Imagine working for a supervisor who doesn’t always make the best decisions but refuses to listen to anything anyone else has to say. If you knew he was about to make a big mistake, would you try to warn him, or would you let him suffer the consequences?

In this story, one man was in this situation. He knew his supervisor was not informed about how to fuel the work truck properly, but the supervisor refused to listen to him. Keep reading to see how the story plays out.

Supervisor insists he does not require instructions, for the “most simplest of tasks”

I’m not usually one for malicious compliance, But a few months ago we got a supervisor who’s just a jerk. He shifts all his work onto others and then complains about how hard his job is. Lets just call him Gary from here on out.

My work operates two sites about 30 miles apart. Being in security we are responsible for both sites.

Last night one of our night shift guys up and quit due to Gary’s never ending BS and as Gary implemented overtime restrictions there was no one to cover the shift, which meant Gary had to as the contract requires a minimum amount of staff at all times.

As part of the night shift, 1 guard is required to drive over to the second site and do a routine patrol 3 times during a shift.

But Gary thought he had a better idea.

Gary of course decided, he’s wasn’t done with his BS and made the “executive decision” (i told you he was a jerk, who says that?) that rather then “wasting time” driving between both sites 3 times, 1 person would drive over and stay there overnight.

This of course was a bigger waste of time as there’s nothing to do but make sure the building is secure. You just need to check doors and fences which leaves the rest of us a man down for all the mainsites duties.

So Gary decided he’d be the one going to the second site and wanted to sign out a work vehicle. Gary of course decided that since he wasn’t “officially” on the gatehouse duty, i would have to do the checklist and sign the vehicle out for him.

He noticed a problem.

As i went over the vehicle i noticed the tank was low, so i checked who’s previously signed the truck out and low and behold it was Gary, because of course it was.

Now our work vehicles are all propane powered, they were not factory made like this and were instead converted. The conversion left the old fuel tank and fuel fill point in place (i’m sure you can all tell where this is going) so i went and got the book which tells you exactly where and how to fill the truck up and try to hand it to Gary.

Gary ask’s “what is that” and i begin to tell him it’s to show him how to refill the vehicle.

But he cuts me off insisting he “doesn’t need instructions for the most simplest of tasks”.

Gary was very impatient.

I ask Gary if he’s ever refueled one of the work vehicles before.

To which he replied “i’m sure i’ll manage” and he pushes the book aside.

Now i could have easily just interjected and told him how to fill up but i decided forget it, i had it with his nonsense.

I very slowly started going through the checklist item by item starting with the ignition switch. By the time i got to tire readings Gary yanked the checklist from me and signed off on everything (including that he had read and understood auto-gas refueling procedures booklet A) and told me to “open the freaking gate”, so i did.

He expected Gary to call at some point.

I never saw or heard from Gary again for the rest of the night.

Honestly i thought it would just be a bit of inconvenience. He’d be unable to workout how to use the auto-gas pump and he’d have to call me or one of the guys and ask for instructions.

I actually forgot all about it by shift end.

The consequences ended up being much more serious.

But that was not what happened.

I was called into work before my shift today for a meeting as the security manager wanted to know how it came to be that Gary ended up stuck on the side of the road out of gas after he Pumped 26 gallons of gasoline into the old tank and drove off and somehow didn’t know notice fuel pump indicator light on the dashboard until the truck sputtered to a stop about 10 miles from the second site.

The union rep had my back which was great and Gary has been given some leave after he was informed he would be paying the cost of the fuel and the tow.

I didn’t intend for a minor bit of malicious compliance to end up this serious, but 2 weeks without Gary is going to be great.

Wow! Gary really should’ve listened instead of assuming he knew everything. The fact that he signed off on everything meant he was the only one to blame. Hopefully he learned to listen next time someone tries to tell him something.

Let’s see how Reddit responded to this story.

Yes, Gary is completely to blame.

This comment is funny!

Here’s another story about someone named Gary.

Listening is an important life skill.

If you liked this post, check out this story about an employee who got revenge on a co-worker who kept grading their work suspiciously low.