I got screwed out of my job :(

[YorkieLove77]

I was recently terminated from my job. I had been there 1.5 yrs and was promoted to assistant mgr 7 months ago. My regional mgr had even mentioned that I will become a property manager in no time because I am such a good employee (this is a large mgmt company for apartment communities).

My manager loved me from the get-go and apparently has a habit of latching onto people and quickly wanting to become "BFFs" (and she's almost 40). I know it's my fault for allowing a friendship to develop between myself and my superior as it could turn ugly (and it did), but when you're new at a job you will usually do anything to get them to like you. She would call and text me outside of work, invite me over to her house and her parties and ask me to go out for drinks with her (well, she would drink I would watch...I'm a nondrinker). However, her problem is that when she becomes "BFFs" with one person, the other person in the office becomes "public enemy #1" and she would constantly put him down in front of me. This made me uncomfortable, but I never said anything as I didn't want to jeopardize my job. According to others who are at other properties who had previously worked with her, she is huge into playing favorites.

Working for her though was extremely challenging. She would come in every morning pissed off about something or another...whether her hubby made her mad or her dogs made a mess, or whatever...and make the whole staff uncomfortable. She would ask for something to be done, and if it wasn't complete in 30 seconds take it away and say "ugh, I'll just do it myself". I had to listen to countless stories about her marriage and their "lackluster sex life". Again, I never said anything because I didn't want to become the person on the outs with her. Well, that was a big mistake.

The guy left (for these very reasons) and someone else was hired in his place. This new girl became my mgr's new obsession, and I quickly became the odd man out in the office. I would find them whispering, making plans to hang out and my mgr even allowed the new girl to leave an hour early every day. They practically stopped talking to me and every time I spoke I was met with attitudes and cold shoulders. I felt terrible, so I decided to send an email to my regional mgr and outlined everything, even from the beginning. It was not an angry email, rather, just me telling her how I felt and asked that if we could not remedy the situation if I could be given an internal transfer to another property.

My regional responded to my email by saying how valuable I am to the company and would like to sit down with us to discuss the issue and resolve it. We did exactly that, with my mgr apologizing, and we both said we will continue our work relationship on a professional level. However, 2 days later I was terminated for "misconduct". My regional came back to fire me and said the reason was because I was illegally accessing company information with my manager's passwords that could be considered confidential. She showed me proof of logins from my computer, and said it had been going on for months. The problem is, my mgr had given me all her passwords a long time ago so that I could help her...she would even ask me to do things for her while she was away or on vacation. How the heck would I have gotten all the passwords otherwise?? I'm not a friggin hacker! I told her this, but she didn't care and I was ultimately asked to leave.

This was last week and I'm still so upset over this. I worked so hard for this company. I filed for unemployment right away, but now I'm hearing that if someone is terminated for "misconduct" it can be denied. But I know that the real reason is because I sent that email. Does anyone think that I would have a good chance of winning an unemployment appeal based on my reasoning, as well as the email communication with my regional shortly before being fired? She even stressed how valuable I am to the company. To me, it's just too much of a coincidence for them to suddenly "audit" my computer right after I send in a complaint.

I'm sorry this is so long, but I could really use others' take on my situation or share their own.

[Patti]

I am sorry to hear about your termination. Something similar happened to me after 33 years on the job. New boss hated me, gave her no reason to. She made my life hell for 6 months. After trying to discuss with her and getting no where I went to her boss just to let her know I felt like there was no way of my pleasing my boss and wanted her to know what was going on. A month later I was let go because my position had been eliminated. Right! I couldn't collect unemployment because they made me take early retirement so I wasn't eligible. But a good friends son was fired from Target for being late all the time. He fought for his unemployment and got it. They will have a conference call and you can state your case. I hope everything works out.

[YorkieLove77]

Wow, Patti, after 33 years. I'm so sorry to hear that. My stepmom seems to think it was partly because my manager felt threatened by me as I was always getting recognition in the company. Maybe that's why your new boss disliked you, because she felt threatened by you.

Thanks for sharing your story, and I'm also glad to hear your friend's son won his appeal. Gives me some hope!

[gidget529]

You could talk to an employment atty. The close proximity from the email to the audit and firing might send up red flags to those conducting the hearing. Even a $200 consultation w an employment atty who could tell you what you need to defend yourself could be money well spent.

[YorkieLove77]

Originally Posted by gidget529

You could talk to an employment atty. The close proximity from the email to the audit and firing might send up red flags to those conducting the hearing. Even a $200 consultation w an employment atty who could tell you what you need to defend yourself could be money well spent.

Thanks for the suggestion. I'm currently in the "what if" phase right now as my claim has not yet been denied, but I'm trying to be prepared because it probably will be. This is a good idea, if anything, like you said to help me prepare my case if/when that time comes.

[Patti]

Do you have copies of the email? That will be very helpful in pursing this if need be. I know my new boss hated that my employees and I had a good relationship and she hated that I had been there 33 years and she had been laid off from her former job after 22 years and would say things like don't ever feel secure in your job. Even though it was tough financially it allowed me to take care of my parents and FIL until they passed. So even though she didn't intend for it to be a good thing for me it worked out as most things do. I hope you hear good news soon from unemployment.

[YorkieLove77]

Originally Posted by Patti

Do you have copies of the email? That will be very helpful in pursing this if need be. I know my new boss hated that my employees and I had a good relationship and she hated that I had been there 33 years and she had been laid off from her former job after 22 years and would say things like don't ever feel secure in your job. Even though it was tough financially it allowed me to take care of my parents and FIL until they passed. So even though she didn't intend for it to be a good thing for me it worked out as most things do. I hope you hear good news soon from unemployment.

Yes, I do have the copies as they were sent from my personal email account (thankfully!). Those emails are the one bit of hope I'm holding onto right now.

[capt_noonie]

Wow that sucks. I really feel for you. I don't have any advice but I hope it works out for you. I would talk with an attorney also if it were me. This is why I can't stand working in a corporate environment. I left it almost 10 yrs ago and never looked back.

[maci_mace]

Oh man, that is horrible.
I had something similar happen... I worked for a phone answering company as a CSR for a year, had the same "team manager" the whole time. He was a person who played the favourite game too. I was among a few of those he chose to befriend, and although I worked hard at my job people always thought I was a slacker because the manager spent his free time visitng all his "favourites".
However once managers were switched the new lady had it out for me, for no reason! [team managers rotated teams once a year] She would always yell at me to "make sure your answering your calls" [ummm okay, the calls come in automatically answering isn't optional lol] she would give me poor quality control scores even if it was just one thing i said wrong or switch words around... anyone else would get a pat on the back for only making minimal mistakes. Half the time she wouldn't even let me go to lunch until I was the last person left to go! [which really was ok since we had snacks in our desks lol] and most of all she always stared me down lol.
I put my two weeks in shortly after she took over, because I was moving to Hawai'i March-September. If you want to be re-hirable you have to talk to your manager and get them to say you're "re-hirable" on your resignation. So I wanted this job opportunity back if there was an opening when I got home, so I asked her and she said "oh yeah sure, no problem I'll let 'em know"

6 months later I come back, and go to apply for an opening and they say "sorry the last manager you had said you weren't re-hirable.
I was like really? She was my manager for TWO weeks, why don't you ask the guy that was my manager for a whole year what he thinks! Needless to say I had to wait a year before I could reapply on good terms just because of that lady!


I really hope you can get your job back because being screwed out of a job because someone doesn't like you or couldn't handle what you had to say, is the worst.

[Alvindy]

Usually the unemployment folks will book a call that you will dial into. Your former employer can also dial in if they want to to present their 'evidence'. Most of the time when this happens at my work we fax in anything that is relevant and don't attend. If your former boss has a new favourite maybe she will just 'let it go'. In my experience it has to be really gross misconduct to exclude you from collecting unemployment - not the minor thing you have talked about.
One suggestion I have for you at the hearing is to stick to the facts. Don't talk about the manager having favourites, etc (that's subjective and you can't 'prove' it). Just say that she gave you her p/w so that you could perform certain functions on her behalf, etc. If you stick to the facts and present them clearly and concisely hopefully, you can impress the adjudicator with your candour and honesty. Good Luck!

[QuickSilver]

Originally Posted by Alvindy

Usually the unemployment folks will book a call that you will dial into. Your former employer can also dial in if they want to to present their 'evidence'. Most of the time when this happens at my work we fax in anything that is relevant and don't attend. If your former boss has a new favourite maybe she will just 'let it go'. In my experience it has to be really gross misconduct to exclude you from collecting unemployment - not the minor thing you have talked about.
One suggestion I have for you at the hearing is to stick to the facts. Don't talk about the manager having favourites, etc (that's subjective and you can't 'prove' it). Just say that she gave you her p/w so that you could perform certain functions on her behalf, etc. If you stick to the facts and present them clearly and concisely hopefully, you can impress the adjudicator with your candour and honesty. Good Luck!

I think this is really good advice. Simply say you requested a transfer, and then suddenly got fired for having your manager's password, which she had given to you to use. Hopefully you will simply be able to get unemployment without anymore hassle, though.

I am really sorry this happened to you, but it doesn't sound like it was a good place to work. It might end up being a blessing in disguise.

[YorkieLove77]

Thank you everyone for your wonderful advice and for sharing your own stories. I do realize that I am not completely innocent, in that I allowed her to treat me better than the other person when I was her favorite, but I never wanted to jeopardize my job. I just figured I'd wait it out until another promotion to manager and then I'd be out of there.

One thing that is certain is that I would never want to go back. I consider myself to be a kind person and I didn't like the backstabbing that went on at that company. And thank you for the advice about sticking to what's important and not mentioning the behavior (favoritism). My biggest regret at this point is having left my airline career of over 5 years to work here (I was a flight attendant for Delta...I loved it so much! But I decided to leave in order to find a job with a more consistent schedule in order to go back to school to pursue a nursing degree). Plus, and I realize that not everyone is pro-union, as a flight attendant I was unionized and one could never just be terminated without having gone through a process (i.e. write ups, warnings, etc.). *Sighhhhhh* Really wish I never left that job now.

[capt_noonie]

Originally Posted by QuickSilver

I think this is really good advice. Simply say you requested a transfer, and then suddenly got fired for having your manager's password, which she had given to you to use. Hopefully you will simply be able to get unemployment without anymore hassle, though.

I am really sorry this happened to you, but it doesn't sound like it was a good place to work. It might end up being a blessing in disguise.

That's what I was thinking.

[manina]

Originally Posted by Alvindy

Usually the unemployment folks will book a call that you will dial into. Your former employer can also dial in if they want to to present their 'evidence'. Most of the time when this happens at my work we fax in anything that is relevant and don't attend. If your former boss has a new favourite maybe she will just 'let it go'. In my experience it has to be really gross misconduct to exclude you from collecting unemployment - not the minor thing you have talked about.
One suggestion I have for you at the hearing is to stick to the facts. Don't talk about the manager having favourites, etc (that's subjective and you can't 'prove' it). Just say that she gave you her p/w so that you could perform certain functions on her behalf, etc. If you stick to the facts and present them clearly and concisely hopefully, you can impress the adjudicator with your candour and honesty. Good Luck!

This is a great advise !! Write down what you will tell them when they call and stick to the facts, don't talk about the manager. If you don't get your unemployment, than see a Atty and make sure you have your emails and your facts right.
Good Luck !!! It suck just before the Holidays !!!
Happy Thanksgiving !!!
Bark@ulater !!!
manina,mileyandmax

[courtney1121]

I've been having problems at work and my mom had a very similar issue to you as well and one thing she has told me about it is "document, document, document" When her and her boss got into it, she had everything written down very precise and detailed and presented her case to HR with it. HR ended up siding with my mom mainly cause she had everything organized and documented. So at work when I had issues with 2 guys I work with, I made sure to write down the date, time, and detailed summary of what happened. Write down everything you can think of that will back you up and produce any physical evidence you might have. If you come prepared, there's always that good chance your former boss won't. It'll definitely make you look a lot believable than her.