Calling in sick is supposed to protect your health, not cost you your job.

So when a pharmaceutical employee phoned in sick with a brutal cold and fever, only to have their message never passed along, they returned to work to find themselves fired for “not reporting” their absence.

But before walking away, they decided to spread some pretty contagious payback.

Keep reading for the full story.

Was wrongfully terminated. Coughed all over the letter to infect the HR manager who fired me…

I came down with a bad case of a cold, vomiting, and fever whilst working at a pharmaceutical company.

He tried to communicate this to work, but the front desk bungled it.

I woke up and vomited and then phoned into work to inform the company of my absence, but the receptionist failed to pass this on to the team leader.

So when he returned to work, he was in for quite the surprise.

Upon returning to work a few days later, after informing them each day of the absence, I was met by the HR manager and dismissed on the spot for “failure to notify of absence” and told I could appeal in writing, not by email.

Having set my phone to automatically record all the calls I made, I had the calls to reception on file.

When he came back to the office, he put his plan into action.

I burned them to a CD and wrote a letter explaining the situation, which I hand-delivered, even though I held little hope of reinstatement.

I coughed dozens of times over the letter and envelope before handing over the letter to the HR director who fired me.

I hope he has a nice week.

Let’s hope the illness is contagious!

What did Reddit think?

Direct communication is always the way to go.

This user plays devil’s advocate.

This employer could make things even more difficult if they really wanted to.

Hopefully HR will think twice before wrongfully terminating another employee.

Karma always shows up right on time!

If you liked that post, check out this story about a customer who insists that their credit card works, and finds out that isn’t the case.