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Antiwork

Was fired at the height of the pandemic for not returning calls quick enough while off-duty.

I started working at this position in January 2020. Every evening I'd be told what I was doing the next day. They were supposed to tell us before we left for the day. They did sometimes, but most of the time I didn't know what I was doing the next day until around 1700 when I get off at 1500 and start at 0300. Sometimes as late as 1900! I'm in the trucking industry and my hours are federally regulated. I must have 10 uninterrupted hrs off-duty before returning to work again. So, this was problematic to me. This was an issue from day one. They'd call and I wouldn't answer because I was busy. I'd call back and first thing out of this dudes mouth every time was “FFZombie, you need to answer when we call.” And I was always like “I'm off-duty and not being paid. I've called…


I started working at this position in January 2020.

Every evening I'd be told what I was doing the next day. They were supposed to tell us before we left for the day. They did sometimes, but most of the time I didn't know what I was doing the next day until around 1700 when I get off at 1500 and start at 0300. Sometimes as late as 1900! I'm in the trucking industry and my hours are federally regulated. I must have 10 uninterrupted hrs off-duty before returning to work again. So, this was problematic to me.

This was an issue from day one. They'd call and I wouldn't answer because I was busy. I'd call back and first thing out of this dudes mouth every time was “FFZombie, you need to answer when we call.” And I was always like “I'm off-duty and not being paid. I've called you back within 10 minutes. Is it really that much of an issue that I have a life outside of work?” Every time I didn't answer and had to call them back was the same thing.

The pandemic hits and I'm laid-off. Two weeks later I'm called back in. They got one of the relief grants. They said work was slow, but that if we didn't make at least 8hrs in a day that they'd pay as if it were an 8hr day. There's one catch. You have to be “available”. About 3 days into this I miss the call. I call back about 20 minutes later and am told that they're going to have to mark me as unavailable and that they can't pay me the 8 hrs they promised. I, of course, call them on this bullshit and argued with the dude for 5 minutes. The next day I get a call from my supervisor saying that the boss wants to let me go specifically because of this altercation and the fact that it's been a repeated issue.

Then they had the gall to demand that I return the equipment I still had in my possession the next day. It was a 35 minute drive in to work. Like, you just told me that I have no income at the beginning of a pandemic. I'll return it, but I'm gonna get myself squared away first. About a month later I had secured another position and had enough extra to make the trip over. After I returned the equipment, my supervisor called and thanked me for keeping my word and then later called after he had left that company to offer me a position.

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