Person Is Allowed $40 For Food On Trips And They Make Sure To Spend All Of It Every Time, Maliciously Complying With The Rules
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There are times when your job and its policies truly baffle you – whether that’s their ethics and the overall environment or any other problematic reason. It’s not a secret that, in general, workplaces seem to be on totally different planets, as you never really understand why they function the way they do.
Sometimes it leaves folks no other choice than to maliciously comply and do what their employer asks them to, even if one understands that it’s full of nonsense. Moreover, there are times when you think you’re being helpful, as maybe you found a way to save the company’s funding by refusing to spend an allowance of 40 bucks per meal and going to the grocery store instead – however, in this case, this company’s accountant has a completely contrasting view:
An online user decided to take it to one of Reddit’s online communities to reveal a pretty ridiculous story of how he was forced to dine at pricey restaurants due to the absurdity of the accountant responsible for his organization’s budget.
More info: Reddit
Sometimes your workplace’s policies leave you no other choice than to question their sanity
Image credits: George N (not the actual photo)
Imagine having to travel to a pretty touristy city for a 4-week work assignment. You’re all exhausted and the only thing you want to do after work is to chill in your hotel room, but for some interesting reason you end up spending your evenings at bougie restaurants because your accountant said so. The author of the story managed to receive nearly 30K upvotes and over 1K worth of comments debating about this rather entertaining situation.
Employee maliciously complies and dines at expensive places after the company’s accountant didn’t approve his $60 grocery bill
Image credits: upaboveitall
The OP starts his story off with revealing that this situation happened a while ago. He’d stay at the Big Apple every Monday to Friday, where he was assisting his organization’s manager with a project, and had a hotel located near the company’s office in the Theatre District.
In fact, BP contacted the author and he added a few words about his workplace: “this was a company providing services to high-end clients. So normally almost all expenses were business development, to entertain clients (which had a higher dollar limit), or were directly billable to clients when working for them, or for very short-term travel. They didn’t usually send people to other offices long-term, so it seemed they’d not carefully considered a situation like mine in their policy.”
Image credits: upaboveitall
The author then goes to explain that the Theater District heavily relies on tourists, so there are practically no places where you can grab a bite for a relatively ordinary price, as the dining places around are all overpriced. Though the OP’s company had a generous food policy with about $30-$40 per meal allowance, after using it for a while, the employee decided to put an end to the constant eating out malarkey, as all he truly wanted to do after his long hours was to watch TV and go to sleep.
Image credits: upaboveitall
So after around a week of visiting all the lavish food places, the OP decided to save the company a few bucks, as well as his nerves, and went to get some groceries instead. He bought a standard set of foods that folks would normally get, plus a few microwaveable meals that he could easily heat up at the office. The whole grocery trip cost him around 60 bucks, apart from occasional meals out – that was it for his food expenses.
Image credits: upaboveitall
The author did the same for the next four weeks and at the end of the month he submitted his expense report to the company. Of course, the accountant lady blew up his phone, refusing to refund his food expenses as he went over the 40 dollar limit. The author tried explaining that those $60 fed him for a week, but despite his hard effort, he was told that it didn’t matter. So without any hesitation, the man spent the next month trying all the expensive foods in the neighborhood.
Image credits: upaboveitall
The author also told BP that: “although I was traveling, I had lived near that neighborhood a few years earlier. So, while some of the restaurants had changed, I knew quite a few places that I could barely afford when I lived there. I especially liked trying out the sushi ones! This was also before smart phones so it was helpful that I sort of knew where to go.”
Image credits: upaboveitall
Hey, at least the author got a chance to feast on some sushi. Even though it was kind of an obligation – we sincerely hope that he enjoyed it. What do you think about this slightly silly situation? Do you have similar stories to tell?
Fellow Redditors were amused by the logic of the accountant and even shared their own stories
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A bit off topic, but I found out that in expensive cities, there is always some place to eat cafeteria style that doesn't cost so much, usually somewhat hidden, like in an alley. That's where the people who work in that neighborhood eat lunch. Ask the hotel staff.
I had the same experience at a previous job. The accountants only cared about the rules, didn't care about the actual money at all, and constantly harrassed employees for trying to save the company money if it didn't fit the rules perfectly. At this same job our head accountant was put in charge of our IT department and all the decisions made during that time were crazy. I.E, "We need to start replacing our aging equipment before it fails" "sure but you need to tell me exactly which computers will fail on which days so we can budget for it properly". We found we could expect absolutely no understanding of the physical world whatsoever from the accounting team.
It appears they are only interested in making their job easier, not in doing what best for the company.
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Yeah I had a job like that once. It wasn't a good time financially for me so I had to take on a contract job that is frankly quite insulting. The job was in another country where it isn't exactly safe for foreigners. So the accommodation is taken care of and meals all claimable. The contracting firm sold this point hard. The thing is, you need to stay in an area that's really upscale by local standards and not wander off if you don't want to end up robbed , kidnapped or worse dead. Meals alone often exceeded what they are paying me. Nearly every month, I would hit my credit card limit just for meals. I kind of ate and lived like some bigshot for that period. The bean-counters did complain. The bossman eventually took care of it after being there himself for a week. He knew what's up.
A bit off topic, but I found out that in expensive cities, there is always some place to eat cafeteria style that doesn't cost so much, usually somewhat hidden, like in an alley. That's where the people who work in that neighborhood eat lunch. Ask the hotel staff.
I had the same experience at a previous job. The accountants only cared about the rules, didn't care about the actual money at all, and constantly harrassed employees for trying to save the company money if it didn't fit the rules perfectly. At this same job our head accountant was put in charge of our IT department and all the decisions made during that time were crazy. I.E, "We need to start replacing our aging equipment before it fails" "sure but you need to tell me exactly which computers will fail on which days so we can budget for it properly". We found we could expect absolutely no understanding of the physical world whatsoever from the accounting team.
It appears they are only interested in making their job easier, not in doing what best for the company.
Load More Replies... Yeah I had a job like that once. It wasn't a good time financially for me so I had to take on a contract job that is frankly quite insulting. The job was in another country where it isn't exactly safe for foreigners. So the accommodation is taken care of and meals all claimable. The contracting firm sold this point hard. The thing is, you need to stay in an area that's really upscale by local standards and not wander off if you don't want to end up robbed , kidnapped or worse dead. Meals alone often exceeded what they are paying me. Nearly every month, I would hit my credit card limit just for meals. I kind of ate and lived like some bigshot for that period. The bean-counters did complain. The bossman eventually took care of it after being there himself for a week. He knew what's up.
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