Some workplaces cause you more headaches than they’re worth.

So, what would you do if your job expected you to climb a dangerous staircase everyone already knew was unsafe, then later acted shocked when you refused to work in the rain because they never bothered to give you proper gear? Would you keep pushing through? Or would you find loopholes to make your life easier?

In the following story, one church employee finds himself in this situation and starts working less than ever. Here’s what he did.

Break health and safety no problem and We don’t work in the rain, excellent.

I used to work for the local church as a groundskeeper (and other odd duties).

One of the odd duties was going upstairs to brush/vacuum the open floor. It wasn’t an odious job, but getting up the very old, worn, and uneven stone stairs was a pain with a vacuum, brush, bucket, etc.

One of the first times it happened, I noticed several of the brackets that held the thick rope ‘hand rail’ were either loose or came out completely if you weren’t careful.

The first issue was fixed within a month.

I reported this and was told the Parish Council had known about it for 3 years.

I kinda got annoyed about it at this point because if it came out when you had the vac on your back (it had a rucksack harness) and you slipped, it’s a heck of a fall backwards. Not to mention the thousands of tourists who used to go up those steps, it could lead to serious injury.

I also said that I was marking the date and any injury caused by the stairs, and I’d immediately advise H&S.

I told my immediate boss I wouldn’t be going up to them until the issue was fixed. She seemed a bit shocked but said she’d say something at the meeting. True to my word, when asked to go clean, I refused. Weirdly, the issue was fixed within a month or so.

Then, the rain caused an issue.

A few months later, I was called in to a meeting with the Parish Council’s Employee Contact.

Long story short, in the 1st I was told my job was secure. I was asked to come in for a 2nd meeting a month later (agreed at the time of the 1st meeting) and was told I was being laid off at the end of the year (this was August). I did win a discrimination case against them, but that’s a different story.

There’s been an ongoing joke about the Parish Council saying we didn’t have to work in the rain.

I’d been asking for general work and rain gear since I started working there the previous year, but wasn’t too bothered because I had plenty of old work clothes from previous jobs.

Luckily, everything was documented.

After the Employee Contact informed me that I was being laid off and was “unemployable” and a year of asking for rain gear I’d had enough. So every time it even drizzled, I went inside. If it stopped, I came out.

Thankfully, my colleagues were fine with this, because they knew the score. As it was coming towards Autumn, I did less and less work and just sat with my feet up. This carried on until the end of October, when I just booked the rest of the year as a holiday.

I was on a disabled work scheme via the government, so it was documented what I was and wasn’t capable of. This was also adhered to even more strictly than before, and if any job even looked like it might fall under the umbrella of the “if he thinks it’s too much, he can say no” rule.

All in all, I helped my colleagues as much as needed, but my workload dropped massively as I started to go inside to avoid the rain and refused to do the jobs I didn’t necessarily have to.

Wow! He definitely found ways to avoid working.

Let’s see how the people over at Reddit feel about what he did.

This person guesses where he’s from.

For this reader, it was about the stairway getting fixed.

This person doesn’t think it’s in the right place.

It seems this person is mocking him.

He was only following directions. They were lucky he ever went above and beyond under those conditions.

If you liked that post, check out this one about an employee that got revenge on HR when they refused to reimburse his travel.