“It Still Gives Me Enormous Satisfaction”: 59 Times People Delivered Karma To Bosses Who 100% Deserved It

To set the stage, a coworker (let's call him Bob) was fired a couple of months ago. Bob oversaw a pretty large team, was well liked by everyone (in and outside of his team), and generally was seen as the ideal employee. Unfortunately, the only person that didn't agree was Bob's boss (John)--it's not exactly clear why John didn't like Bob anymore, but he claimed Bob wasn't meeting his deadlines/goals and fired him. John then took Bob's job, reassigned about half of the responsibilities (because it was an unreasonable amount of work for one employee) and posted the opening.

John has been interviewing candidates for Bob's replacement and narrowed it down to some outside candidate and another former coworker (Adam). Adam used to be on Bob's team but left shortly before Bob was fired for a much better position somewhere else. It was a big surprise to everyone that Adam wanted to come back after making it pretty well known how dissatisfied he'd been working at our company. In any case, Adam really is perfect for the job and went through the lengthy interview process and was selected as the final candidate. John called to offer Adam the position, and he said, "No. I would never work for you again. You're the reason I left in the first place." Adam made it pretty clear he'd only applied to waste John's time since he's still friends with Bob.

Panicked, John just tried to call the other candidate and he's already accepted a better job somewhere else. Now John has to start over with finding someone.

My old manager used to micromanage the hell out of me and take credit for my work. Left that job 2 months ago. Today I found out the client I brought in (who hated working with him) just pulled their contract. They specifically mentioned how much smoother things were when I was there. He emailed asking if I'd come back as a "consultant" to help fix things. Told him my rate is 3x what he paid me. He said that's ridiculous. I said cool, good luck then. Feels good honestly.

When I was an apprentice, mid 1980's, the drunken owner wanted the thermostats in the shop set to 62F (16.6 C) in winter. Long narrow industrial building, heater and thermostat at each end. I worked in the middle, near a door. Which really sucked. Doesn't sound cold, but when your job requires you to stand still all day, yes, it sucks. (I'm sure it was colder in other work places, doesn't matter.) Mysteriously, the office was always 72-75F. Strange. So one day, I took the covers off both the thermostats in the shop, figured out how they worked, and "recalibrated" them. After I was done, they ran about 10 degrees F warmer than indicated. 62F (16.6 C) became 72F (22.2C). Big improvement. More than once I saw him check the thermostat, because it wasn't cold AF. Then he wandered off with a puzzled look on his face. He NEVER figured it out.

Here's a story of minimum wage job triumph in case anyone needs to feel uplifted. When I was a teenager I worked at a cheapo theater, the kind that played second run movies for two-dollar admissions. The manager Dave was the quintessential early 2000's [jerk]. He was a fat guy with a shaved head and ponytail who spent every day locked in the office playing Diablo and listening to nu-metal. If someone on the floor had a problem and disturbed his office time he would scream at them to figure it out themselves. He was a creep with the high school girls that worked there and even [attacked] the projectionist during an argument, yet was never disciplined because the theater was insanely profitable.

After six months Dave suddenly fired me. When I asked why he said because my drawer was always short and that I had been stealing, which was untrue. I got a job at a theater across town.

Six months later, my new manager informed me that they had just bought the cheapo theater and, since I had worked there, asked if I could manage it for a few weeks until they got some people from corporate to take over. I returned to the theater that had fired me, and learned the awful truth of what had transpired. Dave had been cooking the books to make the theater look profitable when, in fact, it was hemorrhaging money. He had embezzled tens of thousands of dollars and blamed it on teenage employees stealing. After a year corporate caught on, fired him, and put the theater up for sale. It was early in the process, but my coworkers heard rumors that Dave was gonna face criminal charges.

The greatest moment came when Dave returned to the theater to retrieve his personal items from the office, only to find me sitting there in his chair with an extremely smug look on my face. His giant CD book of like 500 discs and his gaming stuff? Yup, I had sold it. I told him he wasn't allowed on the premises and that if he remained I would call the police and have him trespassed. Pretty much the one victory from my decade of minimum wage hell, but it still gives me enormous satisfaction when I think back on it.

After ending my contract with zero notice I get a call back an hour later asking me for the backups I kept on disc as they didn't bother keeping any.

Alas as I'm now no longer under contract, I will have to charge 125 an hour and I keep my backups four hours away. So that's going to be 1,000, if they transfer over the money I'll get it to them next week.

They agreed and paid the money.

I opened my drawer, took out the backups I kept there and made a note to drop it in to them across town in a few days.

My company laid me off six months ago. It hit me hard, as I have a baby on the way. I signed my settlement agreement, got my money, and started to pick up the pieces.

Then, this morning, I got a phone call. It was a debt collector, asking for me by name. This was unexpected, because I don't have any debts. I'm quite assiduous about this.

They weren't after me though, they were after my former employer. I was only too happy to point them in the right direction. Disgruntled? Moi? Oui!

This was several years ago. So my boss, an extreme type “A” personality, found out I was seeing a young lady at another one of our offices, it was a long distance relationship. He was the type he liked to control everything and mess with people for fun. He was also married to another employee, but he was very unfaithful. And he had a hobby, photography, he liked to take pics of himself and his conquest, in the act! Then he would show the pics around the production floor and brag about it. Well, on his next trip to this other office he tried to get my girlfriend to sleep with him, but she spurned him. He made up some lies and got her fired.

It took a long time but I was patient, I knew he kept the photos in his office, he could not risk keeping them at home where his wife might stumble upon them. One Saturday I was working OT and the cleaning lady came thru, they unlocked his office. I came in acting like I was taking dimensions on some drawings. The lady just ask me to close the door when I was finished. She left and went down toward accounting, that’s when I went thru his desk. Sure enough in the back of one drawer I found a stack of photos 4” tall. I took them all! Then I waited until he went on another trip. When he did, I went out for lunch, I had a dozen pics of him, in the act with 4 different women, all showing his face, the women all had dark or red hair, his wife is a blonde! I drove to the town he lived in, to the closest post office to his house, and mailed the pics to his wife with no return address. She divorced him, and her lawyer took him to the cleaners! My girlfriend is now my wife, and we aren’t mad anymore.

I used to manage an amazing pub/restaurant back in my old city. It’s a 16th century coaching inn that had recently had a multimillion pound refurb. I more or less got on with the owner but I knew he could be a bit of a tool so I kept my eye on him. I hired all the staff and worked closely with them, they were all 18-25 and I was early to mid 30’s at this point so I saw them as kids that were my responsibility. I genuinely liked nearly every member of staff I ever hired and wanted the best for them. …. Here’s where we get into it - every week I’d input the hours my staff worked and send it over to the gaffer to pay. One day about 5 years into my tenure he told me he was taking over that job, obviously alarm bells rang as he’s a known penny pincher. As anyone that’s worked this job knows, it’s common for staff to stay later than rota’d quite often if the place is really busy or someone calls in sick. My staff were happy to help me out as they know i’d help them out if needed and often they need the extra cash.

My boss decided that if people worked late or came in early then they wouldn’t be paid for it. Staff that accounted for that money were left short that week. I had 18 year old girls crying on my shoulder saying they can’t eat, I was furious. I ranted at my boss and he gave excuses and said he’d look into it and refused to reimburse staff for what they’d worked. Luckily at this point I’d lined up a new job.

I went to work on the next shift and my replacement in the evening (just as it was getting busy) was late. Now I’m no sucker, I do not work for free and neither do my staff. I went around the pub and told every customer that we were closing and told them why. I took food off people and returned their cash and threw it in the bin. I sent all the staff home and text my boss telling him “hey the assistant manager was late taking me off, as I knew I wouldn’t be paid for this extra work I’ve closed your pub”.

Maaaaan he was going crazy. Phone rang off the hook and got ignored. I was put on gardening leave meaning I was getting paid for no work for a bit, I went into a disciplinary meeting hoping to be fired (so I could appeal and get more gardening leave) but they knew that I had too much on them so they tried to just give me a ticking off. At which point I told them about themselves in no uncertain terms and then quit, in the following week the entire staff except the [jerk] quit too. The pub is [in dire straits] now and he’s trying to sell but no one wants it as it’s underperforming and will cost a fortune.

Used to work as a CVS pharmacy technician. At the time, I was studying for board exams to get into residency (I graduated medical school abroad and need to pass board exams to get into residency to practice medicine in the US). Last year, because of COVID, my last board exam was postponed 1 week before taking it. It was rescheduled 2 weeks later. It was the only time slot available that would let me apply to residency within the time limit. Problem is that I couldn't find anyone to cover my pharmacy shift for the rescheduled date. I told my pharmacy manager and she told me that it was my problem and I had to find someone. I was a part time tech making less than what the job was worth, but it got me by, so I endured knowing it was only a temporary thing. Anyways, come exam time, I couldn't find a replacement so I was like, screw it and missed my shift to do my exam. I get to work the next day and she fired me on the spot, even though other people she liked more missed days all the time and no punishment ever happened to them. It's no issue, because I managed to get into residency across the country. I move there and no regrets.

Now the petty revenge. She called me a few weeks ago and asked if I was interested in coming back to work. Apparently most of the techs they hired quit 3-4 weeks into the job because of the horrible work environment (because of customers and other staff). She has no idea I moved to another part of the country. I was about to say no, but the devil in me made me say, sure. I asked for a higher salary though and she said she'll talk to her district manager and get back to me. A few days later, she called me and said that she pulled a bunch of favors and got me a 5 dollar raise (per hour obviously). She sounded desperate, poor thing. I told her to shove it, I was in residency, living my dream while she's getting yelled at because the coupon for KitKat bars wasn't working. She began to yell at me, I just hung up and laughed.

I worked as a gymnastics coach. I just started working there for a month or two. And in a month I started getting really dizzy (regularly outside of work) and I would lose my balance best way to describe it as my brain lagging. I’d look one way and it’d take forever for my eyes to adjust looking that way. And I left early 30 mins early once because I could not stand and if I coached I didn’t want to pass out or miss spot them then something goes wrong. Then the next time this happened I asked my boss to cover for me real quick to go to the bathroom. I went to the bathroom and threw up and left then went to the hospital. I never throw up and the dizzy was bad. While I was in the ER my boss fired me. Didn’t say hope you feel better or anything. Just fired me. So I told the people I know there and the people i’m close with who go there I told them what happened and they were appalled at why they fired me so they left and quit going there or sending there child there. Quite a joy to watch her place fall apart.

Company hired me for 8 months at a subsistence salary as an accountant. I accepted cos I was in a needy situation. Asked for 30% increase on August, they refused since believed I would not have been gone anywhere.

They didn't know I had 2 offers parked and I resigned.

They found themself suddenly without accountant, struggled to find new one (losing time and energy) and they get new one on emergency, paying him 180% more than me and losing even more time for training.

What I learned: Taking your revenge is priceless!!

One of my first workplaces had extremely toxic management - it was owned and run by an old couple in their 60s were "co-CEOs". The wife in particular was a bitter, racist [jerk] who would micromanage everyone, take credit for our work and also hated my guts more than the rest of the team (I am minority, female, young and also opinionated i.e. all the things she despises). Because she's quite old, she never learned to touch type and instead does the typical hunt-and-peck style, so once she starts typing she stares down at her keyboard the entire time. She also tends to write quite long emails. I became so jaded that any form of revenge was screwing with her to brighten my day, so one time I decided to plug a wireless dongle for a mouse into her PC. Once I saw she was typing, I'd wait until she'd typed a reasonable amount and then click using the spare mouse somewhere random. She'd continue typing, look up, and rage at her computer and have to start again. Sometimes I'd repeat the process within the same email for extra fuckery. My colleagues were in on it, so I'd give them a heads-up when I clicked so we could all have a laugh. When I was done, I'd simply wait until she left and casually unplug the dongle from her PC. Honestly this is one of the things that kept me sane while I was there until I managed to escape.

So I'm very proud of myself for this because it's antiwork with a sprinkle of revenge. This started over a month ago, I was walking down the street when I saw an acquaintance of mine. Her husband and his friend/business partner have just opened a new coffee shop. The shop was very beautiful and the coffee was amazing. So, to show some support, I passed by one day and bought a coffee to support them and see maybe this could be my go-to coffee place when I'm craving a coffee I don't want to make at home. So as I'm sitting there, the husband and business partner find out I do social media. I've been doing it for a huge hotel and a famous artist. So they saw my work and wanted to hire me. I said sure. I told them what I do (product photography and video) and I edit and post it on their profile. I gave them my rate. They loved my work and hired me but said could only afford half of what I was asking. So I said okay, so you'll get half the package. You get what you pay for. They said okay. Now, half the package means no photoshoot with my pro cam. They only get phone photos and videos. And I will post twice a week instead of 5 times a week. They soon started to complain but I moved on, ignored, and did my job. And their followers tripled pretty quickly. (They could've gotten more if I was posting 5x instead of twice) The month ends and it's time for payment. I call and text both and no one answers. Then one of the partners texts me and says to pass by to discuss next month's strategy. I tell him not until you pay me. No answer... So I got fed up this morning and went to the profile, deleted everything I've done and logged out of their account. Can't wait until they see it!

UPDATE: The barista that works there just called me. He just quit, his last day is tomorrow. Also he told me the guy that used to come help them out with the finances and doing the secretarial work in the office for the business just walked off the job 3 days ago because they wanted to cut his salary since winter season started. The dude literally got up and walked out

UPDATE 2: THEY NOTICED! They were shocked. Tried to call me but I have blocked their numbers. The barista who quit called me and told me that they were very surprised (lol). So now they gave access to the wife who is posting the cringiest photos I have ever seen. They went through my followers list and are following my friends. They immediately all texted me and sent me screenshots laughing. They are losing customers because the barista quit too. All in all I don't think this business will be open for very long. I wanna thank all of you for the awesome advice. And thank you for the awards. I don't think this update is as juicy as y'all wanted but I'm satisfied honestly and glad they are all alone with 0 employees in that place. Have a great day everyone.

So, this happened a few years ago when I was working abroad as a translator. My boss was a real piece of [work], had very strange mood swings and would not understand how long it takes to do the work. This one time, he gave me a 80+ page medical document that needed translation, real complicated [stuff]. After 3 days of working on it I was about 10-15 pages in, he comes in in a rage shouting in front of everyone that I better finish because its really important and he needs it right now (it was a regular occurrence for him to ask for stuff he didn't need just to be the shouting boss). I tried to explain, as I did when he gave me the assignment that it would take at least another week to finish it. Oh he wouldn't hear about it and he just shouted "I NEED IT TODAY". I wasn't really intimidated by him and just looked at him blankly because I couldn't comprehend how people can be that way. So naturally I did what anyone else would do, I opened Google translate, copy + paste, edited it a bit, which took a couple of hours and printed the bad boy to present to raging [jerk].

You guess what happened. He didn't even look at it for over 2+ weeks. So to my petty revenge, I know his company and personal emails, which I signed up for all kinds of spammy [stuff], including a lot of weird [adult content]. So whenever I logged into his email (which I needed to do to email providers in other countries) I would delight myself with the sight of all this emails in his inbox which were 20+ per day, sometimes I would select all the deleted spam emails and return them to the inbox. He raged so much about it and I giggled inside. Made the rest of my stay at that [job] lots more enjoyable. I would say I signed him up for 100+ websites in all kinds of languages (I would do this everytime there was a lull at work).

TLDR; Signed up [jerk] boss to 100+ of spammy newsletters/[adult content], watched him rage daily.

After I sent my resignation letter, my boss wrote me an email that they accepted it and she would like to talk to me and arrange everything since I still need to work until 6th December. The reason why I resigned is I accidentally read a thread of emails by mistake, otherwise I would have never knew that they planned to use me during the most busiest time of the year from Black Friday until January sales and then kick me out. I’m very professional but this time they went too far, I went to my doctor and explained everything and he gave me a sick leave until my official last day of work. I just sent it now and I feel so relieved!

Update: I have an interview in 1hr and I know 100% that I have the job because I know the supervisor and it’s just opposite building of my soon to be my old job! Another update: I got the job !! Starting December 7th

I am not looking for insults or support I just want to tell this story. I put my notice in for my retail job because I had another job lined up and I was sick of their [nonsense], especially a certain manager of mine because of his discriminatory rules for professionalism. I worked my second to last shift and whilst there, I created a scavenger hunt to a pile of sticky notes with the “red flags” of this manager (ex: homophobic, racist, fatphobic, hypocrite). I go in for my last shift and he meets me outside and says “you cannot work today because of what happened on your last closing shift.” I did not bat an eye and just gave him the keys I accidentally took home and moved on with my life because it doesn’t even matter.

Not a current story but this happened while i was in HS many many years ago. It was right before xmas break and the local company that hired about 90% of the people that lived in town laid off about half the staff. Eventually the workers found out it was because the president of the company wasn't going to be able to buy his teenage son a new car for xmas. So to get the money he laid off half the work force.

Now imagine this: you are the son of the president of the company and the day before xmas break you park that shiny new car in the student parking lot and go to class. After school you walk to the spot where you parked the car only to find the car's frame resting on some cinder blocks and a note that reads "You can keep the cinder blocks."

My HS has a vo-tech building which teaches auto body; where in people are taught how to strip cars, and which some of it's students are the children of the parents that got laid off.

I think that president and his kid learned a very important lesson that day.

This was about 10 years ago. At the time I was with my ex partner, who worked at a petrol station chain in Australia. He came down sick with gastro which is a highly infectious illness resulting in vomiting, diarrhoea, fatigue etc. My ex notified his manager on Tues night that he wouldn't be able to make his shift the following morning, as he was vomiting copiously still and assumed he would still be by then. His manager replied that he had to contact other workers to get his shift covered- a [jerk] move, but not illegal. My ex spends about an hour trying to get someone to cover for him, with no success. He lets his manager know, who responds with 'you had better show up for your shift or you're fired, doesn't matter if you're sick'. His manager had a habit of doing this- he recently had made someone work while they had conjunctivitis (extremely contagious) and someone come in for their shift after they had been in the hospital that day after having an asthma attack. The following day, my ex went to work. Note that his job also involved food handling as they had a bread store in the petrol station. So people would come in to pay for their petrol, get a coffee and a donut/pie/cake. While handing a customer their cake, he pauses and vomits into a nearby hand washing sink. During his shift he continues to handle food and go to the toilet regularly because of the diarrhoea. When my ex gets home, I ask if he had been unwell and he confirmed he continued to be sick while at work. I am absolutely furious that he was threatened with job loss and most likely has spread his illness to a bunch of other people.

So I call the health board of my state and report it. The board sends out someone on a surprise visit to the site, and turns out there are lots of bad food handling and hygiene practices going on, not just the workers illness issues. The company ends up being fined $150,000 and had to make significant changes to how some things were run. As for the manager, turns out the whole 'show up even if you're sick or you're fired' policy wasn't exactly the company line and he got his ass handed to him over it. TL:DR, Boss makes my ex work while contagiously ill, I call the health board and the company gets fined $150k.

I moved from the east coast USA to LA and got a retail sales job. The showroom manger made my life hell. She was having an affair with the married owner. Even though my sales were good she nit picked and complained about petty things - I used too much paper. I quit, got a new job at a very upscale showroom as the manager. After a few years I received her resume in the mail. She was looking for a job and it was my job to hire or fire. Being the bigger person I decided not to call her in for an interview. But even that made my day.

About 2 years ago I had this boss who was a typical micro-manager - would time how long you took in the toilet, wouldn't let you even say hello to your co-workers in the morning, denied me annual leave while complaining that I had too much leave stockpiled, called me non-stop on the one day I did have off and got upset because I wouldn't answer my phone, forced hugs on me when I'm not a hugger etc etc. I was thankful when she got moved on to a different department. Well this week I finally got my petty revenge. I ran into an old family friend this week out socially and turns out old boss had applied to work for them. I didn't lie when asked what they were like as a manager, just explained my experience with them. Family friend is now not hiring them and I don't feel bad.