If you're going to play hookey, don't get caught

[Jay 2K Winger]

Reminds me of when I worked at the movie theater. We'd get co-irkers calling out sick, and then trying to come to the theater to use their free tickets for some movie, and get confused when they were asked why they couldn't work that day.

[bainsidhe]

If he didn't want to get written up, he should've used a different excuse. "I'm stuck out of town and my ride broke down" is a popular one. Not saying it's right, but he could've picked a different reason than "I'm sick".

[Pimento]

Here supervisors often get calls with loud music in the background and slurred speech lol.

No notes no trouble

[Simbacat]

Where I work, we get points if we call out, and after so many you get fired, so in two years I have called out sick twice. If it weren't for the points system, I am sure I would have taken a mental health day as recently as last week.

A mental health day is actually good for you, according to what I have read, but unfortunately for me, if I used that excuse with my boss, he would laugh in my face and tell me to get my ass into work.

[Android Kaeli]

I, too, will admit to faking it a couple of times but even when I did do it, no one really gave much of a damn. They still wouldn't, considering I call out maybe once every four years or so.

But if someone knows the policy, they should at least be within it to cover their own butts.

[Lady_Foxfire]

Note: I thought about posting this in Cursing Out Coworkers, but at this point I'm more amused by him getting caught than I am annoyed at having to cover his shift.

Shortly after noon on Sunday, I was woken up by a call from my assistant manager, asking -- nay, begging-- me to work the 2-9 shift to cover for my coworker, who had called in sick. I was not at all enthused about coming in to work on my day off, especially since it means working 6 days in a row this week (without overtime pay, because the pay period ends mid-week), but my poor AM sounded desperate, and she did say pretty please.

Fun fact: At my store, when you call in sick, you have to either give 3 hours notice or bring in a doctors note to prove it was an emergency. CW knew this; it was covered at our last staff meeting. Since he called in less than 2 hours before his shift was supposed to start, AM told him to bring in a doctors note by the end of the week. CW said "he'd see what he could do", and AM reminded him it was store policy and that he'd be written up if he didn't provide a note.

Today (Monday), he called AM and admitted that he had lied, and that he skipped work to take care of "personal business". AM is, to say the least, kind of pissed, and I'm pretty sure the store manager is going to hear about this when he gets back from vacation next week.

I will admit to faking sick one time-- It was the end of a six-day stretch, and it had been a particularly bad week, and I was seriously one SC away from an emotional meltdown, so I justified it to myself as a mental health emergency. But, since I knew the policy, I gave them like 8 hours notice, so they were none the wiser.