December 7, 2025 at 8:35 pm

Employee Built Up Tons Of PTO, But It Was Taken Away By New Management. So He Took All His Vacation When He Was Supposed To Train A New Worker And It Left The Owners In A Bind.

by Matthew Gilligan

man on a beach

Shutterstock/Reddit

As the classic saying goes…

If you play stupid games, you’re gonna win stupid prizes!

And this worker wasn’t playing around when he learned that some of his hard-earned PTO was going to be taken away by new managers.

Check out how he maliciously complied and got even!

Get rid of my vacation? Have fun replacing me.

“I worked at a company that gave out exorbitant amounts of vacation.

That’s a sweet deal!

Anyone who worked there for 25+ years received 8 weeks of vacation and 2 weeks of personal time. This was a family owned company, but rather large. We ran 3 shifts totaling 250+ people.

Enter Jimmy.

Jimmy was a grizzled old man, he started at the company when he was just 20, now he was 63 and gave absolutely zero *****.

Jimmy also knew how to make a specific part for our product, him and one other higher up in the office.

There was about to be a big change.

One day the plant owner comes out and announces he’s selling to a corporation. He’s older and ready to retire, he promises that there will be very little change and wishes us all well.

The new company comes in and immediately goes after many of the great benefits we had. The first thing they do is cut everyone’s max vacation down to 4 weeks, and do completely away with personal time.

Anyone who’s maxed out had until December 31st of that year to use it up, and they wouldn’t pay it out. They then go into the office and clean house, firing anyone who’s close to retirement, including Jimmy’s back up.

But they also do away with one very important rule. You no longer have to get vacation approved, you can just call in and take it.

Jimmy is ****** off, and they know it. They realize he’s the only one in the building that can do his job now. So they hire a new kid for him to train, most likely to permanently replace Jimmy.

So Jimmy does what anyone would do.

LOL.

He calls in the first training day for the new hire, and lets us know he’s going to use all of his PTO at once, and promptly takes 10 weeks off.

We had a back stock of parts he had made, so it wasn’t too unnerving. But for 10 weeks, Jimmy went and applied to other jobs, found one, and started.

Fast forward 10 weeks, it’s the day Jimmy is supposed to return. He doesn’t.

For two days they try calling him, and even go to his house. He’s nowhere to be found. Finally on day three he calls and resigns, and they lose their ****.

The parts he makes are specialized and patented by the original founder, you can’t just hire someone off the street to make them.

What eventually happened was they had to contract the original owner to come in a teach some new hires how to make them, and when he found out what all they had done it ****** him off.

This was gonna be expensive!

The last I heard he charged them a 7 figure contract to teach them how to produce the parts, and they had to pony up, or close down.

Moral of the story, don’t mess with people’s vacation time.”

Reddit users shared their thoughts.

This person had a lot to say.

Screenshot 2025 12 04 at 1.22.14 PM Employee Built Up Tons Of PTO, But It Was Taken Away By New Management. So He Took All His Vacation When He Was Supposed To Train A New Worker And It Left The Owners In A Bind.

Another individual chimed in.

Screenshot 2025 12 04 at 1.22.29 PM Employee Built Up Tons Of PTO, But It Was Taken Away By New Management. So He Took All His Vacation When He Was Supposed To Train A New Worker And It Left The Owners In A Bind.

This Reddit user spoke up.

Screenshot 2025 12 04 at 1.22.47 PM Employee Built Up Tons Of PTO, But It Was Taken Away By New Management. So He Took All His Vacation When He Was Supposed To Train A New Worker And It Left The Owners In A Bind.

Another reader shared their thoughts.

Screenshot 2025 12 04 at 1.23.11 PM Employee Built Up Tons Of PTO, But It Was Taken Away By New Management. So He Took All His Vacation When He Was Supposed To Train A New Worker And It Left The Owners In A Bind.

And this individual weighed in.

Screenshot 2025 12 04 at 1.23.22 PM Employee Built Up Tons Of PTO, But It Was Taken Away By New Management. So He Took All His Vacation When He Was Supposed To Train A New Worker And It Left The Owners In A Bind.

If you mess with a worker’s time off, they’re gonna fight back!

Thought that was satisfying? Check out what this employee did when their manager refused to pay for their time while they were traveling for business.