Biggest screw up you've gotten away with.

[powerboy]

The other night, I left the alarm off, lights on, door unlocked. I was 2 blocks away, and I realized that, I turned around, and sped right back. luckily nothing was stolen, as I made sure to triple check everything, even tho I ad reorganized the whole store that day

[Rocko]

I cost my store $1200 last summer. What happened? I accidently hit a customer's car with a shopping cart.

Pushing carts on a 90 degree day, sweat in my eyes, mild heatstroke, I was pushing nine carts when the first two decided to come loose, and right into the back of some piece of shit Honda Oddyssey minivan. Just my luck, there had to be somebody sitting in it. The woman showed me a scratch on the bumper, admist the myrriad of other scratches, as well as a broken taillight, all of which were on the van before. She got my name, and told me she would tell her husband. The manager called me in and told me the people had showed her a dent in the corner of the bumper. Now, the Honda Odyssey had a 5-star crash test rating, so I highly doubt two shopping carts moving less than 1 mph would dent it. looks like somebody was waiting to get the van fixed for free.

I was later told that the van was taken in for repairs, and that the store would be paying for the rental as well. I got written up, and surprisingly the store manager didn't want my head on a pike

[Boozy]

Once when I was waitressing, I took a table's order, brought them their drinks, waited on a bunch of other tables, and then brought the bill to the original table, and said "Thanks for coming, hope you enjoyed your meal!".
But I never actually brought them their meal.
I didn't technically "get away" with this one, because I felt so bad that I reported myself to the manager to get the whole bill comped for them, with coupons for the next visit. But the table was so understanding (they thought it was funny), that the manager just sort of laughed it off with them. So it could've been so much worse.

[technical.angel]

I forgot my keys when I was working at Claires.... :: hangs head ::

The night before the now ex and I went out to do something, so I switched purses, and put my work keys on the table so nothing would happen to them. The next morning, I switched my purses, and forgot the keys. I got to work with about a half hour before the store was supposed to open, reached for my keys to open the gate.... and found NOTHING. I live 45 minutes away. The person who lives ***5*** minutes away, and the only other person with keys wouldn't pick up her bloody phone.

The store gets penalized by the mall for opening late. I called the now ex to bring me my keys. He makes a wrong turn and gets lost. Security comes over and gripes at me, I'm almost in tears, I give the gate handle one heck of a jerk, and it came open. I just stared at it for a minute before rushing in to call everyone I needed and get the store open. Everyone, including the now ex, was NOT happy with me.

[RentalRacer]

This is just one of my many many screwups.

When I worked out west we carried Cadillac Escalades in our fleet, which were great for getting upgrades on. So my boss and I decided to take some "action shots" of it busting through a snowbank after the first snowfall we had to entice people to pay more $$ for one, which was about 2 feet, so pile that up, thats a pretty big bank. We did it in the area near our shop, where we knew there was nothing in the snowbank.

Boy, were we wrong. Apparently the night before the storm the Airport had put up those concrete parking barriers up...who knows why.

So here I am doing about 15-20MPH across the parking lot, boss has camera at the ready. I hit the snowbank and BAM!! Smash the front end all to hell, I actually drove up the barrier and got hung up on the top of it. Airbags go off, I get tossed around. I was ok, but a little freaked out since I just smashed up a $60k vehicle, and its on camera!

I can't really get into detail as to how we covered up the whole thing. Good for me, my boss was really cool. I was actually his AM at the time. So we kind of had each others back on the whole deal. We both felt like a couple dee-da-dees though.

The only good thing that came of it was we now had pictures of a smashed up Escalade that we used to sell people on the benefits of our CDW (collision damage waiver).

[MadMike]

Before I tell this one, I want to point out that I in no way condone this. And I don't need people starting a discussion about how stupid I was to do this, because I know it was. But we've all done stupid things, especially when we were young.

I was partying with one of my best friends, who had I hadn't seen in awhile because she had been in the hospital, and then spent a couple weeks at her parents' house recovering. Well, I completely overdid it. Usually if I got smashed and tried to drive home, she'd stop me from leaving and make me stay and sleep it off. But this time I somehow managed to slip past her. This was stupid not just because I could have hurt or killed myself or someone else, but because I was also only 20 at the time. Luckily, I managed to make it home safely somehow.

I woke up the next morning, over an hour late to start my shift. I checked the alarm, and it was set correctly. I guess I was so out of it, that I slept thru it for a whole hour until it shut itself off. Luckily, I had never called out or been late before, so they were understanding when I called in and explained that I had overslept.

Unfortunately, I was severely hung over, and at one point I had to make a mad dash into the bathroom and "make a prayer offering to the porcelin god." I can only imagine how much trouble I would have been in if one of the managers happened to walk in while I was doing that.

I don't know how, but I made it thru the rest of the day without any problems. I consider myself very lucky.

[myswtghst]

When we get a new hire class out on the phones in our call center, we have a new hire party at a local bar, with food and such. The sups and hiring manager are all relatively young, and everyone drinks and has a good time. It's pretty common knowledge that we have a number of employees who tend to overindulge, and no one really judges the drunks.

At my new hire party, I got wasted (thanks to a number of shots bought by my boss, the hiring manager, and a number of male coworkers), threw up in a trash can, got kicked out of the bar, and had to get driven home by one of our leads (the on-the-phone supervisors). I then had to find a ride to get my car in the morning, and still be in to work by 10am. Thankfully we were still in casual Fridays, so I showed up in a hoodie and jeans, and didn't eat all day.

[customersruinmylife]

Replying to the second to last post, I once went into work so hungover that I fainted.

I went into the glasswash room and all the manager saw was me swoon and hit the floor. I had the perfect defence though. I had booked that day off as a holiday six weeks in advace because the previous night was my best friends birthday, and I told her the purpose of the holiday was to get over the hangover. For some reason, I was still put down to work and made to do it.

Also, in the same day, an ex-workmate came in having a comedown from crack cocaine, so the attention was diverted away from my hangover!

[Dave1982]

I don't know that I've had any really BIG screwups, but I've had a few that I probably should have gotten in trouble for but didn't

At my supermarket job, I asked for a roll of quarters, then proceeded to somehow drop them into a customer's bag without even realizing it until I then couldn't find them. Of crouse they'd alreay long since left.

Same job: let a shopping cart get away from me, which then slammed into a classic Pontiac and smashed a taillight in plain view of the car's owner. He was right pissed, but somehow I never heard of this incident after he left.

This last one isn't strictly speakinf a WORK screwup, but still qualifies. At the Hobby Shop, I was scheduled to open, and both myself and my coworker locked our keys in our cars, so we couldn't unlock the door and open the store until the police showed up and slim-jimmed CW's car. To this day, we both laugh at the amazing coincdence of that day. We both locked our keys in the car at the same time on the SAME DAY.

[flicksgirl]

Our store is in a very small town and its right downtown so when I need to go to the bank or grab a coffee we toss a "back in 15min"sign on the door. Most people will wait or wonder around and come back. Well one day Im out of change and really need to get my butt to the bank so I lock up, toss a sign on the door and take off. Well I got back only to find out I had actually locked a customer in the store. So heres this lady locked in the store with an open till. God it could have been so bad.
Luckly the lady was one of our regulars in fact I have known her personally for years, even dated her son in highschool,lol. I mentioned it was a small town.

[April]

Way back when i was hostessing at Red lobster, I spilled a glass of Red wine on a lady. I had called thier names, they were in the bar. I took them to thier seats and the lady sat her wine down on the table. When iw as handing out menu's i caught the edge of one on the glass and spilled it all over her lap. If that wasn't bad enough she was wearing ALL WHITE. She was insanely cool about it. Much more than I would have been, I think. She just laughed about it and brushed away any talk of dry cleaning or replacement. They didn't even ask to speak to a manager

[Pezzle]

Man I screw up all the time, becuase my store is ghetto fab. Our training wasn't training it was trial by fire being chased by bulls.

But anyway...

1st saturday I ever worked was at the beginning of the holiday season. 11 hour shift. It was my friend's birthday party the night before and... well... I for some reason decided it'd be a good idea to drink 8 beers and chug After Shock straight from the bottle... and then do some shots of 99 Bananas, which is 99 Proof Banana Liquor. After Shock is Cinnamon Liquor. This all took place in the course of about 2-2.8 hours max. I'd also eaten a doughnut.

Found out the 'ard way what a horrid combo this is. Had a mini blackout session, just remember rolling down an interstate puking out the passenger door in projectile fashion. Then i got home and passed out for about five hours.

Next day rolls around and I'm in mad crap condition. The room's spinning, i'm dehydrated, and I puke 3 times before going to work. The day creeped by ever so slowly, and I had to make offerings every hour or so, whilst staying crouched behind the tech bench and taking small sips of gatorade. The SD was doing an eval that day too and he never noticed.

The lead tech caught wind of it though and confronted me. I expected to be flayed -- he then leaned over and said "uuurgh...too much jaegermeister for me... i'll buy you some gatorade and we can split".


How I got to be that lucky still escapes me

[ForestDragon]

Not sure if I actually 'got away with it' but I didn't get fired so I suppose it counts. I was working as a dog washer once at a Petsmart and had just finished washing/drying/brushing a Shar-Pei. Time to do the ears and nails. Ears were no problem, but the dog suddenly decided he'd had enough when I was trying to trim his nails and made a lunge to escape. He was leashed securely and didn't get away, but he did run against me and I fell awkwardly on my ass. In the process I somehow sliced open the dog's foreleg; a shallow slash about an inch and a half long.

God, I felt so bad about it, but there was nothing to be done but tell the supervisor and take the dog over to the in-house veterinarian. Luckily for me I wasn't the one who had to talk to the owner. I don't know how it came out, but I assume that the company paid the vet bill and since it was technically an Act of Dog I got to keep my job.

[myswtghst]

ForestDragon: If it'd been my mom's dog, we wouldn't have blamed you! She's a royal PITA about getting her nails clipped, as I've been *lucky* enough to find out on more than one occasion.

[CrazedClerk]

I once lied to a customer, saying we didn't have a product in stock when we actually did. The product in question was a Playstation 3.

It was dumb, I did it because the guy had been around the store quite a bit and seemed a bit shifty to me (I know, making assumptions is a bad idea), we have a policy that our store does not sell to resellers (which include ebay profiteers) so I guess I somehow figured that justified what I did.

Anyway I got a dressing down from DM over the phone for that one (I apologized profusely) and was told I'd get a write up for it.

Funny thing is, I never got a write up.