I work at a bank. Bank employees who happen to be notaries (which is a service that one obtains from their local county and is separate from the bank I work) perform notary services at the bank, for the bank. We are not allowed to get paid for it from customers, nor does my bank compensate us for notary services (even though if I perform a private notary while not at work I can make money doing it), but all of the laws that come with performing a notary still have to be followed.
So, I had a customer come in one day and ask me to notarize an authorization form to send his underage female child overseas to a foreign country for an extended period of time as part of a program. The problem was, the mother of the child was not present (a requirement as she had to sign as well), and her signature was already on it (all signatures have to be witnessed by the notary, no exceptions). So I told the man I couldn’t notarize it for him unless he brings the child’s mother in and they both sign.
The man became irate. Screaming. Yelling. And eventually stormed out. And Just my luck a few days later, got a survey about me, which he gave me all zeros (a kill shot to your scores).
So my manager calls him to get his side, and he doesn’t answer. So next she calls his wife, the child’s mother, and finds out they are actually in the middle of a nasty divorce and custody battle and that was a blatant attempt to send their child to the husbands home country and avoid losing custody.
Woohoo! Hooray for me for stopping that right? Literal parental kidnapping? That had I just done it to make him happy could have led me to testifying in court and becoming an accomplice to said attempted kidnapping?
I inquired about getting my surgery removed since I obviously did the right thing, protected myself, protected our customer, and the bank itself, and the man was angry and I didn’t deserve to have such a poor reflection on my record for doing my literal job and my RM said…. “We’re sorry but the surveys don’t get removed under any circumstances, because if we did then everyone would ask to get their bad ones removed.”
Lost out on a raise, and my quarterly bonus was cut in half. For doing my job.