Workplace policies are often sold as fair and equal, but in practice, they tend to serve whoever’s in charge.

When a new manager cracked down on PTO flexibility, one employee decided to play by the rules exactly as written.

But it didn’t take long for the manager’s rigidity to backfire spectacularly on her.

Read on for the full story!

HR said “we can’t make exceptions” so I took all my PTO at once

New manager comes in loud, talking about “structure” and “consistency.”

Suddenly no WFH, no flex hours, no swapping PTO.

I asked to move two days.

My cousin’s wedding.

But their manager couldn’t care less about their plans.

She just goes, “Sorry, we can’t make exceptions to anyone. It wouldn’t be fair.”

So this employee decided to do something unorthodox.

Alright then, I put in a request for all 23 of my unused PTO days.

Straight through end of quarter.

No overlap, no coverage.

It got approved in like… 10 minutes?

Lol okay.

Suddenly, the reality sets in for this manager.

Couple days later she’s in full panic mode:

“Wait, who’s handling your workload?”

Looks like this manager would be handling it!

“Dunno. I assumed you had a plan. No exceptions, right?”

She had to cover me and deal with fallout.

Stuff piled up, clients got ticked, and two people quit.

After this whole debacle, management had changed their tune!

I came back to a new HR memo: “Managers can now approve flexible PTO on a case-by-case basis.”

Turns out fair looks different when you’re the one getting screwed.

Looks like HR learned their lesson pretty quick!

What did Reddit have to say?

When toxic managers play hardball, the consequences can come back to bite… hard.

Companies who expect undying loyalty from their employees are often in for a rude awakening.

However, some bosses do actually stick up for their employees.

She wanted consistency… that is, until it became inconvenient for her.

Turns out, rigid rules don’t feel so fair when you’re the one stuck cleaning up the mess.

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.