to her...on many occasions, but nothing happened. It turned out, this chick was giving the manager sexual favors in the parking lot after work, so basically we were all screwed. Once I found this out, I looked for another job, when I found one, starting the night before, I was pounding Carl's Jr. milkshakes, grilled cheese sandwiches and ice cream, all with the intention of blowing up the manager's private restroom in his office. Needless to say I had a pretty good case of bubble guts the next day, but I continued on with the milk products. So he leaves for lunch and I'm ready to destroy his bathroom. I go in there and it's a disgusting mess and I have no intention of sitting on that seat, so I squat. Welllllllll, let's just say that I had quite a quite a few wet farts that preceded my business and I when I completed my business I turned to grab for the toilet paper to see a fine aerosol misting fart juice covering the entire back of the stall, I mean from wall to wall, covering the entire toilet, the floor and the butt gasket holder. It looked like a diarhea smart bomb exploded in there. Needless to say I couldn't control myself laughing, come on give me a break I was a stupid vindictive 18 year old. I walked out of there barely able to stand from laughing so hard and never looked back, I didn't even pick up my last check. To this day, 22 some years later, it cracks me up to tears when I envision it. I have another one, but it seems somewhat anti climatic after this one.

[007]

Let me start off by saying that I am lactose intolerant....LOL

 

I had a job where I was paid under the table when I just got out of high school. It was an office job where people would respond to newspaper advertisements for home rentals. We would then sell them listings of rentals in their area. Well there was this chick who was notorious for answering the phone and putting people on hold so that she would get all the calls. She would be on the phone with somebody and as soon as another line would ring, she would say "please hold" to the person she was talking to and answer the other line put them on hold then go back to her other line. Needless to say all of us other employees would complain, because she'd have like four lines holding and the rest of us would be sitting there with our d**ks in our hand. So the rest of us complained to the manager who said he would talk to her...on many occasions, but nothing happened. It turned out, this chick was giving the manager sexual favors in the parking lot after work, so basically we were all screwed. Once I found this out, I looked for another job, when I found one, starting the night before, I was pounding Carl's Jr. milkshakes, grilled cheese sandwiches and ice cream, all with the intention of blowing up the manager's private restroom in his office. Needless to say I had a pretty good case of bubble guts the next day, but I continued on with the milk products. So he leaves for lunch and I'm ready to destroy his bathroom. I go in there and it's a disgusting mess and I have no intention of sitting on that seat, so I squat. Welllllllll, let's just say that I had quite a quite a few wet farts that preceded my business and I when I completed my business I turned to grab for the toilet paper to see a fine aerosol misting fart juice covering the entire back of the stall, I mean from wall to wall, covering the entire toilet, the floor and the butt gasket holder. It looked like a diarhea smart bomb exploded in there. Needless to say I couldn't control myself laughing, come on give me a break I was a stupid vindictive 18 year old. I walked out of there barely able to stand from laughing so hard and never looked back, I didn't even pick up my last check. To this day, 22 some years later, it cracks me up to tears when I envision it. I have another one, but it seems somewhat anti climatic after this one.

 

 

Dude i almost fell out of my seat at work laughing, thats hilarious

[vbrad511]

Let me start off by saying that I am lactose intolerant....LOL

 

I had a job where I was paid under the table when I just got out of high school. It was an office job where people would respond to newspaper advertisements for home rentals. We would then sell them listings of rentals in their area. Well there was this chick who was notorious for answering the phone and putting people on hold so that she would get all the calls. She would be on the phone with somebody and as soon as another line would ring, she would say "please hold" to the person she was talking to and answer the other line put them on hold then go back to her other line. Needless to say all of us other employees would complain, because she'd have like four lines holding and the rest of us would be sitting there with our d**ks in our hand. So the rest of us complained to the manager who said he would talk to her...on many occasions, but nothing happened. It turned out, this chick was giving the manager sexual favors in the parking lot after work, so basically we were all screwed. Once I found this out, I looked for another job, when I found one, starting the night before, I was pounding Carl's Jr. milkshakes, grilled cheese sandwiches and ice cream, all with the intention of blowing up the manager's private restroom in his office. Needless to say I had a pretty good case of bubble guts the next day, but I continued on with the milk products. So he leaves for lunch and I'm ready to destroy his bathroom. I go in there and it's a disgusting mess and I have no intention of sitting on that seat, so I squat. Welllllllll, let's just say that I had quite a quite a few wet farts that preceded my business and I when I completed my business I turned to grab for the toilet paper to see a fine aerosol misting fart juice covering the entire back of the stall, I mean from wall to wall, covering the entire toilet, the floor and the butt gasket holder. It looked like a diarhea smart bomb exploded in there. Needless to say I couldn't control myself laughing, come on give me a break I was a stupid vindictive 18 year old. I walked out of there barely able to stand from laughing so hard and never looked back, I didn't even pick up my last check. To this day, 22 some years later, it cracks me up to tears when I envision it. I have another one, but it seems somewhat anti climatic after this one.

 

 

Totally hilarious!!! That's gonna be tough to top.

[Dad]

I put My 2 weeks in at the Machine shop I was at then started My own Shop in direct competition with Previous Boss. That was in 1989- He closed in 2002.

 

Dad

[BrazilBoy]

I worked at Jiffy lube for one day..I got a call back from an interview 2 weeks prior that paid 10k more offering me a job..

Told the Jiffy Lube boss that my ship from mars is due any minute and I have to get to lookout mountain to get picked up before they blowup the earth with thier diarrhea laser beam......the look on that dudes face was priceless..

 

 

[Killtodie]

so basically we were all screwed.

 

 

Not screwed like the manager was!

[Komeuppance]

I put My 2 weeks in at the Machine shop I was at then started My own Shop in direct competition with Previous Boss. That was in 1989- He closed in 2002.

 

Dad

 

Mofo'n BALLER STATUS.

 

-Robert

[boostdquest89]

Mofo'n BALLER STATUS.

 

-Robert

X2!

Edited October 28, 2009 by boostdquest89

[mstieg]

^^^^ success is the greatest revenge.

 

Thanks for the laughs tonight. Long day at work & I needed that.

[Killtodie]

Yeah, I need to make a few more grand so I can come in and throw my paycheck in my old sups face

[SQF]

I put My 2 weeks in at the Machine shop I was at then started My own Shop in direct competition with Previous Boss. That was in 1989- He closed in 2002.

 

Dad

That's one of the best ones I have heard so far. I'm not much of a bridge burner. Always left places on the best of terms, with them hating to see me go.

[BrazilBoy]

I put My 2 weeks in at the Machine shop I was at then started My own Shop in direct competition with Previous Boss. That was in 1989- He closed in 2002.

 

Dad

and thats how the legend began and all our starquests are forever gratefull....

[nomad]

I worked at O'charley's for a few months. One day I got in a petty argument with an assistant manger a few hours after I handeled a party of 55 by myself at lunch. It was a stressful day. Well after this argument about 10 minutes went by and the GM calls me into the office with the assistant manager. He says something like "I need you to explain your self". I say "hold on a second" then I pulled a quarter out of my arpon. Flipped it. Caught it. Looked at it, and said "Tails, damn...... I quit" Then I put my apron on the desk and walked out.

I got another serving job the next day and would go a drink at O'Charley's on a regular basis. All the employees had heard about what it did. Got some high fives for it.

[JustPaus_88TSi]

Hmmn...

 

 

Family friendly site.

 

 

Umm.

 

Involved with two women(management types), 14 and 17 years my senior. They already didn't like each other. They each knew I was also with the other, a sort of contest came about, hilarity insued and I had to quit.

 

 

Oh, how I wish I could explain it.

 

 

Didn't burn the bridge though, my work ethic was/is exemplary. I just couldn't work around these women anymore.

Edited October 28, 2009 by JustPaus_88TSi