What are your worst workplace cockups...?

[underbank]

I was a very naive, virtually tee-total 18 year old when the office girls took me out for an 18th birthday liquid lunch. Can't quite remember how much I drank but it included whisky, brandy and lager. Started to feel a lit bit poorly back at my desk in the afternoon, shortly followed by projectile vomit over several computers. I was helped to sober up a bit by a few black coffees and then at the end of the day, I went to the senior partner's office to apologise, only to vomit profusely over his desk and on some of those old ledgers.

 

[Cowley]

I was a very naive, virtually tee-total 18 year old when the office girls took me out for an 18th birthday liquid lunch. Can't quite remember how much I drank but it included whisky, brandy and lager. Started to feel a lit bit poorly back at my desk in the afternoon, shortly followed by projectile vomit over several computers. I was helped to sober up a bit by a few black coffees and then at the end of the day, I went to the senior partner's office to apologise, only to vomit profusely over his desk and on some of those old ledgers.

We have a winner .

 

[fowler9]

I work in a complaints department and when other departments transfer people to us it is meant to be a warm transfer, they speak to me before transferring a customer. This morning I saw an internal call coming through on my phone. I picked the call and introduced myself, the person on the other end said "Is this complaints?" I jokingly put on a board voice and said "Yes it is unfortunately". Someone had put a customer straight through to me. Fortunately the customer was sound and stopped me apologising. Funny in the end but hey ho. Haha.

 

[bnm]

My first time in the workplace, work experience as a 15 year old.

Myself and a friend got our two week placement at a branch of Texas DIY (remember them?)

Second day there we were tasked with unloading bags of Portland cement from their delivery pallet to a shop floor display pallet. 40 x 25kg bags.

We were mucking about a bit with the pallet truck, pumping it up and down, moving it backward and forward. Being told to get on with the job I lowered the pallet. Right onto my friend's foot. Approximately one tonne of cement. He wasn't best pleased. The scream of pain was heard across the store and even into the car park!

I broke three of his toes.

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Then there's the night Princess Diana died.

I was working in a Forte Posthouse hotel that night as the night porter, watching the drama unfold on TV. Around 6.30am I got a message from head office asking that all hotels that had flags to lower them to half mast. We had three flags in our car park. Two Forte branded ones and a Union Flag. I easily lowered the two Forte ones, but the Union Flag had been tied to the top of its flagpole. I later discovered this had been done by the maintenance man using the hotel's lifting platform, as the pulley mechanism on this flag pole was broken.

Concerned that myself and the early duty manager (the breakfast chef) would be getting complaints from guests for not lowering the Union Flag, we decided to get a ladder and I'd go up it to untie the flag. We couldn't get the lifting platform out as only the maintenance guy had access to it and he wasn't in until 10am.

We placed the ladder against the flagpole and I climbed up, with chef steadying it at the bottom. Now, a ladder with round rungs against a round flagpole is not the steadiest of things. As I neared the top, and reached to untie the flag, the ladder swung round the pole. I managed to wrap my arms round the pole to save myself from falling and certain injury.

The ladder crashed earthward. Straight through the windscreen of a 7 Series BMW.

I did manage to untie the flag before sliding down the flagpole fireman style!

I had a nervous couple of hours expecting to be fired, when the hotel manager came in at 8.30am, for badly damaging a customer's car. Fortunately, said customer, whilst quite angry, accepted my and the manager's profuse apologies. The ladder had fallen in such a way as to only smash the windscreen. No bodywork damage. We quickly arranged for a windscreen replacement.

I got a final warning and was required to pay the excess on the hotel's liability insurance policy.

Now every time I see anything in the media about Princess Diana I'm reminded that because of her I lost £150 and nearly broke my neck!

 

[Ianno87]

My first time in the workplace, work experience as a 15 year old.

Myself and a friend got our two week placement at a branch of Texas DIY (remember them?)

Second day there we were tasked with unloading bags of Portland cement from their delivery pallet to a shop floor display pallet. 40 x 25kg bags.

We were mucking about a bit with the pallet truck, pumping it up and down, moving it backward and forward. Being told to get on with the job I lowered the pallet. Right onto my friend's foot. Approximately one tonne of cement. He wasn't best pleased. The scream of pain was heard across the store and even into the car park!

I broke three of his toes.

-----------------------------------------------------------

Then there's the night Princess Diana died.

I was working in a Forte Posthouse hotel that night as the night porter, watching the drama unfold on TV. Around 6.30am I got a message from head office asking that all hotels that had flags to lower them to half mast. We had three flags in our car park. Two Forte branded ones and a Union Flag. I easily lowered the two Forte ones, but the Union Flag had been tied to the top of its flagpole. I later discovered this had been done by the maintenance man using the hotel's lifting platform, as the pulley mechanism on this flag pole was broken.

Concerned that myself and the early duty manager (the breakfast chef) would be getting complaints from guests for not lowering the Union Flag, we decided to get a ladder and I'd go up it to untie the flag. We couldn't get the lifting platform out as only the maintenance guy had access to it and he wasn't in until 10am.

We placed the ladder against the flagpole and I climbed up, with chef steadying it at the bottom. Now, a ladder with round rungs against a round flagpole is not the steadiest of things. As I neared the top, and reached to untie the flag, the ladder swung round the pole. I managed to wrap my arms round the pole to save myself from falling and certain injury.

The ladder crashed earthward. Straight through the windscreen of a 7 Series BMW.

I did manage to untie the flag before sliding down the flagpole fireman style!

I had a nervous couple of hours expecting to be fired, when the hotel manager came in at 8.30am, for badly damaging a customer's car. Fortunately, said customer, whilst quite angry, accepted my and the manager's profuse apologies. The ladder had fallen in such a way as to only smash the windscreen. No bodywork damage. We quickly arranged for a windscreen replacement.

I got a final warning and was required to pay the excess on the hotel's liability insurance policy.

Now every time I see anything in the media about Princess Diana I'm reminded that because of her I lost £150 and nearly broke my neck!

The second one wins it for me!

 

[Cowley]

The second one wins it for me!

Yeah that was impressive. Having worked up ladders quite a bit over the years, I actually shuddered when I read that.

 

[Wivenswold]

I was the Personnel Officer at a London train crew depot. I forgot to add a bank holiday allowance and 65 members of staff were underpaid. To make matters worse, I was the guy who handed the pay packets out on the Thursday. I ended up surround by several angry drivers and two union reps threatening to not allow drivers out for the evening peak.

I faced them all (I was 19 at the time) and said "Look, this isn't BR, this isn't management, it's me. I've made a dreadful error and it's all my fault and I'm very sorry". Worked a treat, though it did still make it to HQ and I got a written warning. Refereeing football matches was a doddle after that.

 

[Welly]

I commissioned a brand new item of medical equipment for another NHS Trust and just after I finished the job, I dropped it! It had to go back to the manufacturer for repair and my department had to pay the bill! Ouch!

My colleague was repairing an infusion pump and put the plug back in such a way that the wrong connectors were mated. When he plugged it's battery in, quite a bit of smoke was released from the circuits and the damage was £750 worth!

 

[STEVIEBOY1]

I commissioned a brand new item of medical equipment for another NHS Trust and just after I finished the job, I dropped it! It had to go back to the manufacturer for repair and my department had to pay the bill! Ouch!

My colleague was repairing an infusion pump and put the plug back in such a way that the wrong connectors were mated. When he plugged it's battery in, quite a bit of smoke was released from the circuits and the damage was £750 worth!

Ouch, did he have to pay for the error himself?. (I have worked at firms, where, if an employee makes a mistake that costs the firm money, then that employer has to pay for it, deducted from his wages.)

 

[Welly]

Ouch, did he have to pay for the error himself?. (I have worked at firms, where, if an employee makes a mistake that costs the firm money, then that employer has to pay for it, deducted from his wages.)

Luckily he didn't, the supervisor even laughed it off!

 

[YorkshireBear]

While certainly not in line with the damage caused in most of these posts, no money or company reputation was damaged.

Sat in a meeting and called your boss Dad is one of the most embarrassing things that could ever happen. Indeed I do not think I have been that embarrassed since!

 

[Crossover]

Had an interesting one a few years back in our school where we had a power supply short on a PC we had on the maintenance bench (in a room which was also an office, server room and the rest!), putting a surge on to the electrical circuit. First thing we noticed was the red light on the Cisco phone we had (indicating voicemail) was no longer illuminated, soon followed by the sound of fans getting fainter to the eventual sound of silence. Unfortunately, it had tripped out the whole mains ring which had all the server and comms kit on it and most of the systems weren't on battery backup devices for a myriad of reasons (one may have been but the battery could have been goosed, I forget). A couple of teachers stuck their head in to see what was going on as systems had suddenly stopped working. It all came back up again, though, which in the case of the old NT4 stuff (anyone remember that?!) may have been more luck than judgement. I think the NT4 stuff went over to Server 2003 not so long after!

 

[STEVIEBOY1]

While certainly not in line with the damage caused in most of these posts, no money or company reputation was damaged.

Sat in a meeting and called your boss Dad is one of the most embarrassing things that could ever happen. Indeed I do not think I have been that embarrassed since!

Oh yes that would be embarrassing.

 

[STEVIEBOY1]

Luckily he didn't, the supervisor even laughed it off!

Wow, he was lucky.