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No matter how clearly a policy is explained, sometimes there will be customers convinced that speaking to a manager will magically solve everything.

That reality was a regular part of life for one council employee whose job often required delivering decisions people didn’t want to hear.

Over time though, he developed a simple approach: if a request was prohibited by policy, there was no point escalating the matter because a manager would only reach the same conclusion. Simple enough, right?

Well, a new manager disagreed. After receiving a complaint from a customer who was denied an escalation, he instructed the employee to pass every request directly to him.

Read the full story below, and see how that worked out for him.

You want me to escalate every time? Ok then!

I work in customer services for my council, and because of the policies in my job, I have to be the bad guy frequently as I have to say no to people, and frequently, people want to speak to my manager because of this.

I always refuse to escalate because I don’t engage with adult tantrums.

Whether you speak to me or the CEO, it’s going to be a no, so accept it now and move on with your day to avoid further frustration

I recently got a new manager and a couple of weeks ago, someone complained about me for refusing to escalate the call, and he agreed with them and told me that in the future, I should escalate the call if someone requests to speak to him.

He was very honest in response, to no avail.

I explained to them that I don’t escalate because it’s pointless as they’ll also say no too, as it’s a policy.

I explained that speaking to someone just to repeat what has already been said is a waste of both their times and that I don’t want to contribute to this ‘I want a manager!’ view that people have.

But he shut me down and told that whenever someone requests a manager, I must call him and see if he’s free and if he’s not, I should email him their details and the issue and he’d call them back that day.

Be careful what you ask for!

Cue malicious compliance – the second someone requested to speak to a manager/someone ‘in authority’ etc I called him and asked him to take the call, and the first few times he took it, and then he suddenly became less free and started telling me to email him the details and he’ll call back later.

Later started to turn into the next day or later in the week.

I battered him with the multiple escalations that I would have ordinarily refused over these past couple of weeks.

As I was in the office, I could tell he was getting stressed because I could hear him on his escalation calls.

Things escalated, indeed!

And it was clear that he’d bitten off more than he could chew with dealing with these escalations as the calls steered into them trying to get my no turned into a yes by speaking to him.

He was getting flustered and telling people he’d speak to the managers in the other departments, and then he’d have to call them back to tell them that he’s looked into it and it’s a no – as I told them already on my call with them.

In a complete u-turn, he emailed me today to tell me that I can go back to dealing with escalation requests the way I want to and if someone raises a complaint, he’ll back me up.

He went from ‘you must escalate’ to ‘please shield me’ in the space of two weeks 🙂

Well, I guess sometimes you don’t understand what you’re asking for until you get it. What did Reddit have to say?

Yup!

A reader shares their thoughts.

Hehehe.

Another commenter chimes in.

Something to consider.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a man who gets revenge on his company after they fire him and try to steal his custom program.

For years, this employee acted as a filter, shielding managers from complaints that had no realistic chance of changing the outcome. Well, sometimes the best work is almost invisible. Until it’s taken away.

The new manager saw things differently when it was him handling the calls.

Before, he was adamant that every request to speak with someone higher up should be honored. After warning him, the employee complied exactly as instructed, forwarding call after call from people hoping a manager could overturn decisions that were ultimately dictated by policy.

Before long, the calls began piling up.

After just a couple of weeks, the manager gained a newfound appreciation for how those escalations were being handled.