Excuses For Missing Work Getting Wackier

[Amelia]

Excuses For Missing Work Getting Wackier

Most People Admit Faking Sick

27 Nov, 2006

'Fess up -- have you ever called in sick when you're feeling fine? If so, you're in good company.

Forty-one percent of hiring managers said they have received unusual or suspicious sick day alibis. Sixty-two percent did not believe them, according to the survey. When asked to share the most unusual excuses employees gave for missing work, hiring managers offered the following examples:

1) Employee was poisoned by his mother-in-law.

2) A buffalo escaped from the game reserve and kept charging the employee every time she tried to go to her car from her house.

3) Employee was feeling all the symptoms of his expecting wife.

4) Employee called from his cell phone, said he was accidentally locked in a restroom stall and no one was around to let him out.

5) Employee broke his leg snowboarding off his roof while drunk.

6) Employee's wife said he couldn't come into work because he had a lot of chores to do around the house.

7) One of the walls in the employee's home fell off the night before.

8) Employee's mother was in jail.

9) A skunk got into the employee's house and sprayed all of his uniforms.

10) Employee had bad hiccups.

11) Employee blew his nose so hard, his back went out.

12) Employee's horses got loose and were running down the highway.

13) Employee was hit by a bus while walking.

14) Employee's dog swallowed her bus pass.

15) Employee was sad.

The survey by CareerBuilder.com was completed in September 2006 and included 1,650 workers and 1,150 hiring managers nationwide

[aldona]

Quote:

3) Employee was feeling all the symptoms of his expecting wife.

It really does happen! It's weird, and we don't understand why it happens, but there have been cases where this has genuinely happened. I hope the employer doesn't go too hard on this guy.

aldona

[Gail]

I'm not quite sure how this works... These people should at least be given points for being truthful, as wacky as their excuses seem. They could have just said they were sick!

[Dr. Shane]

I had a subcontractor who was to send a crew to one of my jobs. When no one showed up I called him and he told me all of his employees had been thrown in jail the night before but they would be on my job the next day.

Another time, shortly after 9/11, a chainlink fence contractor told me the delivery time on the fencing would take a number of weeks because of the terrorist threat. Yet I could have bought the fence myself there in town.