Bankers can be difficult to reason with.

This man had to recover a boat from an owner who went bankrupt.

He was trying to avoid a messy situation with the bank rep by volunteering to store the boat, but the rep brushed him off and told him not to touch anything.

He did exactly what they said, and it resulted in a stinky consequence.

Read the story below for all the details.

Don’t touch anything on the boat until the bank has inspected it? Fine.

I recently started working at a boatyard/marina, and this story belongs to the owner. We’ll call him Joe.

Joe is a hardworking, salt-of-the-Earth type of guy.

Treat him right, and he’d give you the shirt off his back, but he doesn’t take crap from anyone.

One of the boat owners filed for bankruptcy.

Evidently, a few years ago, one of the boat owners declared bankruptcy.

Joe had a lien on the boat for unpaid repairs, so the boat was hauled out of the water.

It was stored on site while the legal mess was sorted out.

The bank representative didn’t listen to Joe.

Now, Joe tried to explain something to the bank representative, that there were some things that needed to be taken care of prior to long-term storage.

Evidently, the rep was a bit of a jerk, and didn’t listen to Joe.

He just kept saying that nothing was to be touched or removed from the boat until the bank evaluated it.

He let the boat sit under the sun all summer.

Fine.

So, Joe hauled the boat to the far corner of the lot.

He let it sit all summer while the bank sorted things out.

It sat in the sun for months before the bank came to take a look.

Apparently, the boat was still stocked with fish bait.

Well, ladies and gentlemen, this was a commercial fishing boat.

Evidently, the forfeiture of the boat was rather abrupt, so the boat was still stocked when it was hauled out of the water.

It was stocked with fish bait.

Joe didn’t warn the bank representative about this.

Specifically, three half-full barrels of fish bait.

Sealed barrels of fish bait that had been sitting in the sun for months.

Needless to say, Joe didn’t bother warning the adjusters when they showed up.

They insisted on inspecting everything personally, after all, and they weren’t interested in his opinion.

The boat stank for half a mile!

Not long after the inspection began, the smell of rotting fish became so strong that it was nearly overpowering in the office half a mile away.

Joe got his money with no further crap from the bank.

Fish bait for the win! Complying has never smelled so bad!

Let’s see what others have to say about this on Reddit.

Short and sweet.

It was the worst smell, says this person.

This user shares their personal thoughts.

Here’s a positive remark from this person.

Finally, people are loving the malicious compliance.

Guess the banker got baited by his own request.

If you liked that story, check out this post about an oblivious CEO who tells a web developer to “act his wage”… and it results in 30% of the workforce being laid off.