Store Manager Thinks The IT Guy Has No Right To Disrupt Her Lunch Break, Calls His Boss To Report On Him, Gets Fired Herself Instead
Interview With AuthorHaving a manager’s position comes with a set of responsibilities as they are the ones who have to ensure that employees are doing their jobs, motivate them, give them advice and handle difficult situations. While their duties are important, sometimes the power they have to control other people goes to their head and makes them unbearable people.
So the stories of such arrogant managers being brought down to Earth are very satisfying and Reddit user DistrictEquivalent79 has such a story to tell. He had to fix a server in a store, but the manager there didn’t really understand how important his job was and demanded to call his manager to complain about how he had disrupted her lunch break. Little did she know the IT guy’s manager was way above her and had the power to fire her.
More info: Reddit
IT guy just wants to do his job when the store manager asks to speak with his boss, so knowing it will end badly, he allows her to speak to them
Image credits: Taiyo FUJII (not the actual image)
The story took place 13 years ago and the Original Poster (OP) worked as a field service engineer, also known as an engineering technician, or, as DistrictEquivalent79 put it himself, “the IT guy who drove around in a company vehicle, servicing the computer networks in the stores.”
The OP was a corporate worker as opposed to a retail employee, which meant he received corporate stock as part of his salary, technically making him a co-owner. His base salary was also quite higher than any of the retail managers’ salaries.
This information is relevant because the OP felt it was quite ironic that when he had to deal with store managers, they would act as if they were the store owners and the OP was some random IT guy who was below a retail worker in the company hierarchy.
Bored Panda reached out to DistrictEquivalent79 and once again confirmed that this was very much the case, “Store managers looked at us, field service types, much like low-level retail employees, even though we reported to the C-level. I even had store managers calling me directly to ‘order’ me to do maintenance at their specific store immediately.” He added, “he incident you asked me about was an extreme example of a customer disrespecting the IT guy.”
For those who might have misunderstood, the OP explained that he never felt above the store managers because he earned more and owned shares of the company, but he wanted to illustrate how highly the managers thought of themselves though they shouldn’t have.
The OP worked for the company as a traveling IT guy who went to the store that needed his help
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
Now that the context is clear, we can get into the details of the incident. The traveling IT guy was called to replace a server. He came into the store officially dressed and the store manager immediately made it obvious he was not welcome in “her” store.
We asked DistrictEquivalent79 if he ever tried to explain how important his job was when greeted with such attitude and he never initiated such conversations, “If they didn’t understand their own chain of command, it was not my place to educate them. My own supervisor advised me to ignore any retail manager who tried to bark orders at me. Gladly!”
So the IT guy just calmly explained to the store manager where he would be working and that at some point, the cash registers would stop working for 5 minutes. Usually, these kinds of procedures won’t be done during store working hours because customers can get quite impatient, but in the comments, the OP explained that it was an emergency and it had to be done as soon as possible to avoid any other problems that might have come out of it.
A lot of the time, he wasn’t really respected by the store managers who thought they were the kings of the store, which was ironic because he had company shares
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
The OP was finishing with his work when he realized he hadn’t take a couple of cables he needed, so he went back to his truck to get them, but when he came back, the store manager was already sitting in front of the table with her food laid out on it.
The server was under that table and the OP needed to finish hooking up the server as at this point, the cash registers were not working. The store manager refused to move and asked the IT guy to come back after an hour when her lunch break finished, which left him speechless, because the store couldn’t sell anything if the registers were offline.
One time he was called to replace a server as soon as possible and the manager was very clearly unhappy about him being there
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
Image credits: Sergiy Galyonkin (not the actual image)
However, there was no way to convince the manager to move; even the other employees coming in panicked because of the lines at the register didn’t help. She blamed the IT guy for not finishing his work before her lunch break started.
Understanding that this was ridiculous and that he himself could get in big trouble for making the registers not work for an hour, the OP tried to suggest to the store manager to find another place to eat or have her break at another time.
We were curious to know why the manager wouldn’t move as it seemed she didn’t care her behavior was causing chaos. The OP was convinced that she did care, “Only, her theory was…because I broke it, I would take the heat for the registers not working. She didn’t understand, my taking the registers down was not my idea. I had orders from way up high to yank the server out NOW. So the registers were going to go down (at least briefly) if I followed orders.”
While working, the OP realized he needed a few more cables to finish hooking up the service, so he went to his truck to grab them
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
It seems that asking to move hit a nerve and the store manager demanded to speak with the IT guy’s manager. Knowing that the situation was serious and that his boss was way higher up in the company hierarchy than the store manager preventing him from doing his job, he maliciously complied with the request.
He called his boss, handed the phone to the woman and went to the store front to calm down the customers, explaining what was going on. Even though he wasn’t there when the phone conversation took place, the OP heard some bits of it and was quite sure the manager was trying to convince his boss to fire him.
When he came back, the manager was already having her lunch and wasn’t planning on moving, even knowing that the server was under the table she was eating at
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
After a few minutes, the manager left the office with her food and the OP went in immediately to get the server working. It didn’t take that long, but he stuck around for another 15 minutes to clean up and collect his things.
While he was there, he noticed the retail district manager coming in and when she was going out, she was leaving with the store manager and her things put in a box. It seems that not even half an hour had passed and the manager was already fired.
In the comments, the OP explained that it wasn’t surprising that the district manager showed up so quickly because the district office was 5 minutes away by car. Also, he was guessing that this wasn’t the first time the store manager had done something wrong and it could have been that this incident was just the last nail in the coffin.
While she was refusing to move, the cash register wasn’t working and a line was building up, so the OP wanted to get this over with
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
The Redditor told us that he doesn’t know what happened to that store manager next as he never got involved in the retail gossip and there were not many opportunities to do so anyway, ”
For the most part, when I was in a retail store, I was there to service an open ticket as fast as possible, and then roll out to the next store on my ticket list. I made a few friends in the retail stores, here and there. But kept to myself on most retail store visits.”
Of course, not all store manager are like that. The OP told us about one of them who actually flirted with him and was quite upset when he left for a better job, however, in his experience, most of them just tolerated his presence.
He also opened up that “The lack of respect from customers is depressing. It’s not unusual for folks in IT to burn out from stress.” DistrictEquivalent79 also revealed that this particular story “sadly is only one of thousands I could tell you, based on my personal experience alone. You definitely want to stay on the good side of your IT guy. But many people don’t see it that way.”
The manager felt disrespected and demanded to speak to OP’s boss, so he called them and after a few minutes of conversation, the woman left the table
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
While the OP was picking up his things, he saw the store manager being accompanied by the retail district manager with her belongings in a box
Image credits: u/DistrictEquivalent79
Image credits: Elvert Barnes (not the actual image)
People in the comments were entertained by the story and were suggesting what could have made the situation even better. Someone suggested that the OP probably saved the regular store employees from the dictator that she was.
What did you think of the story? Do you think the manager got what she deserved? Do you think the OP should have warned her who his boss was? Let us know your thoughts in the comments!
Redditors have found the story entertaining but couldn’t understand the manager’s stupid behavior
Sadly, a lot of people treat IT/data closets as "extra space" for storage, janitorial supply, etc... then complain when someone spills something or trips over a cord and brings the whole system down. 34 years experience servicing phones, computers, alarm, access, etc... I've seen it all.
Load More Replies...I have worked with company computers since the mid-1980s, and my own home computers since the later 1990s. At work, even back in the eighties, if the IT person came to do something with the system, we ALWAYS worked around them, and a manager was always touching base with them at regular intervals (like every hour or so—-not bugging them constantly) to check progress and find out how long before everything was up and running, because IT was doing us a great service. We never considered them as intruding, or an inconvenience, and NEVER told them to “come back in an hour”!! Hell, when I worked in the hotel industry, we always offered them free lunch, coffee, sodas, and snacks, especially if the job was going to take hours. Make nice like that with the IT folks, and you won’t have problems with your computers for very long!
Treat anyone routinely doing any kind of maintenance or troubleshooting with kindness and things will go better for you. It doesn't matter if they are a new hire in an entry level position or the manager for a large engineering department, there's just no reason to be nasty to someone whose job is to be there for as short a time as possible in order to make your day hopefully better. Note: I know some IT people get mad about anything less than reverence and that's too bad for them, I am not suggesting reverence just basically understanding that they already know you are frustrated because they are there to solve a problem, but are human and would prefer you be frustrated by the problem and not at the people trying to solve it.
Load More Replies...Hmmm.....My BF used to be that IT guy and scheduled (like mentioned in the story) replacements of servers, POS etc. were done over night when the stores were closed...
He said in response to someone asking that question above that the situation with the server was critical enough that were afraid it would shut the whole store down for several hours if not fixed ASAP. I don't know why they didn't realize it was getting bad earlier, but he did also say the company was barely staying afloat overall so maybe there were other issues going on.
Load More Replies...Something less than a retail worker..... is there anything less than me, a lowly retail worker.
This is so "thathappened." So he just shows up? No one told the store manager there would be a service call, or downtime? And she was frog marched out of the building after being fired? His corporate iPhone -- oh wow, he's really important. He owns stock in the company -- wonder if that company is still in business or he took worthless compensation.
I do understand her initial reaction. Store managers don't think they own the store but they do refer to it as their store and should question someone coming in on why there are there and what they are doing. Seems idiotic not to. Not that you have to be rude when asking. Also, store managers should get a heads up about someone coming in. Would have solved the issue. But then her next reaction seems like a power play which is never a good sign when it comes to a manager. You got to learn to pick and choose your battles and to not escalate situations.
I call b******t. Worked for Urban Outfitters as a store manager for five years. IT would shut down our registers during the middle of the day with no notice and act like total assholes if we called them with even the smallest of problem. Upper management seemed totally unconcerned with how this affected sales or morale. Think about it people, you really think the person that has no power in this situation, ie the store manager, ie, "her boss was my bosses employee" is the bad guy here?? No. She was just sick of being treated like total s**t by the entire company.
I was a store manager for a different company. During onboarding, I walked in to my training manager in tears because IT was on the phone treating her like c**p. I checked the system and got on the phone, cut him off, said all the things I tried first and told him what needed to be done to fix it. He then sent out a tech. A lot of IT people think they are special and treat others like garbage. His "I make three times what they make" and "I actually do own part of the company" leads me to believe he is one of those overly self-valuing types... they tend to shrink when they realize you know as much about the system as they do.
Load More Replies...I like how OP keeps referring to her as the Store Owner and then keeps correcting themselves :) Another example of overinflated managerial ego and/or someone having a really really bad day and can't recognise when to take a breath to calm down and reality check themselves.
Pretty sure his point was that she was acting like she was a franchisee & _owned_the place, when in reality all she was was an employee, even as store manager.
Load More Replies...Don't ever f*ck with IT. It's the difference between getting miracles done or your own sh!t shoved back at you.
I don't understand why people debate whether an, online, story is real or fake. We are all reading this for entertainment or, maybe, for a social connection, but either way, why would it matter? I am still entertained, by the story, and the discussion of it, and get social interaction in the comments. I don't like having to scroll past the "fake story" comments. I don't care if it's fake or real. EDIT - i don't mean to offend anyone. Maybe there is a benefit to these comments that I'm not seeing.
I work in IT myself but the way he's about ''my company issued iPhone'' just bugs me and takes away all my compassion. He seems really stuck up to be honest. 🙈🤦🏻♀️
I guess stories about retail sadism and stupidity are very popular right now. Yeah, maybe your boss was a jerk but, do we have to make some weird fetish out of it?
I’ve worked retail management my entire life and I always sang Hallelujah when the IT guy walked in the door because I knew everything would be fixed and/or all the problems that I had been been complaining about would be validated. Through the years I would ask the IT guys to teach me little things that could help before making a call to have them come out. I also always profusely apologized if it was something stupid that they had to waste their time on.
This sound like bullsh*t I've worked several retail jobs and the registers aren't serviced during business hours. Also what company has the retail district managers work in the district office? Our district managers always worked from a store office from within their district.
Middle level Managers tend to be power tripping, narcissistic psychos who are utterly useles.. 1 out of 10 might be a decent human being.
I have never heard of a retail company that would allow the servers to be replaced during store hours.
Documented transactions can continue without electricity. Sales should never be stopped because of power failure.
It's been a while but I have seen employees pulling out those old credit card machines with the carbon paper receipts when register systems went offline. Half of the time a customer would have to show the employee how to use them lol!
Load More Replies...I got my iPhone 4—that’s 4, four, FOUR, not 1—in 2010, 12 years ago now. The iPhone 1 came out in 2007, 15 years ago now. So yeah, it’s entirely plausible that, 13 years ago in 2009, someone working for an IT contractor would be issued up to date tech, like the latest (or at least next to latest) iPhone, to use for work.
Load More Replies...NEVER mess with the IT guys. They can make life miserable for you. In an electronic world, IT = da boss!
Did you call beforehand and tell the store manager that you would be there and what you would be doing? I will say 13yrs ago the workforce was different then, people do not care about their jobs so they will just go on down the road if they get butt hurt. These little mass-built general stores pay very little, no benefits, and treat their employees like c**p. I think she had just had enough of the BS the company was shoveling he shows up and throws his weight around and she was just tired of the company's BS.
I used to work for a cellphone company that had corporate retail and reseller retail employees. This sounds like it could've happened there lol
I cam back up the fact that if the servers remained down for an hour, it would've been a sh-t show - when I worked at my previous retail job, we had a moment on a Sunday night where every register in the store simultaneously crashed. Not just that, but we couldn't do orders either. It was down for 3 hours, and while my coworkers were having a field day kindly telling customers we couldn't help them, I was having a panic attack at all the angry faces and insults being thrown our way. To this day, I have no idea what shutdown the servers, I don't even think there was any IT guy in the store, but it was not fun.
I really don't understand this attitude of "I'm above you in the pecking order". You were there to UPGRADE the system, which is a good thing. I'd have brought you a cuppa and made sure everyone left you alone to get on with it.
The person who told the endless loop story almost gave me flashbacks. 😳
This is an amazing story! I've known a few managers like this and it's no picnic. I've been mid-ladder to bottom rung. EVERYONE is expendable! (Apparently even the company in this story, as he said it was kind of rocky even then)
So here at pain in the a*s panda we can’t write a single story? We have to write three that are intertwined and all hacked up within each other and are a pain in the a*s to follow?
It sounds like a P---ing contest that got out of hand. Don't get involved with those. They always hurt both parties.
This idiot broke federal laws. Taking a lunch is a labor law which companies like this one are sued everyday and have to pay their employees for forcing them to work during their lunch break. The level of stupidity displayed by his manager and the company is exactly why the law is there. You cannot force an employee to work or stop their lunch break. He is a bad it person and f****d up she had every right to get him fired for trying to force him to work during her lunch break. Honestly, she should sue the company for discrimination and breaking federal laws.
I did corporate audits briefly for a restaurant chain, and lemme tell you. When the manager is upset that you showed up, it's almost always because they don't want you to notice something they're doing. Fight or flight reaction.
A complete fairytale! Replacing a server is a major IT undertaking, almost certainly takes more than an hour, and would never be done during working hours if the company activity relied directly on it. It would be planned, all relevant people notified, then after configuration would be tested to ensure full functionality. You wouldn't even get a single POS or laptop replaced like this description.
It depends on the condition of system. If they received overnight alerts of a pending crash they would immediately do whatever was required to prevent a catastrophic event.
Load More Replies...Sadly, a lot of people treat IT/data closets as "extra space" for storage, janitorial supply, etc... then complain when someone spills something or trips over a cord and brings the whole system down. 34 years experience servicing phones, computers, alarm, access, etc... I've seen it all.
Load More Replies...I have worked with company computers since the mid-1980s, and my own home computers since the later 1990s. At work, even back in the eighties, if the IT person came to do something with the system, we ALWAYS worked around them, and a manager was always touching base with them at regular intervals (like every hour or so—-not bugging them constantly) to check progress and find out how long before everything was up and running, because IT was doing us a great service. We never considered them as intruding, or an inconvenience, and NEVER told them to “come back in an hour”!! Hell, when I worked in the hotel industry, we always offered them free lunch, coffee, sodas, and snacks, especially if the job was going to take hours. Make nice like that with the IT folks, and you won’t have problems with your computers for very long!
Treat anyone routinely doing any kind of maintenance or troubleshooting with kindness and things will go better for you. It doesn't matter if they are a new hire in an entry level position or the manager for a large engineering department, there's just no reason to be nasty to someone whose job is to be there for as short a time as possible in order to make your day hopefully better. Note: I know some IT people get mad about anything less than reverence and that's too bad for them, I am not suggesting reverence just basically understanding that they already know you are frustrated because they are there to solve a problem, but are human and would prefer you be frustrated by the problem and not at the people trying to solve it.
Load More Replies...Hmmm.....My BF used to be that IT guy and scheduled (like mentioned in the story) replacements of servers, POS etc. were done over night when the stores were closed...
He said in response to someone asking that question above that the situation with the server was critical enough that were afraid it would shut the whole store down for several hours if not fixed ASAP. I don't know why they didn't realize it was getting bad earlier, but he did also say the company was barely staying afloat overall so maybe there were other issues going on.
Load More Replies...Something less than a retail worker..... is there anything less than me, a lowly retail worker.
This is so "thathappened." So he just shows up? No one told the store manager there would be a service call, or downtime? And she was frog marched out of the building after being fired? His corporate iPhone -- oh wow, he's really important. He owns stock in the company -- wonder if that company is still in business or he took worthless compensation.
I do understand her initial reaction. Store managers don't think they own the store but they do refer to it as their store and should question someone coming in on why there are there and what they are doing. Seems idiotic not to. Not that you have to be rude when asking. Also, store managers should get a heads up about someone coming in. Would have solved the issue. But then her next reaction seems like a power play which is never a good sign when it comes to a manager. You got to learn to pick and choose your battles and to not escalate situations.
I call b******t. Worked for Urban Outfitters as a store manager for five years. IT would shut down our registers during the middle of the day with no notice and act like total assholes if we called them with even the smallest of problem. Upper management seemed totally unconcerned with how this affected sales or morale. Think about it people, you really think the person that has no power in this situation, ie the store manager, ie, "her boss was my bosses employee" is the bad guy here?? No. She was just sick of being treated like total s**t by the entire company.
I was a store manager for a different company. During onboarding, I walked in to my training manager in tears because IT was on the phone treating her like c**p. I checked the system and got on the phone, cut him off, said all the things I tried first and told him what needed to be done to fix it. He then sent out a tech. A lot of IT people think they are special and treat others like garbage. His "I make three times what they make" and "I actually do own part of the company" leads me to believe he is one of those overly self-valuing types... they tend to shrink when they realize you know as much about the system as they do.
Load More Replies...I like how OP keeps referring to her as the Store Owner and then keeps correcting themselves :) Another example of overinflated managerial ego and/or someone having a really really bad day and can't recognise when to take a breath to calm down and reality check themselves.
Pretty sure his point was that she was acting like she was a franchisee & _owned_the place, when in reality all she was was an employee, even as store manager.
Load More Replies...Don't ever f*ck with IT. It's the difference between getting miracles done or your own sh!t shoved back at you.
I don't understand why people debate whether an, online, story is real or fake. We are all reading this for entertainment or, maybe, for a social connection, but either way, why would it matter? I am still entertained, by the story, and the discussion of it, and get social interaction in the comments. I don't like having to scroll past the "fake story" comments. I don't care if it's fake or real. EDIT - i don't mean to offend anyone. Maybe there is a benefit to these comments that I'm not seeing.
I work in IT myself but the way he's about ''my company issued iPhone'' just bugs me and takes away all my compassion. He seems really stuck up to be honest. 🙈🤦🏻♀️
I guess stories about retail sadism and stupidity are very popular right now. Yeah, maybe your boss was a jerk but, do we have to make some weird fetish out of it?
I’ve worked retail management my entire life and I always sang Hallelujah when the IT guy walked in the door because I knew everything would be fixed and/or all the problems that I had been been complaining about would be validated. Through the years I would ask the IT guys to teach me little things that could help before making a call to have them come out. I also always profusely apologized if it was something stupid that they had to waste their time on.
This sound like bullsh*t I've worked several retail jobs and the registers aren't serviced during business hours. Also what company has the retail district managers work in the district office? Our district managers always worked from a store office from within their district.
Middle level Managers tend to be power tripping, narcissistic psychos who are utterly useles.. 1 out of 10 might be a decent human being.
I have never heard of a retail company that would allow the servers to be replaced during store hours.
Documented transactions can continue without electricity. Sales should never be stopped because of power failure.
It's been a while but I have seen employees pulling out those old credit card machines with the carbon paper receipts when register systems went offline. Half of the time a customer would have to show the employee how to use them lol!
Load More Replies...I got my iPhone 4—that’s 4, four, FOUR, not 1—in 2010, 12 years ago now. The iPhone 1 came out in 2007, 15 years ago now. So yeah, it’s entirely plausible that, 13 years ago in 2009, someone working for an IT contractor would be issued up to date tech, like the latest (or at least next to latest) iPhone, to use for work.
Load More Replies...NEVER mess with the IT guys. They can make life miserable for you. In an electronic world, IT = da boss!
Did you call beforehand and tell the store manager that you would be there and what you would be doing? I will say 13yrs ago the workforce was different then, people do not care about their jobs so they will just go on down the road if they get butt hurt. These little mass-built general stores pay very little, no benefits, and treat their employees like c**p. I think she had just had enough of the BS the company was shoveling he shows up and throws his weight around and she was just tired of the company's BS.
I used to work for a cellphone company that had corporate retail and reseller retail employees. This sounds like it could've happened there lol
I cam back up the fact that if the servers remained down for an hour, it would've been a sh-t show - when I worked at my previous retail job, we had a moment on a Sunday night where every register in the store simultaneously crashed. Not just that, but we couldn't do orders either. It was down for 3 hours, and while my coworkers were having a field day kindly telling customers we couldn't help them, I was having a panic attack at all the angry faces and insults being thrown our way. To this day, I have no idea what shutdown the servers, I don't even think there was any IT guy in the store, but it was not fun.
I really don't understand this attitude of "I'm above you in the pecking order". You were there to UPGRADE the system, which is a good thing. I'd have brought you a cuppa and made sure everyone left you alone to get on with it.
The person who told the endless loop story almost gave me flashbacks. 😳
This is an amazing story! I've known a few managers like this and it's no picnic. I've been mid-ladder to bottom rung. EVERYONE is expendable! (Apparently even the company in this story, as he said it was kind of rocky even then)
So here at pain in the a*s panda we can’t write a single story? We have to write three that are intertwined and all hacked up within each other and are a pain in the a*s to follow?
It sounds like a P---ing contest that got out of hand. Don't get involved with those. They always hurt both parties.
This idiot broke federal laws. Taking a lunch is a labor law which companies like this one are sued everyday and have to pay their employees for forcing them to work during their lunch break. The level of stupidity displayed by his manager and the company is exactly why the law is there. You cannot force an employee to work or stop their lunch break. He is a bad it person and f****d up she had every right to get him fired for trying to force him to work during her lunch break. Honestly, she should sue the company for discrimination and breaking federal laws.
I did corporate audits briefly for a restaurant chain, and lemme tell you. When the manager is upset that you showed up, it's almost always because they don't want you to notice something they're doing. Fight or flight reaction.
A complete fairytale! Replacing a server is a major IT undertaking, almost certainly takes more than an hour, and would never be done during working hours if the company activity relied directly on it. It would be planned, all relevant people notified, then after configuration would be tested to ensure full functionality. You wouldn't even get a single POS or laptop replaced like this description.
It depends on the condition of system. If they received overnight alerts of a pending crash they would immediately do whatever was required to prevent a catastrophic event.
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