Strict rules can backfire when they’re followed too well.

So, what would you do if your boss enforced a rule so rigidly that it stopped you from doing your job properly?

Would you break the rule to fix the problem?

Or would you follow it to the letter and let the chips fall where they may?

In the following story, one betting shop employee finds themselves in this exact position and decides to follow the rules.

Here’s what happened.

Phone must be off during Work? You’re the boss.

I worked at a betting shop, a pretty large one that anyone from the UK has probably heard of.

We were open from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m.

One big rule was that mobile phones were to be turned off during work hours, no ifs or buts.

Cue the morning of the Epsom Derby, a big horse racing event, and the start of my 12-hour shift.

During setup, we had a problem with our Internet.

The tills, FOBTS (fixed odd betting terminals), and internal phone line were all connected by the Internet, meaning that until it was fixed, we could take literally no money.

The day passed, but he couldn’t use his phone to contact anyone.

I waited and waited.

About three hours had passed, and nothing had improved.

I had no way of letting anyone know; my phone HAD to be off.

At about 5 pm, we eventually had Internet back.

Not long after, I eventually got a call from my area manager asking why no money was taken.

After a lot of huffs and puffs, he hung up.

The area manager didn’t learn anything during the first call.

I was just following the rules.

A short while later, maybe about 20 minutes, I got another phone call from the manager asking if I could take pictures of the marketing screens to make sure they had loaded correctly and then send them to him.

No, I can’t, sorry, my phone needs to be off.

He had to do a 3-hour drive to the shop to check himself.

Yikes! Maybe they should lighten up on that rule.

Let’s see how the folks over at Reddit relate to this story.

This person calls out where he works.

Here’s an excellent point.

This person worked at a betting shop before.

It was as simple as this.

He should’ve considered emergencies!

Hopefully, the policy was relaxed after this situation.

If you liked that story, check out this post about a group of employees who got together and why working from home was a good financial decision.